Newbie about to embark on adventure

Many potters bisque at 04, some at 06, some as cold as 08. This is generally not critical. (I use 04 myself.)

For bisque you can pretty much stack stuff in however it will fit. Assuming you are using a clay that you will glaze at cone 6 or above, it probably won't be softening enough to warp a tile at

2. Best regards,

Bob Masta dqatechATdaqartaDOTcom D A Q A R T A Data AcQuisition And Real-Time Analysis

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When I bisque, I do it at cone 06 with a 10 minute hold to finish burning out most of the impurities. Then glaze and fire to cone 6. Although some of the clay I use states on the box to fire to cone 5. So that clay I fire as directed but still bisque at cone 06. Sandi

I bisque to cone 06 and glaze to cone 5 or 6. I soak for 30 minutes in both cases. Stacking the kiln for a bisque firing it is not very important how you stack, you can put pieces on top of each other and inside each other. However stacking for a glaze firing is very important. Clay gets hot enough to warp and therefore needs to firmly sit on the shelf and there must be no glaze on the bottom and no pieces touching each other. Always make sure that there is a reasonable clearance from the elements. Am

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I would just add that since you are a beginner you might want to bisque to cone 04 if you are using the dunk method since most beginners hold the pot in the glaze for too long and get the glaze on too thick (cone 06 is going to be more absorbent than cone 04). If you are painting on your glaze then you will want to bisque to 04 or make sure you do a hold in the glaze firing so that you don't have pinholes in your glaze from venting gases.

When you are stacking your greenware you want to keep in mind that you don't want to put a heavy piece with it's center of gravity on a light fragile area of another pot. So stack heaviest on the bottom, moving up to lightest. Try to put the foot of one piece over the foot of another or stack rim to rim (a bowl on the bottom, a taller piece with the foot over the foot, a bowl with the same rim size upside down on the bottom bowl). Another thing you should do is to take a straight stick and lay it on your kiln posts (the kiln furniture that holds up your shelves) so that you can more clearly see that you have clearance for your next shelf. Remember that clay expands when it fires before it shrinks so leave room on top for expansion and when you are glaze firing leave room around the pots as well. A kiln book would recommend about 1/4" - I do bump and pull which gives me about 1/8". You will learn best from the mistakes you make. You are going to lose pieces. Just keep in mind that it is easy to recycle and not a tragedy just more experience (greenware goes into making more clay, bisqueware makes grog or tiles for a mosaic - same with broken glazed pieces). Make sure that your shelves are well coated with kiln wash but don't over do it so that it chips off and falls into your pots.... So many odds and ends we just take for granted that we know.

I highly recommend going to the web site of the manufacture of the kiln you are using and downloading their manual. From this you will learn that cone

06 is radically different from cone 6 and most of the stuff that I have mentioned.

Donna

Hi Fred, if you would like some general notes on electric kiln firing, send me an email and I'll foward the same, Andy.

Hi again Fred, 'made a mistake with email address send to this one and not the previous! Andy

Thanks for all your comments and advice. I really appreciate all the help!

Fred

Hi Fred

To avoid any tensions building in the tiles, I would try to lay them flat. As this is unglazed, why not just lay the tiles on top of each other in a stack?

Marianne