mel jacobson on fri 27 jun 97
some thoughts:
we have a small wood fired kiln at the farm...bout 30 sq. feet..
we have (kurt wild and i) tightened the flu and stack with mortar,
added a nice 12 foot steel stack to that. the fire box is tight and
mortared with a small opening for wood...several bricks can be
removed for primary air....and old music stand with kaowool is the door to
the fire box.
we fire it thus:
load....turn on two nils lou propane burners half way open...leave
all night... about 8 or so we have a big strong potter named kevin
caufield that starts the wood...the kiln is at 1700F. turn off gas, start
wood stoking every two minutes...two pieces of cedar or pine...
2 inch square, 15 inches long... keep it up for 3-5 hours....taking
turns stoking... when the kiln reaches 2200F we put one gas
burner back on. (two seem to choke it off and no rise in temp occurs)
with the gas and wood we go to cone 11 flat..or 12. sorta. (maybe more)
we stir the grates and get as much ash as we can to fly....
soak for as long as we can or want.....throw in a cup of salt (table) into
the fire box....turn off....all pots look like classic wood fired
pieces..do it all again the next day...easy, sensible, no one
gets exhuasted...and i can fire that kiln all alone, just me, and
it is easy.
our best firing of the 10 days was a 4 hour wood stoke, lots
of ash flying...windy. and one propane burner going throughout.
IS IT A WOOD FIRED KILN...? who cares.? it works..
may all the purists fire for hundreds of hours and be happy in it.
fall in exhaustion, sweat and pant.
i am more and more committed to multiple fuel kilns...multiple use
kilns, and kilns of a size that can be fired whenever one is ready to
fire. and as a teacher i am so happy to have people at the farm
and allow them to fire 5 different kilns in a week, and go home
with a trunk full of great pots.
editorial opinion:
i am sick of teachers that just want an automatic electric kiln...
set the buttons and then go home. next day talk of metaphore
and smarty pants... don't let the students have real experience, just
talk....more bullshit. (no mfa should graduate without learning to weld,
stack bricks, compute a glaze, and know how to set a good
stack and fire a gas kiln to cone 12 and make the damn thing sing.)
sorry...seeing a lot of that kind of teaching...makes me grumpy.
mel jacobson/minnesota. 612 935 5943/ fax 612 935 5434
Sherry mcDonald Stewart on sat 28 jun 97
Where I went to school to get my BA the, art dept. was upstairs in the
art/ education building. The main emphasis by the school president was
that the school be clean.( and have lots of palm trees and plants on the
campus) The art dept only had two electric kilns, but we worked around
that. We didn't ask, and were eventually caught, firing raku on a patio
that no one used up by the art dept.. But we got by with it for several
years! And one of my friends and I worked on building a kiln for the
highschool, a gas kiln. We did everything but the welding. It was my
friends research project. We also went to Rogers Allens Chicken Farm
Arts Center, and did work there. So, there is not much of an excuse for
students not to have these opportunities, but so much of it was equally
due to a good instructor (we had raku parties at her house, and later on
at mine) and students who wanted to do more and learn more. I have to
wonder about people who come out of those classes not having built
anything, I'd wonder about their initiative.
I built a wood fired kiln that that wild Kajun, whose name I can't
recall at the moment, but who many if you know, had us build at a
workshop. It was made of plain red brick. Mine just wouldn't get up tp
temperature, so I went in the house and brought out a fan, and it went
right on up to temperature. (which was anout 1700) I guess thAT's
cheating, using electricity, but it solved my problem!
David Hendley on sun 29 jun 97
(no mfa should graduate without learning to weld,
>stack bricks, compute a glaze, and know how to set a good
>stack and fire a gas kiln to cone 12 and make the damn thing sing.)
Dittos mel --- and add to the list:
formulate a claybody
design and build a kiln
develop colors in glazes
what elese have I forgotten?
I love my fast fire kiln because I can fire it by myself to cone 10 using
only wood in 7 hours...
David Hendley
Maydelle, Texas
Dannon Rhudy on mon 30 jun 97
----------------------original message------
.........with the gas and wood we go to cone 11 flat..or 12. sorta.
