I love opening the kiln! The fire Gods were good to us this time - the pots came out better than expected. While most of the time we want a lovely smooth, uncrazed glaze, this time we were looking for a good crater glaze, and wow! did we get one.
The pot on the left of the screen is porcelain, and the glaze used a 300 mesh silicon carbide - the one in the middle is stoneware with an 80 mesh silicon carbide and the one on the right is a red stoneware with the same glaze as the porcelain pot on the left. I don't usually use red stoneware, because it gets my hands dirty, and it contaminates so easily, but it looks wonderful with this glaze.
So, right now the test kiln is fired up and we have added a little copper oxide to see what colour variation we will get. Also, I slow fired these above, but in the current fire we are trying a medium speed to see if there is any difference (Kevin gets so impatient). Oxidation, straight ^6, no ramp, hold or soak.
And tomorrow, I need to spend the whole day glazing - the ware cart is full of bisque and there are oodles of greenware waiting to be fired. How can one have so much fun with their clothes on!
Life is good.
