Kiln Element Longevity.

[yedrow]

Thanks John, I hadn't considered the formation of a thin glassy shell that healed over cracks! Also, a true blackbody would be black, but there aren't many of those. The ITC we used was kinda white though, and that puzzled me. I however do suspect there is some blackbody effect along with an ability to effect the refractive index of IR. If one or the other, I'm guessing that the surface melts and produces a very organized glassy film that is highly reflective in the IR range.

 

Lily, not to undermine everything I say from this point on, but I'm a high school dropout. I'm almost completely self-educated, including pottery. I did things this way not so much because I have deep philosophical convictions about education, lol, but because I'm bi-polar and only self-educate well. That being said, I thank God for lithium!!!

 

Anyway, in the late eighties and early nineties I worked in thin-films in Texas. I just walked in off the street and got the job. Before that I was an exterminator. I worked my way up in skills and became a cryogenics tech, and developed skills in vacuum technologies and such. Unfortunately the end of the Cold War caught up with me and they stopped hiring people like me to do thin-film work and went instead to electrical engineers and such. I had the choice of moving to one of the coasts or getting different work. Since I had lived on all coasts and wasn't at all interested in doing it again, I gave up that career, winding down by repairing and reselling high tech junk out of a barn. When my dad was killed in an car accident I moved back home and became an exterminator again.

 

Then, I got married to a woman with a wheel. I tried making pots and made about a hundred pieces. We sold those at a festival and I made over $2000, I later made almost $3000 selling the rest of the pots. However, I had no skills and I was embarrassed that other potters there didn't seem to be doing as well. So I just quit. I couldn't center clay and all my stuff was heavy. That's just one of the ways BPD works.

 

About eight years ago I got an opportunity to work at my present position. I had no skills, no training, and no background in art whatsoever. I again just walked in off the street. And they were in need of someone soon, so they hired me. These days I'm the number two craftsman in a four person shop. I'm getting pretty good I think, and once I learn glazes I believe I'm going to knock a few socks off, lol.

[yedrow]

 

Really? Do you know what kind of equuipment they tried to use? Were these students or the faculty?

 

best,

 

................john

 

 

My guess would be either a gas chromatograph or a mass spectrometer. But they may not even use those these days. That being said, knowing what a thing is made of only solves a small part of the problem. Especially after it has undergone a phase change.

[Mark C.]

I had friends at the science Dept at university who gas tested this.They could not reverse engineer it with the equipment they had.

 

 

Really? Do you know what kind of equuipment they tried to use? Were these students or the faculty?

 

best,

 

................john

 

 

John its was back in the early 90s and my memory is old on this-The machine burned the stuff and I gave a printout of if I recall the fumes??

The info seemed sketchy at best back then. I think this was in the geology Dept as the equipment was old then.

Mark

[Guest JBaymore]

I had friends at the science Dept at university who gas tested this.They could not reverse engineer it with the equipment they had.

 

 

Really? Do you know what kind of equuipment they tried to use? Were these students or the faculty?

 

best,

 

................john

 

 

John its was back in the early 90s and my memory is old on this-The machine burned the stuff and I gave a printout of if I recall the fumes??

The info seemed sketchy at best back then. I think this was in the geology Dept as the equipment was old then.

Mark

 

 

 

 

Sounds like gas chromatography. It that was all the lab stuff they had at their disposal ...... pretty limited. Would still like to have had access to the data . Thanks.

 

best,

 

...............john

[Mark C.]

John -I'm sure I still have that paper from 20 years ago-the question is where-After 40 years on the same one acre property one collects a few items-If I can dig it up I'll gladly get you a copy.

It may be in the studio corner . If someone has an inside to testing I can supply some material for the test. My University connections are all retired.

Mark

[Guest JBaymore]

John -I'm sure I still have that paper from 20 years ago-the question is where-After 40 years on the same one acre property one collects a few items-If I can dig it up I'll gladly get you a copy.

It may be in the studio corner . If someone has an inside to testing I can supply some material for the test. My University connections are all retired.

Mark

 

 

Thanks Mark. Don't go to any trouble.... if you find it ....great.

 

No need on the sample... I have the stuff sitting around all the time.

