An Amaco authorized kiln repair man, Rogier has been maintaining and repairing kilns for over thirty five years. His clients include the Indianapolis Public Schools, the Vigo County School Corporation, the Northeast School Corporation, the South Vermillion School Corporation, the Southwest School Corporation, as well as numerous other school corporations in the Midwest.  Should your school's kiln be broken or need attention ,please do not hesitate to make use of the "800" number below or send Rogier an E-mail with all the pertinent kiln information.  On Amaco kilns all the important numbers and information are stamped in the metal nameplate on the side of the kiln. Model number, serial number, Voltage and  Phase. When you do call, have all that information handy. Just in case you read this in "Timbuktu" and to save on the "800" number phone bill, please realize that Rogier travels mostly in Indiana and border areas of neighboring states. A service call to California or Maryland just would not be cost effective :-) So, if you live in the Midwest and have a kiln problem go ahead and make that call or send that E-mail. Rogier  will be happy to discuss your needs and quote you a realistic and honest evaluation!

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By now everyone knows that I’ve been around kilns for over forty years. It never ceases to amaze me how little those who are trained to teach the next generation know about firing kilns…  This being MY web site and being an opinionated sort of guy I can spout off a little. Again!  ;-)

The other day I was called upon to repair an Amaco AH 25SF. Smaller cousin to the AH 30SF, the “25” is on of the larger front loaders. Like most Amaco kilns this model too carries a five-year warranty and is one of the more popular school kilns. As is the case with the AH 30,  the “25” has elements in the floor. Highly recommended by the factory and “those in the know” (like yours truly…) operators are encouraged to place a false bottom on top of 1” shelf supports on the floor of the kiln to protect the elements from possible explosions and the resulting “smithereens”. Now everyone knows that “explosions” happen, either because the kiln is fired too fast, or the ware in the kiln was not quite dry when the firing cycle began… It is one thing to have explosions, quite another thing to not realize that the resulting debris and smithereens need to be cleaned out…. The kiln pictured below suffered multiple explosions.  At no time were the smithereens vacuumed out. As a result  the bottom element grooves filled up with glaze and clay particles. So many explosions took place and so many smithereens were the result that the element grooves filled up to the point of embedding the element coil in lava… Each subsequent firing resulted in more melting and re-melting  of the lava and it should be considered a miracle that the heavy-duty elements lasted two years before giving up the ghost…  Warranty does NOT cover this blatant kind of disregard of basic house keeping rules and operating guidelines!  Good thing Amaco is such a nice company to do business with! Amaco kilns are built to withstand abuse and they can be repaired to top notch “as new condition”. It would of course be better if the universities did a better job of training our future teachers in the correct operating procedures of these very expensive pieces of equipment! The AH 25 retails for “only” $ 5495.00 and like all AH or HF Amaco kilns has a lifespan of forty to fifty years IF PROPERLY TAKEN CARE OFF!  Ah well, as I mentioned earlier, things like this keep me in business… It took some doing, but once the floor brick and all the lava was chiseled out, and the floor was rebuilt with new brick and new bottom elements, were installed the kiln was like new again. As part of the repair, the operators also received a “mouthful” as well as a copy of the manual “Of Clay, Glazes and Kilns” in which basic operating procedures and a few other bits and pieces of information are discussed.  To purchase YOUR copy of “Of Clay, Glazes and Kilns” please hit the link on the opening page of the web site.

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So you over fired your kiln?  Got lava?  Call me, I'll fix it!

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Once in a while it is necessary to rebuild a kiln (in this case, a couple)
in the field. No problem! All new block insulation, new fire brick and new
elements and in "no time" the kilns were as new....such expertise...;-)
Should you or your school have a problem with your kiln, please do not
hesitate to make use of the "800" number.

Here is an over-fired AH30, the Cadillac of the Amaco line of school kilns.  Badly over-fired, it was rebuilt and the kiln is ready to serve the school again.

