Lessons from the Firing!

1.  I definitely didn't have to worry about not enough soda! It was plenty and more. There is a lot of pearl gray in this kiln. Don't get me wrong, I like pearl gray! But I was hoping for more variation. 
2. On the plus side, every pot save one is saleable! I wanted more variation in the load but each individual pot is quite nice. When has that ever happened? Only a few even need to be ground. 
3. When I turned the kiln off, ^11 was soft. When I opened the door ^11 was flat. This kiln is so tight it sorta kept on firing after I turned the burners off. Good to know! 
4. During the firing, I noted that the back pressure looks different than I am accustomed to, due to the power blowers. It was more turbulent & also a different color. This made it hard to determine how deep the reduction was. Again, I needn't have worried! There was plenty of reduction. Could do with a little less, even. 
5. The top back got the lightest soda & the lightest reduction. In future - since I will be decreasing both - I should remember to put glazed pots there, or pots that will do well with paler colors. 

   

   Some peachy pots up under the arch. 

6. I can't wait to fire again! I have about...idk, maybe 30% of a load ready to go. 
7. Despite heavy soda on the pots, the shelves are only very lightly affected. I will grind them, just as a best-practice, but they don't really need it. The post-firing of this kiln is going ot be a lot less work than the old one!