Malone & Dean McRaine on sat 13 feb 99
Aloha all:
I have an old Skutt that I bought used for $100. I added fiber insulation
so that I could fire to ^10. This is supposed to be hard on the elements.
I typically hold the temp above 2000 for 4-5 hours and have roasted a few up
to ^11. In the last four years I've fired well over 100 firings. I've
replaced 4 of the old elements in that time (I bought them from Skutt). I
just wait till they break to replace them. I have fired to ^ 10 on 5
elements (one broken during firing) but it took a hell of a long time. As
far as the economics go, those elements cost something like $40 each and I
get from $6-800 worth of work out of a firing so that seems OK to me. If
you burnt out elements at ^6 after 30some firings I'd say something's wrong.
As far as electric (read oxidation) fired glazes go, I recently read an
article by Robin Hopper in which he stated that there is a broader range of
color available in oxidation than there is in reduction. This coupled with
the sometimes inconsistent results of reduction firings makes oxidation
firing attractive to me. Personally, I like the bright colors I get and
firing to ^10 gives me access to high temp fluxes that you can't use at ^6.
The much praised richness and texture of reduction glazes is usually a
product of claybody and glaze formulation.
The fact is there's hardly anybody out there firing ^10 oxidation so how do
you really know what's possible?
Now for my opinion (everybody's got one).
When it comes to reduction I think we're just addicted to history. Don't
get me wrong, I drool over bloody copper reds and frothy rutile blues and
soft blue celedons and inky tenmokus with rusty edges as much as the next
guy. But these glazes were all developed in wood kilns in Japan and China
and later worshipped by the Leach generation in England. Why didn't they
develop high fire oxidation? Duhhh, they couldn't do it in a wood kiln. He
was a pioneer but Leach turned reduction firing into a religion. He had his
mind blown in Japan and came back to England a zealot. The Reduction Church
of Saint Bernard is still the most universally practiced faith in the
ceramics world. It's archaic to limit yourself to the grayed palette and
narrow vision dogmatized by that old grey Englishman. Uncork your mind,
there are colors you have never seen on a pot and they're coming out of an
oxidation firing. I still haven't gotten a reply to my post about "rutile
yellow or not." Has anybody ever fired a glossy rutile yellow? It's
pretty, it's oxidation.
Dean in Kauai
Maybe I'm just cranky cause it's still raining and windy and everything, me
included, is coated with sticky red mud (and no, you can't make pots out of
it, it shrinks 50%).
Joseph Dallas on mon 15 feb 99
Malone & Dean McRaine wrote:
>
> ----------------------------Original message----------------------------
> Aloha all:
>
> The fact is there's hardly anybody out there firing ^10 oxidation so how do
> you really know what's possible?
> Uncork your mind,
> there are colors you have never seen on a pot and they're coming out of an
> oxidation firing. I still haven't gotten a reply to my post about "rutile
> yellow or not." Has anybody ever fired a glossy rutile yellow? It's
> pretty, it's oxidation.
>
> Dean in Kauai
> Maybe I'm just cranky cause it's still raining and windy and everything, me
> included, is coated with sticky red mud (and no, you can't make pots out of
> it, it shrinks 50%).Dean,
Howdy from Georgia:
I have been firing to ^10 in a Paragon S99 for six years now. I bought it used
and fired it regularly untill last year when I replaced all element,switches and
connecting wires, now it fires to ^10-11 beautifully. Of course everyone warned
not to fire that high, said the kiln couln't take it. Being the hardhead, I did
anyway. My firings give me beautiful colors that you don't get with gas firing
using the same glazes. I recently bought a used 30 cuft Alpine updraft and am
planning to do some reduction,copper reds,etc, but I will never give up my
electric ^10 firings. And I do have a ^10 rutile glaze that if fired to ^9 and i
slighly thin over a buff clay will give a nice creamy yellow.
By the way, I was in Kauai Sept 97 wish I Had known you were there, would've loo
you up.
Joe Dallas
Dallas Pottery
Columbus, Ga.
jedallas@worldnet.att.net
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