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The most popular school kiln is the Amaco HF 97. These so called "box" kilns are far superior to the round or octagonal "hobby" kilns. Amaco kilns are heavily insulated (unlike most hobby kilns) and easily have a life span of thirty, forty even fifty years. The oldest Amaco kiln I ever worked on was a AH 10 front loader that was fifty four years old at the time (1997) that I repaired it . To the best of my knowledge it is STILL working ! The HF 97 top loader pictured here is eight years old, was over fired four years ago, but still worked fine. It was moved recently and sustained quite a bit of additional brick damage. All the elements are broken. The kiln will be rebuild with new brick and new elements at a cost of under HALF the replacement cost ($3000.00) Once rebuild the kiln will be like new, and, barring any other over-firings or moving will serve the school for many more years to come.

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 Amaco front-loading kilns, like the AH series are notorious for their longevity. All too often though I encounter front loaders that suffer from element "creepitis". The pictures show a very common situation, which lead to premature element burn out that is totally preventable. Elements expand during heating and contract during cooling. When installing new elements there must be a certain amount of tension on the elements in order for them to return to their original position upon cooling.  Elements that are installed ³loosely² into the element holders and not under tension will creep and sag and eventually sag so much that they will short out... as illustrated in the close up picture on the right. The exposed loops will sag so much that they touch each other thus shorting out the elementŠ. Most of the AH series kilns have three series of four elements and  are built so well that they can attain  a temperature of around 1855 degrees Fahrenheit (cone 06) on only four elements. When one element in a series of four fails, all four elements in that series will not workŠ..Having shorted out elements because of "creepitis" is no fun as the firing cycle will seemingly "take forever"! Pinning the "sags" in place with kanthal wire staples may be a temporary "fix", but eventually the elements will short out. Of course that will happen when you least expect it! Have your elements installed by someone who KNOWS how to do it!! Save your school corporation some money in the long run too!

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This seems like a good place to spout off a little :-)

I’ve been working on kilns and been around art teachers for almost forty years now and every once in a while I am thoroughly amazed at the…well …you can fill in my choice of words here yourself.

Here’s a sad tale about a perfectly good kiln suffering a totally unnecessary over-firing

          Got a phone call from a school administrator the other day. Could I please come and check out their kiln. It seemed to have over fired.  So I hopped in the old Suburban (244-plus thousand miles, running, still, like a sewing machine, thank you!) and drove 240 miles to check the kiln out. A twenty-year-old HF 105 with a kiln sitter with limit timer. Over fired all right…imagine my surprise when I saw why it had over fired…First of all the timer had not been properly calculated to back up the melting of the Junior cone and secondly the veteran art teacher, who should have known better, had used a full size large cone in the kiln sitter tube assembly…. The picture below shows what it looked like!  The good folks at Orton (makers of the ceramic cones) as well as yours truly have been telling the art populace for years NOT to EVER do that!  In the picture you can clearly see how the weight of the large cone is responsible for NOT letting the cone rod down enough to kick off the kiln sitter…. I TOLD YOU NOT TO DO THAT!  Should you not know the formula to calculate the timer of the kiln sitter in relation to the kiln temperature may be you should purchase my manual?

          Even though both the junior cone and the standard size cone are marked the same (05,06 or whatever) they behave quite differently when used in a kiln sitter tube assembly. It is NEVER a good idea to use a large cone in a kiln sitter tube assembly. There are those who would argue with me and say that it is all right to break off the tip of a large cone and use it instead of a junior cone…HEY! How much does a box of little cones cost? It just is not worth it in my humble (you call that humble?) opinion!  Of course if you insist on using large cones, go right ahead, your malpractice keeps me in business!

          Pictured below is a mock up of the cone that I salvaged out of the over fired HF105. One can clearly see how the weight of the large cone “body” prevents the downward travel of the cone rod. The other picture shows the proper way to install a junior cone in a kiln sitter tube assembly.

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