–it had to happen eventually.

We have been loading the kiln and firing our own work for almost 3 years now.

We’ve had remarkably great luck for a coupla kiln beginners.  Yes, we’ve had a few cracked tiles, but that’s mostly been from clay imperfections or unseen weak areas.  Even though it’s very disappointing to discover any cracks in a completed glazed piece, it’s not worrisome for the other tile and doesn’t put the kiln furniture in jeopardy.  And it occurs very rarely.

Then it happened.  Kabloom!  Kapow!

Yes, we flew too close to the sun, as they say…when we had a recent cloudy week.  We were scheduled to run a bisque load (going from clay to hard ceramic) when we noticed that some tile were not perfectly dry.  Since this kiln-load was full of tile sizes that we really needed, we decided to fire the load using a carefully calculated, slow preheat-mode to completely dry out the tile prior to the actual firing.

I think not!

Not only did several tile on several shelves explode but there was collateral damage to neighboring pieces.  Opening the kiln to see ceramic shards everywhere was rather horrifying.

Luckily this bark was worse than the bite.   About 7 or 8 tile were damaged out of an estimated 80 or so tile.

I believe we have learned our lesson.  We’ll keep our little mascot here with the big hole… to remind us.