Pretty cool! Or maybe cool isn't the right word...
When I unpacked all the pieces on Thursday night to begin getting them ready for glazing and firing, I was surprised to find that I had more than I needed for my part of the kiln.
This is what 42 pots looks like. Better to have too many and be able to choose the "best" ones than too few and have to let the other potters see all the wompy and otherwise ugly pots. "Wompy" may be a word that I made up (or maybe I've heard it somewhere). It means slightly off center and out of round.
On Saturday morning I went over to Ron Philbeck's and started glazing pots. I was too busy to get many pictures of the process. Below is the canister set with the glaze applied waiting for wadding.
In a salt fire, the salt reacts with the clay to make the finish on each piece. All exposed surfaces will react, so alumina hydrate wadding is used to keep pieces from sticking to the shelves and to keep lids from sticking to pots. In the picture below, Allen is gluing wadding on the bottoms of these bowls with Elmer's glue. The glue holds the wadding in place while it is handled and loaded and then burns away. I don't understand all the chemistry involved, but the alumina does not react with the salt so there is no finish on the pot every place it is in contact with a piece of wadding. The bottom line is that since the pot is not in contact with the shelves and the lids are not in contact with the pots, nothing sticks that shouldn't stick.
(Thanks to Allen Griffin for this picture from the June firing.)
Once everything was outside, Ron started loading. He'd figure out what size pieces he needed and we'd take turns handing him things.
And here's a shot of the full kiln. We are going back over on Wednesday to unload. I can't wait.
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