(maybe ..we stir the grates and get as much ash as we can to
fly....so ... pots look like classic wood fired
pieces..
i am more and more committed to multiple fuel kilns...multiple
use kilns.....
mel jacobson, minnesota
-------------------------------------------------------------
In support of what Mel says re: gas/wood firing, it was my
observation that not only did the pots have the classic wood
fired appearance, but they had it more UNIFORMLY - that is, there
were none that did not exhibit the classic flashing/ash deposits
of wood firing. The ash deposits were not as heavy as they might
be in a longer firing. Carbon trap glazes responded
beautifully, as did the porcelain bodies. Celedons were
nice,with gorgeous random ash deposits. Not quite what they might
have been with longer firing/cooling- but not exactly shabby.
For purposes of a workshop, or for those who might like
to fire with wood but often fire alone, or under great time
constraint, this kiln is a gem. Have been planning one myself;
now, don't have a doubt. Am doing it.
kinoko@junction.net on thu 3 jul 97
Mel., We built several kilns,from small ones of less than15cubic' to the
largest of over 300cubic'. and used combinations of oil and wood,introducing
the wood just before thepeak of the fire and continuing until cone10. We
found that the pots did indeed attract and disintergrate ash to form a
glaze. We admit that th "uniformity" of the glaze did not please us very
much as well as the considerably thnner glaze effect. Our burner was one of
three CORONA oil-burners we purchased from Corona of Japan. A really lovely
small and very efficient burner without an oil pump,which worked by
aspiration,the oil atomizing from a thin-edged tube at the center of the
turbine. If one requires efficientcy one can do no better than to buy
equipmentof this sort from a country which does not have oil,or coal as a
natural resource. I believe,that with a slight modification,such burners
would work using fluidized coal. Incidentally, I showed a few pices of
Anthracite to some American school children and they were fasacinatede with
"rocks that burn," never having seen coal....the march of progress,I guess.
Don Morrill >----------------------------Original
message----------------------------
>----------------------original message------
>........with the gas and wood we go to cone 11 flat..or 12. sorta.
>(maybe ..we stir the grates and get as much ash as we can to
>fly....so ... pots look like classic wood fired
>pieces..
> i am more and more committed to multiple fuel kilns...multiple
>use kilns.....
>
>mel jacobson, minnesota
>-------------------------------------------------------------
>
>In support of what Mel says re: gas/wood firing, it was my
>observation that not only did the pots have the classic wood
>fired appearance, but they had it more UNIFORMLY - that is, there
>were none that did not exhibit the classic flashing/ash deposits
>of wood firing. The ash deposits were not as heavy as they might
>be in a longer firing. Carbon trap glazes responded
>beautifully, as did the porcelain bodies. Celedons were
>nice,with gorgeous random ash deposits. Not quite what they might
>have been with longer firing/cooling- but not exactly shabby.
>For purposes of a workshop, or for those who might like
>to fire with wood but often fire alone, or under great time
>constraint, this kiln is a gem. Have been planning one myself;
>now, don't have a doubt. Am doing it.
>
>
*****************************************
*****************************************
** Don and Isao Morrill **
** Falkland, B.C. **
** kinoko@junction.net **
*****************************************
*****************************************
Don Jones on fri 4 jul 97
>----------------------------Original message----------------------------
>Mel., We built several kilns,from small ones of less than15cubic' to the
>largest of over 300cubic'. and used combinations of oil and wood,introducing
>the wood just before thepeak of the fire and continuing until cone10.
Dear Group,
Once again I find myself on the wrong side of the fence regarding
what's cool in the wood fire arena.
I am reminded of the recent CM article showing pictures of a pot
that was fired in a wood kiln for 12 days in a anagama kiln in Japan. You
can count me among the tree huggers here. I'm not knowledgeable enough to
comment on smoke and the air quality of the world but I can say that living
AND dead trees are becoming an endangered species world-wide. The article
in CM went on to say that they used some 8 tons of red pine to fire these
kilns. I'm of the opinion that not many pots are worth this. Even fallen
trees in a natural environment serve a variety of purposes in the larger
system.
For the 3rd time I'm going to tell you of my camping trip in the
Rocky Mountain Natl forest some 26 years ago. The campground was in a
"forest" where ALL the trees had ALL of their branches broken off at the
height of around 8 feet. There were NO fallen trees or twigs, NONE for an
area of about 5 square miles. This wasn't a forest; it was a park with no
grass, just dirt, live trees, no birds, few insects and campers hungry to
burn wood. I live in the west where it seems that trees have no end. In
fact, they do have an end, either in the pulp mill, fires, or in your kiln.
I think they look better rotting in the wild, growing mushrooms and
sheltering animals. Wood fired kilns are an extreme luxury. Lets make
some REALLY GOOD POTS for these kilns.
Don Jones
claysky@highfiber.com
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