[Clayart] Bisque firing

[Rick Mahaffey]

Carol,
We use a conservative schedule at school.  We hold at 180f for 3 hours, then go up at 100-150f per hour to 250f.  Then hold 3-4 hours.  We fire at 150f per hour to 1500f then hold for 45 minutes ( to lake sure the organ is are burned out). Then up at 125 per hour to finish temp ( we go up to 1900f due to the mix of stoneware and some of the various porcelains that Clay Art Center sells all cone 10 clays).  We hold for 15 minutes at 1900 to be sure the heat penetration is even with student work of varying thickness.

As I said it is conservative and I am sure you can speed things up considerably with thinner work.  The early holds can be shortened as well.   I think you can safely go faster once you pass the second hold as well.

Rick Mahaffey
Tacoma Community College

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