Words cannot describe the incredible rush I got when I opened the kiln after the first glaze test firing of my pottery experience!
Thanks to the good advice I got from this NG, I felt almost competent going in. Also, again from someone's comment here, I discovered "Mastering Cone 6 Glazes," got a copy and used it as my basis for setting up glaze mixing (I never wanted to only use commercial glazes for some reason).
My wife and I made the trip to the ceramics supplier, got stuff, stuff and more stuff then mixed some tesat batches.
I honestly expected everything to come out black or muddy brown, all the tiles melted and the whole glob fused to the kiln shelf. Surprisingly, it was totally opposite. The glazes were beautiful (Waxwing Brown, Waterfall Brown, Bright Sky Blue, Variegated Blue, Gloss Base Glaze 1 and even an experiment I came up with.) Nothing was stuck down. Nothing melted. The only "near runs" were where I double-coated a glaze and got the total thickness too great.
The only problem I saw was some slight pinholing in the blues. All of them showed it, and none of the browns or the clear base glaze did. I soaked for
15 minutes at peak temperature. Maybe it should have been 30?
Anyway, now I'm *really* into it! Thanks again for the good advice.
Fred