Help! I have a sticky relay.

[Blueraven]

        Pp pppp0p0ppppppppppHelp! I have a sticky relay. Can someone tell me how to fix it?

The other day I ran a cone 5 firing.  My kiln shut itself off three times. I'd check it, find the light out and turn it back on. Finally I figured after two days of playing with it I realized that I was being kind of dumb and shut it off myself.  8 out of 11 pieces were cracked, one of the three remaining pieces was crazed. 

So I'm pretty sure it's a relay.. How do I find a new one? How do I take the old one out? Will I be able to tell which is the bad one?

[neilestrick]

1 hour ago, Blueraven said:

        Pp pppp0p0ppppppppppHelp! I have a sticky relay. Can someone tell me how to fix it?

The other day I ran a cone 5 firing.  My kiln shut itself off three times. I'd check it, find the light out and turn it back on. Finally I figured after two days of playing with it I realized that I was being kind of dumb and shut it off myself.  8 out of 11 pieces were cracked, one of the three remaining pieces was crazed. 

So I'm pretty sure it's a relay.. How do I find a new one? How do I take the old one out? Will I be able to tell which is the bad one?

What brand/model of kiln do you have?

To see which one is dead (without using a meter), set up a custom program with 1 segment, rate of 9999, to 1500F. Start it up and wait a few minutes. Then carefully crack open the lid and see which elements are glowing. Depending on the model of kiln you have, typically a relay will power both of the elements in a section of the kiln, typically two elements. So if you see that a section of the kiln is dead, that's your dead relay, assuming the problem isn't a fried wiring connection.

If your relays have a lot of firings on them, like 150 or more, just replace all of them. You can either buy them from the kiln manufacturer, or pull one out and search for that part number on the Google.

[Blueraven]

I think I'll replace both/all relays. My kiln is an Olympic 1818E and is possibly an antique.  Just kidding about the antique, but the folks at Olympic sounded like they couldn't believe it was Still alive and kicking.  In the spring I'll replace the elements, thermo-couplers and update the kiln sitter.

Thank you for taking the time to answer me.  I posted this in pure panic, then realized that I'm quite capable of doing research.  I still don't know exactly where the relays are, but once the parts arrive I will recognize them.

Again, thanks.