handbuilt Teapot

Here was a nice surprise, this little handbuilt teapot was sitting in the second tier of pots. It's a shino with heavy fly ash. Can't wait to try it out. Then of course it becomes a used pot. ` Make good pots.

Starting to unload

Here is the door down with all the ash still in place. We got about 50 gallons of ash out of the firebox. Some will get used for glaze and the rest will be used on the lawn and flower beds as fertilizer.

Here is another picture of the columns. The camera has a flash so the colours are not quite right on these. It's a new camera so I'm still working out how this modern inconvenience works.

Here is Leona taking out some of the ash. We had a beautiful day to start to unload. The temp on the inside of the kiln was about 100F. Warm but not to bad. We waited for the kiln to get that cool not because the pots needed to be that cool to unload, but because we didn't want to get overheated unloading. We are going slow on unloading the pots, so that we can take the time to actually look at them! So besides unloading the kiln, we split wood, mowed the lawn and cleaned up around the kiln.

Finally here are some of the first columns to come out of the kiln. I'm pretty chuffed about the way they recorded the flame and ash. Well that's it for this post. Make good pots~~~

You know it's the end

Here is the white smoke from the salting of the hidden chamber. A sure sign that the firing is over and we can all go home and get some rest.

Salting the hidden chamber

I haven't salt fired in about ten years, so this was a mild foray into the world of vapor glazing again. It seems now days there is more soda firing going on than salt. We used about 5lbs of Safety salt that was sprinkled onto four curved wood pieces, two in each side. The cone 11 was down but the 12 was still standing very straight. This was at the end of the fire into the hidden chamber just behind the seitma. Here are a couple of pics of us pouring the salt on the wood and stoking the hidden chamber.

Barry and dave doing the final stoke of the firing. They look more awake in the photo than they really were.

Finishing the firing

Here is Dave stoking the main firebox. It is about 2 oclock in the morning of Saturday and we are raising the temp for the final time. Firing this kiln is more than one person can do. Fortunately there are folks like Dave that like to stay up all night and play with fire. I am truly grateful for Dave and the other crazies that think that a good time is to stay up all night and play with fire.

The ember bed was a little high, we had mainly oak to stoke this time and oak coals up and leaves a large ember bed. We pulled off about 20 gallons of embers to get the firebox running efficiently. Different woods coal up differently and oak seems to be on the high end. With anagama's regulating the height and size of the ember bed is important to be able to reach the temperatures that you want.

Here I am starting to sidestoke the second stoke hole. I stoke this tier a lot during the firing for ash effects.
The kiln is still at about 200F after cooling for a week. The kiln opening will be Monday afternoon. Oh.. I peeked and am really looking forward to the opening!!

Door and small fire

Today we mudded up the door and started the small fire! The mud is just dirt that we dug up from around the kiln and sieved. Last firing I used clay but that flaked off, dirt seems to work better, so dirt it is. The beginning of the fire is always so peaceful and relaxed, hard to imagine the energy that the fire will become.
Make good pots
~Craig

All loaded and bricked up

The spring firing is all loaded up and the door is bricked, now all that's left is to fire!
Make good pots
~Craig

The loading continues

We keep loading the kiln. I always think that we have more than enough pots, but they all seem to fit in the kiln. One more tier to go and then we start to load the second chamber.
The weather continues to be better than nice, hard to imagine that there was three feet of snow on the ground only a month ago.

Setting plates

This last week has just been one of great weather and has been fun to get out from under the winter and load the kiln. Leona and I plan to have the kiln all loaded and ready to fire in two more days.
I took a couple of pics of wadding and stacking some small plates. The plates are glazed with a couple of different shinos. The shells leave nice marks and the shino records the flame well.
For now
Make good pots
~Craig

Wikiclay

Here is a great new resource that you should check out and contribute your knowledge to. What a great idea. Thanks to Simon and Lloyd!!!

Simon Levin and Lloyd Cledwyn would like to announce the creation of a new resource for ceramicists everywhere. We hope Wikiclay.com will become a fluid and vibrant source of information on artists, galleries, schools, videos, and whatever else you think may be helpful. Anyone can use it, anyone can contribute, any...one can refine articles.

If you are a ceramic artist, a good friend of just a helpful person. Please post this in your Facebook Status, and check it out.