So, Funny Story...

 

You can recognize the copper blue in 
the burner channel

It's time for our favorite game, that we play after every firing, called How Did Lori Fuck Up This Time? 

I'm kidding, sort of! But I am serious about sharing my goofs, large & small, because I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one who feels like a screwup most of the time - & I want you all to know: you can screw up, even big-time, and still do okay. I do! All the time. 

So, what happened this time? Well, it was kind of funny...or rather, it is now, now that I know it didn't cause any serious mayhem. Before the firing I took apart the sprayer & cleaned out any clumps of crystals of soda ash that might cause it not to work properly when I needed it. I was actually pretty proud of myself for doing this! Like, look at me, all preventative & stuff! I am one competent human! 

~*~LOL~*~

That crusty black material is what remains 
of the spray wand.

Apparently when I put it back together, I failed to screw on a little collar that keeps the brass wand attached to the sprayer hose. How did I discover this, you may ask? Well, my first clue was when, while spraying soda through the port, the pressure from the tank blew the rod right off the hose...and right into the port. 
There was nothing to be done about this in the moment, of course, except replace the wand (YAY EXTRA PARTS), continue spraying, and hope for the best. Brass is about 2/3s copper and 1/3 zinc - both will volatize well before ^10. I feared the fugitive copper might cause some flashing, and I really had (have, lol) no idea what fugitive zinc might do. 

I saw little evidence, actually, that the copper did much. It seemed only to affect pieces that had a specific flashing slip - Bauer Orange. The BMix pieces wearing Bauer turned blue - not the teal blue I would expect of copper, but what looked like a watery cobalt blue. Those are quite nice. There were only a couple items in brown stoneware wearing flashing slip, and good thing, too, because those were less nice; a dull mud-brown color with little shine. 

These shells had only Bauer Orange 
Flashing Slip applied.

So, weird but could have been worse! Overall a very successful firing; I will photograph some pieces on Wednesday & update the online shop on Thursday. Thanks for reading!