It’s been months since someone last let me fondle the valves on a gas kiln. Except for last spring’s excursion into soda firing with Matt from MossBeachCeramics, I’ve been exiled exclusively to electric firings for the last 4 years. Since then I’ve learned to enjoy worshipping the coil, but hey, I love the flame… 
This week, the local community college ceramics professor, Joe Mariscal let me burn one with his new studio tech in their old Alpine updraft. I had forgotten what pandemonium anundergraduate classroom could be like at the end of a semester and I was given the opportunity to find out that a community college classroom is quite a bit crazier. As nutty as it was, it was totally worth it. They were looking for someone to help push through a reduction firing and viola, I’m still a burner at heart.
God I love that old kiln smell…
5 comments:
ah excellent, love the door notes..
there is nothing like a little gas or as an older potter once said.
Oh gas is nothing but hot air.
He fired with oil.
bet it was great fun... man that thing looks like an old warhorse
I kept thinking that this old kiln looked like a sarcophagus. They build this model like a tank. The whole thing is armor plated.
I help teach pottery at a community college and we have two Alpines. I was doing the end of semester kiln dance this week. Load, fire, unload, and repeat. Fired each three times this week. Why do students wait until the end of the semester to glaze? And you're right, the Alpines are built like tanks.
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