 

best,

 

...............john

[LilyT]

I use to get my ITC directly from Feriz and Alice, his wife. Alice and I talked for long times about growing up in NE Philadelphia.. we were about the same age. Unfortunately Alice died rather quickly from Breast cancer in the 1990s.. They were both very lovely and generous people. Feriz did invent ITC for industrial use but he also loved to see how artists and potters used it. Nils Lou gave a demo at NCECA once where he built a kiln out of plywood coated with ITC. It did work. I wouldn't use it for production, it merely demonstrated the insulating qualities of ITC. other uses used in advertising the material was patching a furnace wall with ITC coated plywood just to get the job done until further repairs could be made.

Some kiln companies will coat your new kilns and elements as part of a special order. I got two kilns that way about six years ago. It is an added expense , but I think it is worth it.

In the Mid to late1990s Feriz gave ITCto some of the techie folks on Clayart like Linda Blossum , Nils Lou and Mel Jacobson and other just to see how they used it.

Linda coated rods in her tile supports and said it prevented the rods from warping at high temperatures. she coated her burner tips to protect the metal from oxidizing.

And of course she sprayed the bricks inside her kilns.

 

You are suppose to dilute the ITC 100 with 50% water. I spray it with a sand blaster and usually have a drill with a mixer attachment stirring the solution at the same time I have the hose in the bucket for the sand blaster. I used it on the kilns where I taught both gas, electric, and soda kilns.

Marcia

 

 

Hi, Marcia,

 

This is great information, too. I like the idea about coating the burner tips.

And I love the idea of the sprayed plywood kiln. Was that a gas kiln

 

in the example you quoted? Do you happen to remember how many hours

the firing took? Bet it cooled down kinda quickly, ha. Were you there witnessing

this feat? Was the plywood charred at the end? Or crumbly? This story would seem

to imply that ITC has really good thermal reflective properties. Unless all

sides of the plywood were coated then it might have really good

oxygen-excluding sealing properties.

 

Would you comment on exactly what you felt was helpful about the ITC

in the soda kilns? Does it keep the glassy stuff from sinking into the brick?

Does it keep the soda from even forming glass or glaze by keeping it off

or the silica/alumina surface all together? Or does it keep the bricks cool

so it doesn't flux as much with each firing?

 

Thanks so much!

 

Warmly,

Lily

[LilyT]

Thanks John, I hadn't considered the formation of a thin glassy shell that healed over cracks! Also, a true blackbody would be black, but there aren't many of those. The ITC we used was kinda white though, and that puzzled me. I however do suspect there is some blackbody effect along with an ability to effect the refractive index of IR. If one or the other, I'm guessing that the surface melts and produces a very organized glassy film that is highly reflective in the IR range.

 

Lily, not to undermine everything I say from this point on, but I'm a high school dropout. I'm almost completely self-educated, including pottery. I did things this way not so much because I have deep philosophical convictions about education, lol, but because I'm bi-polar and only self-educate well. That being said, I thank God for lithium!!!

 

Anyway, in the late eighties and early nineties I worked in thin-films in Texas. I just walked in off the street and got the job. Before that I was an exterminator. I worked my way up in skills and became a cryogenics tech, and developed skills in vacuum technologies and such. Unfortunately the end of the Cold War caught up with me and they stopped hiring people like me to do thin-film work and went instead to electrical engineers and such. I had the choice of moving to one of the coasts or getting different work. Since I had lived on all coasts and wasn't at all interested in doing it again, I gave up that career, winding down by repairing and reselling high tech junk out of a barn. When my dad was killed in an car accident I moved back home and became an exterminator again.

 

Then, I got married to a woman with a wheel. I tried making pots and made about a hundred pieces. We sold those at a festival and I made over $2000, I later made almost $3000 selling the rest of the pots. However, I had no skills and I was embarrassed that other potters there didn't seem to be doing as well. So I just quit. I couldn't center clay and all my stuff was heavy. That's just one of the ways BPD works.

 

About eight years ago I got an opportunity to work at my present position. I had no skills, no training, and no background in art whatsoever. I again just walked in off the street. And they were in need of someone soon, so they hired me. These days I'm the number two craftsman in a four person shop. I'm getting pretty good I think, and once I learn glazes I believe I'm going to knock a few socks off, lol.

 

 

hmm, the glassy shell ideas are interesting. Seeing pictures of ITC coated brick

on advertisements however, it doesn't look glossy smooth - it seems sort of

matt and rough. Maybe that's just after bisque firing and before use? Maybe it

gets glossier with use?

