Rogue Train Kiln Handbook 1.1

Philosophy

The owners of Woodland Sun homestead, Jane Anderson and Monty Zukowski, offer invited wood-fire community members to participate in wood firing events. The firings aim to be cooperative mindful learning and firing adventures.

  • Put tools back where you found them
  • Give everyone a chance to do the job
  • Work toward being a cooperative group
  • Hydrate
  • If you have a question, ask
  • Take pictures of your team working
  • Sign in and sign out of shifts
  • Fill out your release form

 

Arriving

Please do not bring a guest without getting permission from us first. Do not bring your pets!

Woodland Sun is near Jacksonville Oregon. We’ll provide the address to participants. The gate requires a code which we will also provide. Watch out for deer and other wildlife on the way. Drive slowly. This is private property and people are allowed on our property by invitation only. You will need to sign a waiver form in order to participate.

After driving about 3/4 of a mile down our gravel driveway, you will see our house on the left. Turn right and head down to the kiln area.

Loading Thursday 11AM

All pieces need to be wadded to keep them from sticking to shelves. Be generous with your wadding to make pieces as stable as possible. Bring your work fully wadded before the loading or you can arrive early on the loading day to wad. Loaders will select and arrange a shelf’s worth of work to hand to the person inside stacking the shelves. Pieces may be designated to be in front, middle or back and we’ll do our best to accommodate those wishes. We will candle the kiln overnight after loading.

  • Load with 3 ranks in the front, 2 in the back to make one stoking alley in the back as wide as possible.
  • Make sure cones are visible and not blocked by posts.
  • Be protective of the ware along the stoking alley. It may get knocked by wood.
  • Wadding on posts dries very quickly, so wad top and bottom of posts and place shelf on posts immediately

Firing Friday-Sunday

Monty and a crew of experienced woodfirers will manage the firing. Each team will pair experienced people with inexperienced people. If you cannot do a complete firing shift, we will work with you to fill out that shift with others. Our shut down target is Sunday evening around 6PM.

Morning shift is 6AM-2PM. Evening Shift is 2PM-10PM. Night Shift is 10PM-6AM. Please arrive a little early to transition shifts on time.

Unloading Saturday

Arrive after 11:00 AM. We will begin to pull out pots at 11:30 and do some group organizing for cleanup. After unloading we will grind and kiln wash shelves and tend to the kiln. A pot of chili will be available for lunch in your freshly fired bowl.

Cleanup Sunday

We will process wood for the next firing and finish any cleaning/grinding/kiln washing that needs to be done to prepare for the next firing.

Accommodations

All accommodation arrangements must be made in advance. Bring your own drinking water. We don’t have potable water at the kiln site.

There’s an outhouse style bathroom in the studio. No shower is available.

We have space for camping with a tent or a camper or your car. Parking is mostly flat, we have planks to level your vehicle if needed.

For crew only we have available a tiny house and an A-Frame camper.

There are also hotels nearby in Medford. Most of our participants are local and some may also be willing to host someone.

Food

Please come prepared to be self contained. Bring your own food and drinks, and if you like, food and drink to share. We have a gas grill and gas stove that are available for use, and a few kitchen utensils available. It’s best to bring your own camping stuff and be self contained if you can. We’ll have a chili/potluck lunch the afternoon of our unloading.

Things we have to cook with:

  • 2 burner propane stove
  • propane BBQ
  • limited pots, pans and implements
  • some dishes and silverware

Your Ceramics

You must mark your work so we can identify it while unloading. The kiln ranges from cone 10-12 depending on placement. Everything should be bisqued between ^010-^06. Bisquing to lower temperatures can improve the possibility of flashing, but are also more fragile. Different zones of the kiln will accumulate different amounts of ash, the closer to the front, the more ash. At the loading you will have the opportunity to share your preferences and place your pieces.

Everone has a limit to their space. If you don’t have a good handle on how much space that is, please measure! We’re counting on you to be accurate, but you can also bring a bit extra to help us fill out the kiln if necessary.

Here at Woodland Sun the outside of woodfired pieces should not be glazed, though they can be slipped. Often in woodfiring just the interior of functional work is glazed. No pieces will be fired which have glaze on the exterior lower third of the piece due to the risk of the glaze dripping and fusing to the shelf. Clay, slip and glaze recommendations are at the end of this guide.

We will have a wadding team but encourage you to wad your own work. You can learn more about wadding for wood firing from this great article on Ceramics Arts Network https://ceramicartsnetwork.org/docs/default-source/uploadedfiles/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/wadding-for-wood-firing-bonus.pdf, or on youtube videos such as https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HHZM63txniM

Our wadding is 1:1:1 fireclay:sand:sawdust. Other recipies should be OK, just let us know what it is.

Shells can be used as wadding. The best shells to use are scallop shells that are on the thick side. Other ridged shells work too, including bay clams from this area. Avoid thin shells. Shells with no ridges won’t read as strongly as shells on the work but may leave interesting marks nonetheless. Please bring your own shells. We would like to start a community shell bin.

Safety

If possible bring your own safety gear, including safety glasses, a respirator, ear protection, gloves, leather boots (or at the least, not synthetic shoes which can melt.)

Wear clothing that is not flammable

Raincoats, fleece, puffy jackets – anything that is synthetic or blend, will melt or catch fire. Natural stuff like cotton, wool or leather is great. The perfect outfit is work attire such as denim or Carhartts, leather boots and a non-flammable hat and leather work gloves.

We maintain a limited supply of eye, ear, and dust protection, as well as safety equipment like welding gloves and leather jacket for the firing crew.

Some big safety rules:

  • never look into the hot (cone 1 and up) kiln without shade 5 or higher glasses
  • always use eye protection when using any tool, especially axes and rotating tools
  • always wear closed toe shoes and pants when firing
  • be mindful of fire safety and know where fire extinguishers are
  • never do anything you don’t feel comfortable doing. Tell someone and hand it off.
  • Nobody uses the brick saw without Monty’s supervision
Age restricted products

Woodland Sun Policy: Responsible, legal use is OK. Smokers please respect others and smoke on the road only. Never ever litter. Be mindful that alcohol is very dehydrating with heat and can interrupt you from doing a good job. Woodland Sun is family and student friendly, and there may be minors present during some parts fo the firing. In short: don’t break the law, have fun, and be responsible.

Connectivity

We have spotty cell service at the kiln and no wifi. There is wifi named “Poorman Creek” near the house. There is a landline in the house for emergencies.

These are the flexible, forgiving materials that will respond well to the kiln and yeild the best chance for success and are readily available.

Clays: Cone 10 clay is strongly recommended. Avoid red clay bodies. Porcelain generally works well, as do porcelaneous stoneware bodies.

Recommended:

  • Umpqua White ^10
  • Big White ^10
  • OH Woodfire ^10
  • Helmer Kaolin ^10
  • Soldate 60

Rogue Valley Pottery Supply has:

  • Stoney White
  • Three Fingered Jack

Southern Oregon Clay Distributors has:

  • Stoney White

Georgies has:

  • Deschutes White with Old Hickory ^10
  • Three Fingered Jack ^10
  • Crystal Springs Porcelain ^10

Slips: For some ideas look at http://www.davidwbolton.com/uploads/5/5/1/4/55145091/clc_flashing_slips.pdf

Glazes: Glazes are generally only used on the inside of functional ware.

Thanks to Joe Robinson of East Creek for his guides which inspired our guide.