Gretchen Zinkan on wed 14 aug 02
My thanks to those of you who gave me good information and wished me good
luck in my kiln building experience...you knew much more than me!! I have
built Randy Brodnax's quick wood fire kiln, which I was going to use both
gas and wood in depending on what I wanted, time, etc.
Well, the kiln is built, not yet fired, so I thought I would share with you
some of my experiences thus far.
Foundation:
I started on my driveway where I had a pile of sand that I flattened,
tamped, stomped, wetted, etc...but I could never get it to remain stable and
true. I ended up making a slab of concrete about 8 ft by 12 ft by 8 inches
thick so that I wouldn't get any warping and heaving from frost.
Natural Gas:
I consulted with the gas inspector with my drawings and information and he
said all was fine; however, when I had a gas person come up to put in the
line from the meter he couldn't use the already existing .5" line, but had
to put in a 1" line so that I could get enough volume to run 2 venturi type
burners off the line with maximum btu's. The cost of doing that would be in
excess of $500.00 just to do the gas line. So I explored propane.
Propane:
After getting some quotes, it was clear that propane was a much cheaper way
to go. So I have rented a "pig tank" with fittings and a fill, was $178.00.
Much more manageable for me.
Lid:
I was so excited about this kiln, that I had a fabricator make me a lid that
I could lift off with a pully system. The problem? I didn't have the kiln
made yet, and so I really didn't know what size I needed!! Duh? well, it's
a little bigger than I needed but I'll make it work (somehow) - and if I
can't, I'll just use the fibrefax which is what Randy used. (KISS - Keep it
simple stupid)
Bricks:
Trying to be thrifty, I found some bricks that were taken from an old church
and also from a railway station. All I needed to do was do some cleaning!!
Ya, right!! Chisel, screwdriver, ax, hammer, paint scraper, etc., but I did
get them cleaned, but most of them had corners or other chunks missing...
(and my kiln is not mortared in any way). Oh well, I thought...I can do
something with these anyway...so I continue (not realizing at this time -
duh!) that these bricks were a different size than the insulating fire
bricks that I had which I needed to weave in with the chimney (recycled)
bricks!
Building:
The good news is that I know the foundation is true...and it is the only
thing in the kiln that is...my chimney stack looks like the leaning tower of
piza (almost). I had to fudge in places to even out the smaller recycled
bricks with fibre fax so that they could weave with the insultating bricks.
And I had to create the chimeny like a jigsaw puzzle making sure the chunks
out of recycled bricks were covered with a better brick, or if the corner
were missing it were on the outside, not inside!!
Firing:
That is to come, though I am a bit leery of how successful I will be as I
have been following the discussion about the difficulty one will have firing
in reduction if you have too many gaps and holes (and I think this will
certainly be my kiln). I will give it a try, perhaps this weekend, to see
what happens and I will keep you posted.
Question:
Does anyone forsee a problem if I put wood in the fire box when I am firing
with propane so that I also have the possibility of getting some ash build
up?
Thank you, thank you, thank you to my clayart friends...you've been very
helpful, encouraging and very wise.
Gretchen Zinkan
in the SouthEastern BC part of the Rocky Mountain Trench
P.S. Lisa, I've really enjoyed the discussion you started on drawing...it's
been very interesting...thank you for your self reflection.
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