 

I would not hold it against you that you left school without completing it.

Whatever works... works. We are home schooling our children.

 

It takes a lot of motivation and self discipline to learn something. It doesn't

necessarily take a formal classroom. I don't necessarily have a deep philosophy

about education either, though i talk like I do; I just am practical and

sometimes prefer to do things the easy way. Sometimes I like the hard way ;-).

 

I like the parts in your story where you just found people to teach you skills

on the job. How exactly do you ask someone to do that? Plus you must be a

fast learner to blossom in that kind of a working environment.

 

Holding on to my socks :-),

Lily

 

PS will you post some images of your work to your profile? I'd

really like to see some more.

[yedrow]

Lily,

 

Ack, I wasn't thinking about the visual when I posted that, I was thinking about the reaction the material presumably has to heat in order for it to form a protective coating. I can only assume that some 'glass' forming is responsible for covering cracks. However, glasses aren't necessarily glassy. Now I'm going to have to go look at the kiln tomorrow and make sure my internal image matches it, lol.

 

I have some of my work posted in my 'gallery'. I should post more. I as of yet don't do a lot at home and what I do isn't geared so much toward regular production as it is toward personal research. At this point in my life I need to learn as much as possible as fast as possible. On top of that, we just bought a building for my wife to build a business in. This will also allow me to build a couple of kilns, one of which I hope to be a salt kiln. But, for the time being I'm a roofer, electrician, carpenter, draftsman, freakazoid, you name it (I HATE ROOFING). So my home work is on hold. I have over a load of ware sitting in my wet closet waiting to be dried out and bisqued now for two weeks (the stuff I posted a couple weeks ago). Beyond that, my work isn't 'mine'. I make it for a company that puts a sticker on it and sells it. The production flow is such that it's difficult to get pictures of the finished product during the flurry of counting, ticketing, and stocking.

 

And, I make a lot of stuff. It is mostly production stuff and it blurs together. In fact, I generally can't imagine why any other potter would want to even look at it, lol. Since I work at such a pace, the nicer stuff gets swept up. It is much easier to get pics of bisque ware and green ware, oddly enough. I'll try to get more up.

 

Here is a mug I made last week. I did some experimental glaze work on it to see if I could make a chrome green flow into other glazes. I did it, well, because I was told I couldn't do it, heh. I only really like to do things that can't be done. Beyond that I'm working for food.

 

 

 

 

[Mark C.]

I could tell the details but then I must kill you-very common stuff with top secrets these days.

Heres the mix -get the right mix of salt resting chemical and add a binder that sticks to everything

spray it in sand blaster and there its done,

Bettter test it many times to see its really working say up against ITC on soft brick.

Mark

[neilestrick]

So if ITC insulates well enough to be able to make a kiln out of plywood, how can that be good for elements?

[yedrow]

So if ITC insulates well enough to be able to make a kiln out of plywood, how can that be good for elements?

 

 

Granting the question isn't addressed to me, I still want to take a swing at it: It likely only effects radiant energy. It goes on so thin that there isn't enough mass to have any real effect on conducted energy (heat of gas). To be what it claims to be, it must be like a mirror to IR radiation. And of course it must be tightly sealed (amorphic) to block caustic gasses from refractories. The reflectiveness then raises the question: How does it not reflect back into the elements and overheat them. My only guess at that is that the interface between metal to ITC differs from the its interface with refractory materials. There is something in the back of my head I can't get to about interfaces like this. Something that has to do with the difference between looking into water and looking through a scuba mask into water.

[Guest JBaymore]

The metal coating ITC 213 and the ITC 100 HT for refratories are different compositions. That's a starting point.

 

best,

 

...................john

[Guest JBaymore]

So if ITC insulates well enough to be able to make a kiln out of plywood, how can that be good for elements?

 

 

 

 

"Insulate" is not the correct concept here.......... think of it like a mirror for heat energy.

 

best,

 

.....................john

[Marcia Selsor]

I use to get my ITC directly from Feriz and Alice, his wife. Alice and I talked for long times about growing up in NE Philadelphia.. we were about the same age. Unfortunately Alice died rather quickly from Breast cancer in the 1990s.. They were both very lovely and generous people. Feriz did invent ITC for industrial use but he also loved to see how artists and potters used it. Nils Lou gave a demo at NCECA once where he built a kiln out of plywood coated with ITC. It did work. I wouldn't use it for production, it merely demonstrated the insulating qualities of ITC. other uses used in advertising the material was patching a furnace wall with ITC coated plywood just to get the job done until further repairs could be made.

