PYRAMIDS AND POT MELTS

Catchy phrase and my plan for my next pieces.  This is a shades of blue melt to which I added some white and clear glass, approximately 13 grams of glass which will flow onto my kiln shelf unfettered.

Using the following schedule as recommended:

250dph....................................................1100 degrees............................hold 15 mins
450dph....................................................1685 degrees............................hold 1 hour
Full..........................................................1520 degrees............................hold 15 mins
Full............................................................900 degrees............................hold 3 hours
100dph.......................................................800 degrees...........................hold 1 hour
100dph.......................................................650 degrees...........................hold 15 mins
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So this came out alright, using about 13 ounces of glass which I let flow unfettered and that turned into a circle 1/4 inch thick with about a    inch wide radius.

It contained some yellow which was left on the mold from the previous pot melt and thus it is so amazing that it plays such a big role in the color scheme.  Colors I included were two shades of blue, white and some clear.  Here is a previous example of a pot melt where I believe I used less that 10 ounces of glass, largely blue and I dripped it onto a circle of clear.  Too much clear here I think.

 And also I might have liked it more, although I do like it alot, if I had held it a little longer and allowed more glass to melt.

So-o-o-o-o now I am moving to pyramid mold 8948.  I purchased Bullseye Frit especially made for casting clarity and I also choose medium frit, so I fired it once following the suggested firing schedule from Bullseye but instead of holding it for 2 hours at 1525, I held it to 1 hour and 45 minutes.  Their suggested firing schedule is for a much bigger kiln then mine and mine has a ceramic brick top which holds in a lot of heat, so hopefully my shortening the hold period by 15 minutes wont make a big difference.  I cut up some squares from a piece of dichroic glass that I have on black and placed the square around the periphery of the pyramid and i fired.  As predicted the piece shrunk or compacted itself quite a bit.  The instructions I read said to open the kiln at the processing temperature after the piece has soaked some time to see if it is ready, however I am still afraid to open the kiln when it is at its highest temperature, even though I have protective gear.  So-o-o-o after it cooled off, I opened the kiln, saw that the casting had shrunk, put some more of the frit in it and am now running it through the kiln at the same schedule I used the first time.  I hope this is correct.

200 dph....................1225 degrees...........................hold 1 hour
600dph......................1525 degrees.................hold 1 hour 45 mins
Full............................900 degrees...............................hold 1 hour
6 dph.........................800 degress..................................hold 00
12 degrees..................700 degrees.................................00
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