May Luk on sat 6 oct 07
Hello all;
My long awaited first US firing went with a whimper. My new Paragon TNF23-3 is just hooked up by the electrician. To my disappointment, I got an error message already. It is 'TC2-', which means Thermocouple #2, the middle one. I hope there is an easy solution to this. Your advice is greatly appreciated.
Best Regards
May
Quiet Storm in Kings County
Maurice Weitman on sat 6 oct 07
At 09:33 -0400 on 10/6/07, May Luk wrote:
>Hello all;
>
>My long awaited first US firing went with a whimper. My new Paragon
>TNF23-3 is just hooked up by the electrician. To my disappointment,
>I got an error message already. It is 'TC2-', which means
>Thermocouple #2, the middle one. I hope there is an easy solution to
>this. Your advice is greatly appreciated.
Hi, May and all of Kings County (where two days and fifty-two years
ago, the streets were filled with hundreds of thousands of revelling
Brooklyn Dodger fans, myself among them, in celebration of their
beloved team's first World Series Crown, suitably at the expense of
the dread Yankees who, good goddesses willing, seem to be in a hurry
to be eliminated from this year's post-season. Please.),
Until Arnold gets here, maybe you can clarify something for me. As
you say, the controller is telling you that the middle thermocouple
has failed to get hot enough quickly enough to suit the Sentry.
First of all, you say "new Paragon" and "just hooked up." This leads
to several possibilities for failure points.
I'm a bit puzzled by the error message, though. I thought the recent
Paragon/Sentry controllers didn't show numbers in their error
messages, just a hyphen to show upper, middle, or lower position.
Maybe your kiln isn't as new as you thought, or did you mean new to
you?
You didn't mention to what cone you were firing, at what point in the
firing it failed, whether you used a cone fire or a ramp-hold program
and what it was, whether or whether your witness cones (ahem...)
showed that each shelf reached temperature.
So here are the possibilities I can think of, roughly in my order of
probability:
Kiln's element(s) and/or thermocouple(s) not wired properly.
Element or thermocouple dead.
Kiln not wired to panel properly.
Insufficient electrical capacity at the panel.
By now you've probably figured it all out, so let us know what happened, okay?
Best,
Maurice (Go, Tribe!!! -- and D-backs, Rockies, and Sawx... although
it would be poetic if the Cubs were to miraculously make it to play
the Sawx in the 'Series.)
May Luk on sun 7 oct 07
Hello Maurice;
Thanks for writing.
This kiln is brand new, fresh off the crate and never been fired. Kiln built by F. Espinoza; switch box assembled by Jose Estrada; inspected by Mariana Flores and quality assured and approved by AR. The electrician updated my fuse box and make extra wiring to connect my kiln on Friday, when Paragon is closed. Therefore I wrote to Clayart, hoping I can have it sorted on the weekend. I have loads of test ready to be fired.
The error message is actually 'TC-' (middle bar). I opened the controller and I found that the thermocouple wire is not connected to the panel.
Anyway, I will call Ceramic Supplies, where I bought the kiln and sort it out Monday.
Many thanks
May
>
>Until Arnold gets here, maybe you can clarify something for me. As
>you say, the controller is telling you that the middle thermocouple
>has failed to get hot enough quickly enough to suit the Sentry.
>
>First of all, you say "new Paragon" and "just hooked up." This leads
>to several possibilities for failure points.
>
>I'm a bit puzzled by the error message, though. I thought the recent
>Paragon/Sentry controllers didn't show numbers in their error
>messages, just a hyphen to show upper, middle, or lower position.
>Maybe your kiln isn't as new as you thought, or did you mean new to
>you?
>
>You didn't mention to what cone you were firing, at what point in the
>firing it failed, whether you used a cone fire or a ramp-hold program
>and what it was, whether or whether your witness cones (ahem...)
>showed that each shelf reached temperature.
>
>So here are the possibilities I can think of, roughly in my order of
>probability:
>
>Kiln's element(s) and/or thermocouple(s) not wired properly.
>
>Element or thermocouple dead.
>
>Kiln not wired to panel properly.
>
>Insufficient electrical capacity at the panel.
>
>By now you've probably figured it all out, so let us know what happened, okay?
>
>Best,
>Maurice (Go, Tribe!!! -- and D-backs, Rockies, and Sawx... although
>it would be poetic if the Cubs were to miraculously make it to play
>the Sawx in the 'Series.)
Arnold Howard on mon 8 oct 07
From: "May Luk"
> This kiln is brand new, fresh off the crate and never been
> fired. Kiln built by F. Espinoza; switch box assembled by
> Jose Estrada; inspected by Mariana Flores and quality
> assured and approved by AR. The electrician updated my
> fuse box and make extra wiring to connect my kiln on
> Friday, when Paragon is closed. Therefore I wrote to
> Clayart, hoping I can have it sorted on the weekend. I
> have loads of test ready to be fired.
>
> The error message is actually 'TC-' (middle bar). I opened
> the controller and I found that the thermocouple wire is
> not connected to the panel.
---------------------
May, I'm very sorry the thermocouple on your new kiln is
disconnected. That would explain why you had the TC2 error
message that you reported in your original post. TC2 means
the thermocouple of a single-zone kiln failed while the kiln
was at idle. (In other words, the controller could not
detect the thermocouple.)
Are the thermocouple wires disconnected at the back of the
controller? If so, you will find two color-coded connector
buttons that work the same way as the connectors for speaker
wires. Press the buttons and insert the thermocouple wires.
Tug on the wires to check for tightness.
Every new Paragon kiln has a card listing the names of the
people who made that kiln. It adds a personal touch and
encourages pride of workmanship. The idea came from the
first Macintosh computer. Somewhere I had read that the
signatures of the engineers were molded into the inside
surface of the plastic computer case.
I trust that you will enjoy your TnF-23-3. Thank you for
buying it. We introduced the
first generation of that model in 1980. It was the A-123,
the first Paragon kiln I ever photographed. In 1987 we
introduced the digital version.
Sincerely,
Arnold Howard
Paragon Industries, L.P., Mesquite, Texas USA
ahoward@paragonweb.com / www.paragonweb.com
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