Some kiln companies will coat your new kilns and elements as part of a special order. I got two kilns that way about six years ago. It is an added expense , but I think it is worth it.

In the Mid to late1990s Feriz gave ITCto some of the techie folks on Clayart like Linda Blossum , Nils Lou and Mel Jacobson and other just to see how they used it.

Linda coated rods in her tile supports and said it prevented the rods from warping at high temperatures. she coated her burner tips to protect the metal from oxidizing.

And of course she sprayed the bricks inside her kilns.

 

You are suppose to dilute the ITC 100 with 50% water. I spray it with a sand blaster and usually have a drill with a mixer attachment stirring the solution at the same time I have the hose in the bucket for the sand blaster. I used it on the kilns where I taught both gas, electric, and soda kilns.

Marcia

 

 

Hi, Marcia,

 

This is great information, too. I like the idea about coating the burner tips.

And I love the idea of the sprayed plywood kiln. Was that a gas kiln

 

in the example you quoted? Do you happen to remember how many hours

the firing took? Bet it cooled down kinda quickly, ha. Were you there witnessing

this feat? Was the plywood charred at the end? Or crumbly? This story would seem

to imply that ITC has really good thermal reflective properties. Unless all

sides of the plywood were coated then it might have really good

oxygen-excluding sealing properties.

 

Would you comment on exactly what you felt was helpful about the ITC

in the soda kilns? Does it keep the glassy stuff from sinking into the brick?

Does it keep the soda from even forming glass or glaze by keeping it off

or the silica/alumina surface all together? Or does it keep the bricks cool

so it doesn't flux as much with each firing?

 

Thanks so much!

 

Warmly,

Lily

 

 

Lily,

I have been in DC and just returned so I didn't catch this message until today. This demo was at NCECA and carried out by Nils Lou. It was the talk of the day and unfortunately I was at a different session. ITC protects from corrosion. It reflects the heat back. My understanding is that it is not insulation as such but reflects the heat back which acts as an insulating property.If it were an insulation it would not work on kiln elements but the 213 metal coating and the 100 ITC are two separate products.. It does not get flakey and crumbly unless it is applied too thickly. To apply the surface must be clean and dampened with water.

I spray it with water first and then spar ITC on with a simple sand blaster..rubber hose in the buck and syphoning action. The ITC is diluted with water as per manufacturer's directions. It also needs to be stirred constantly or it settles. That is why I have one hand on the drill with a jiffy mixer in the bucket and the other hand on the sand blaster. Spray a nice even thin coat onto the surface.

I have sprayed it on fiber as well. It sprayed it on the "safe" fiber but found that fiber deteriorates easily.

I think spraying on clean unsalted brinks is necessary to get the desired effects. Spraying on an already corroded surface would seem impractical.

I used it on a home made castable and that seemed beneficial. The most significant place for some to spray may be the troughs between the walls and the bag walls where molten soda can accumulate with exhuberant infusions of salt. Much depends on designs, people's different approaches to getting the soda into the kilns, etc.

My preferred method is soda ash dissolved in boiling water and sprayed in intervals.

 

Marcia

[yedrow]

The metal coating ITC 213 and the ITC 100 HT for refratories are different compositions. That's a starting point.

 

best,

 

...................john

 

 

Ah. I was assuming that the ITC 100 and 213 were references to a difference in coefficients of expansion, and that the mechanics were basically the same.

[LilyT]

I could tell the details but then I must kill you-very common stuff with top secrets these days.

Heres the mix -get the right mix of salt resting chemical and add a binder that sticks to everything

spray it in sand blaster and there its done,

Bettter test it many times to see its really working say up against ITC on soft brick.

Mark

 

 

Hmm, not sure whom this note is directed to, Mark, but perhaps one of us could

take one for the team, lol!

 

I'm also curious as to exactly what is meant by a binder - something that fluxes just enough

and not too much?

 

Sounds like you tested stuff quite a bit...

