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advancer shelves explosions

updated wed 31 may 06

 

newt and amy on sun 28 may 06


i bought 20 about 8 yrs ago and they have not been anything but a =
pleasure to use. however, a friend of mine blew his up and the only =
difference is that he stored his shelves horizontilly, which makes me =
think he trapped moisture. i have always stacked mine vertically. i =
also fire pretty quickly. =20

In addition, i have washed both sides with a mix of pyrotrol and epk. =
NEVER flakes, I flip the shelves religiously and it is a dream to =
clean up. =20


Newt Lale www.Osageclayworks.com

Stuart Bidon on mon 29 may 06


Tonya-

Marshall @ Smith-Sharpe in Minneapolis once told me about someone who had been
storing their Advancers on the ground next to their outdoor kiln. The
shelves were in direct contact with the soil. One firing, many
shelves exploded. Marshall was fairly sure that the advancers, while
nearly vitreous, are still porous and moisture had leeched into the
super-tight matrix of the shelf. Moisture in shelf, shelf get hot,
shelf go boom (or, as recent dicussions on clayart tell us: nothing go
boom, but whatever the case, you're two shelves short.)

My guess is your basement is just moist enough to have slowly "wet"
the shelves that blew up. When you fired them, the moisture couldn't
escape fast enough.

If you're concerned about the two surviving shelves, just do a nice,
long soak up to about 1100 (this is playing it very safe) the next
time you fire. Everything should be fine.

If you're firing regularly you probably don't have to be as careful.
Maybe just one cautious firing per firing cycle.

On 5/29/06, tonya Johnson wrote:
> I bought four...two were stored in the basement and two were under cover,
> but outside. Two blew up, but they were the two that came straight out of the
> basement! I'm afraid to use the other two.
>
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tonya Johnson on mon 29 may 06


I bought four...two were stored in the basement and two were under cover,
but outside. Two blew up, but they were the two that came straight out of the
basement! I'm afraid to use the other two.

tonya Johnson on tue 30 may 06


I thought it must have been moisture in the basement. They funny thing is
that the two that did not explode had been stored outside but under cover in
November/December. It had been very cold and wet. But thank you so much for
taking the time to reply. I'll give the remaining two a slow heat up as you
recommend : ) Tonya in Louisville, KY