baby’s first kiln fire

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i’m a little suprised how little the kiln holds. Just more than three of the black plastic shelves full of wares. We could have fit more if we stacked better instead of using the shelves, i suppose.

cookies and earthenware got two shelves of their own – we were afraid the earthenware wouldn’t play nice with the stoneware, and there was worry the cookies were too wet. We did the pre-programmed slow cone 04 firing with a 1-hour pre-heat (Skutt KilnMaster). we also used the vent for the first time and there were no notable odours and it cooled down very quickly. the lid got cracked at somewhere < 140 C and fully opened around 108 C. It took about 3 hours for things to cool enough to be able to handle with bare hands after that.

fire start	11/29/25 11:50
firing time	15 hours 42 mins
max temp	1059 C
completed time	11/30/25 21:08

underglaze painted on greenware.

part of my foolish (?) attempt to make mugs for the 7 people on my team for year-end. can i glaze and glaze fire them all without casualties by next week? we will see!