 

-lily

[LilyT]

 

 

Lily,

I have been in DC and just returned so I didn't catch this message until today. This demo was at NCECA and carried out by Nils Lou. It was the talk of the day and unfortunately I was at a different session. ITC protects from corrosion. It reflects the heat back. My understanding is that it is not insulation as such but reflects the heat back which acts as an insulating property.If it were an insulation it would not work on kiln elements but the 213 metal coating and the 100 ITC are two separate products.. It does not get flakey and crumbly unless it is applied too thickly. To apply the surface must be clean and dampened with water.

I spray it with water first and then spar ITC on with a simple sand blaster..rubber hose in the buck and syphoning action. The ITC is diluted with water as per manufacturer's directions. It also needs to be stirred constantly or it settles. That is why I have one hand on the drill with a jiffy mixer in the bucket and the other hand on the sand blaster. Spray a nice even thin coat onto the surface.

I have sprayed it on fiber as well. It sprayed it on the "safe" fiber but found that fiber deteriorates easily.

I think spraying on clean unsalted brinks is necessary to get the desired effects. Spraying on an already corroded surface would seem impractical.

I used it on a home made castable and that seemed beneficial. The most significant place for some to spray may be the troughs between the walls and the bag walls where molten soda can accumulate with exhuberant infusions of salt. Much depends on designs, people's different approaches to getting the soda into the kilns, etc.

My preferred method is soda ash dissolved in boiling water and sprayed in intervals.

 

Marcia

 

 

hi, Marcia,

I know you're so busy, thanks for taking the time to hash things out

at this forum, too. Much appreciated.

I will follow your instructions which summarizes the general consensus

of how to use ITC : sand blaster to spray onto clean brick (or at least

not salted). Be sure to get the troughs and areas that collect salt. Do

you think it's necessary to dampen the brick first if you're spraying? I'm

going to get a sandblaster... I hope that the less expensive gravity- cup

type will work well enough.

My method of using soda ash is to soak sawdust into a boiled solution,

and introduce blobs of that into the kiln on wood. it leaves a lot of deposit if one is

too exuberant. I changed to this after melting my sprayer tip, oops.

So, I have another question for you and your ITC coated kilns... if

you feel that the ware might reach temperature faster, and ITC reflects

heat into the chamber of the kiln... do you feel that the cooldown time

is shorter than in a similar uncoated kiln since this implies that the walls

of the kiln don't get as much heat?

 

warm regards,

Lily

[Mark C.]

I could tell the details but then I must kill you-very common stuff with top secrets these days.

Heres the mix -get the right mix of salt resting chemical and add a binder that sticks to everything

spray it in sand blaster and there its done,

Bettter test it many times to see its really working say up against ITC on soft brick.

Mark

 

 

Hmm, not sure whom this note is directed to, Mark, but perhaps one of us could

take one for the team, lol!

 

I'm also curious as to exactly what is meant by a binder - something that fluxes just enough

and not too much?

 

Sounds like you tested stuff quite a bit...

 

-lily

 

 

Yes I have tested ITC a lot over time in many situations and worked up my own salt resist but I'm not ever dreaming of talking about test results anymore-last time on another thread that opened a whole can of worms. I'm leaving test talk to others . I realized that I know very little these days and going to leave it at that.

good luck with the coatings.

Mark

[LilyT]

I could tell the details but then I must kill you-very common stuff with top secrets these days.

Heres the mix -get the right mix of salt resting chemical and add a binder that sticks to everything

spray it in sand blaster and there its done,

Bettter test it many times to see its really working say up against ITC on soft brick.

Mark

 

 

Hmm, not sure whom this note is directed to, Mark, but perhaps one of us could

take one for the team, lol!

 

I'm also curious as to exactly what is meant by a binder - something that fluxes just enough

and not too much?

 

Sounds like you tested stuff quite a bit...

 

-lily

 

 

Yes I have tested ITC a lot over time in many situations and worked up my own salt resist but I'm not ever dreaming of talking about test results anymore-last time on another thread that opened a whole can of worms. I'm leaving test talk to others . I realized that I know very little these days and going to leave it at that.

good luck with the coatings.

Mark

 

 

Well, shame on that can of worms for keeping you from expressing yourself

freely. And I apologize if I come across as too pushy, just interested in your thoughts

and experiences simply for the love of all things related to pottery. Personally

I suppose that even an unlined kiln in my hands would last long enough for

all that I and my friends can be expected to produce in a lifetime anyway...

it just seems neat to know the truth somehow. Or find one's way towards it.

 

thanks for all the help and well wishes about the coatings :-)

 

warmly yours,

Lily