Troubleshooting

[dianes]

Hi, we lived abroad for 7 years and I am just now returning to glasswork. My equipment and supplies were in a storage facility without heat or a/c. I fired my first pieces and they all migrated to the middle of the kiln shelf and fused together. I used the Basic 6 schedule from this site BASIC 6-Segment Firing Schedules.
http://system96.com/Resources/FiringGuideFahrenheit.pdf with System 96 glass. I suspect the temp was too high but fear there might be other contributing factors.

I used Thinfire shelf paper that no longer looks white from being in storage so long. It looks beige. Does shelf paper deteriorate?

I used to fire my kilns in my kitchen but have room in the garage in our new house. It was colder (low of 40 F0 and rainy when I fired. Does the garage need to be heated?

Thanks in advance for your kind assistance.

Diane

[DonMcClennen]

It should not make any difference what's going on outside (rain, cold etc.) It's what's going on inside the kiln that counts! If all pieces migrated toward centre then I suggest you have some kind of vibration going on. Put just a few pieces back in and run a monitored test firing.. try to figure out what is causing garage floor/kiln vibration. Check to make sure your kiln shelf is level. Storing a kiln should not cause any problems... yours looks to be in good shape!

[Marty]

Thinfire shrinkage is my guess.

(oops, Jim Hobbyist got it first)

[dianes]

Thank you both for your input. I will try another fire with scrappy pieces and keep you posted.