My soda firing today has been a little crazy.
Everything seemed to be firing fine. Heat, color, flames, cones, reduction, etc.
Everything seemed fine… going smooth… almost.

When I started the kiln this morning, the top temperature was a lot hotter then the bottom temperature. Which is normal. Heat rises. I get it. We use a pyrometer with two temperature probes to check the internal temperature, in addition to the tradition pyrometric cones. According to the pyrometer, my temperature difference was over five hundred degrees. Not too concerning at the beginning.

But as my firing went on, the temperature difference didn’t change much. Usually the temperature levels out as the firing goes on. A simple firing, temps balancing out from top to bottom. But not today.

At least halfway through the firing, my temperature difference was up to 600-degrees difference between top & bottom. Crazy, right?! How can it be that much difference? Things looked fine. The color. The flames. The cones. And yet the pyrometer was still telling me there was a problem. So the anxiety started to creep in and you start considering all of the options.

I started making adjustments to the kiln. Reduce the gas. Push in the damper. Watch for results. Hoping the temp gap would change. Nope. Open the damper. Raise the gas. Wait for something to change. Into reduction. Out of reduction. Just trying anything & everything to make something happen. But the temperature difference didn’t change much. Like five to ten degrees… no the HUNDREDS of degrees I needed it to be!!!

After some more creative problem solving, I was ready to try anything. We turned the pyrometer on & off. We switched the temperature probes. And finally I ran upstairs to get the other pyrometer from the studio kiln room. I attached it to my probes in my kiln and suddenly my temperature difference was like 55-degrees!!! NOT six hundred degrees like the old pyrometer was telling me.

Huge sigh of relief.
By this time I was 3/4 of the way into my firing. Logically I kinda knew that the firing was okay. Nothing seemed off in the firing. If the kiln was indeed 600 hundred degrees cooler on the bottom, I’m sure you would be able to see the difference in flames & color. But still, it felt so much better now knowing that temp was back in an “acceptable” range.

And now back to the firing…
It’s getting close to the end. Cone eight is down. Cone nine is starting to bend.
Time to start adding my soda mixture into the kiln. Get the gloves… get the angle iron…
time to play with the flames!!!