How To Make A Lab Kiln - The Heating Coils
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 10 มิ.ย. 2020
- If you want to have a look at those special videos become a member and join by clicking this link / @thinkingandtinkering
You can buy my books and materials for your own projects from our webshop at secure.workingink.co.uk/worki... - วิทยาศาสตร์และเทคโนโลยี
How could anyone be bored with any of your videos?
I know right! lol - but I can drag on a bit apparently
Double up your straight resistance wire at the ends and twist it. This lowers the resistance at the ends and stops the wire glowing on the outside of your kiln near your electronics.
They not supposed to glow. They will be hot, but not red hot.
The higher temperature of the conductor - the higher its resistance, coil heating faster because each of its turns heat itself and 2 neighbour turns + it is insulated with brick from 3 sides, so coiled part of the wire will heat faster, it would have higher resistance and because of higher resistance will generate more heat, while straight ends of the wire outside will stabilize at some 300-400C. This is common thing when straight ends of the heating coil not glowing, but the coil already yellow hot.
you can do mate - but there is no real need
@@ThinkingandTinkering In professional kilns the heating elements always have twisted(double) wires at the ends. This is also to avoid breaking the brittle threads when doing maintenance
Seems easy to do, and reduces the heat at the wire connections and near the electronics.
The knowledge gained from these public videos is enormous. I don't mind plugging Robert's worth when paying a very small monthly fee for the extra content, well worth it! About time, after all these years, that Robert is earning from his abundant knowledge and skills that he shares with us so fluently.
thank you mate for taking the time to say so and it is well appreciated
I'd watch for an hour:) that's the neatest coil I think I've seen!
awesome mate - and I have made a few - you get better with practice lol
There is huge confusion in the USA as to what the mains voltage is, it is 120V +/- 6%, and has been since 1967, not 110, 115 118 125 or 130 etc, the confusion arises because of how the grid evolved and was stitched together over 100 years, compounded by the fact that some appliance manufacturers still printed the wrong voltage the things they made for many decades after 1967. At my house I get 119.7V
127V at the UPS input at my knee. Nuclear power station about 5 hours away, so we get the high line. Most north American appliances will actually be getting angry with 110v.
it's why you put a lot of safety in mate I added 20% as a margin - that's quite a lot lol
+6% is 125-6 or 7😅
You are a total legend chap, I have been eyeing up a kiln which needs an overhaul and your vids are amazing.
Keep up the amazing work. Your channel is amazing. Thank you.
awesome mate - thank you for taking the time to say so
@@ThinkingandTinkering you're welcome Robert. Credit where credit is due.
If i may bother you,
Do you have any videos of silicon carbide doping for semiconductors?
I wonder how big and flexible they can be.
Really do appreciate these build videos, TH-cam may well be awash with "how-to guides" and diy tutorials but by and large they're made by people who understand their craft but not the art of teaching it to others of no experience. These vids are like WYSIWYG in Laymans terms... Now thats how you teach... Kudos
This Chanel is such a perfect resource for me thank you very much for several years now.
Thanks for making it so simple!
Glad it was helpful!
I have an old kiln with good bricks, This is a great video for me.
Again Robert, I enjoy your videos so much. As an Aviation maintenance technician, I find your videos the best on the internet. As a teacher of Aeronautical Sciences, I can say that you have taught me so much. Please never stop! Your approach and choices of subject matter is really fascinating. I share your results with my student.
Thanks again!
Mark
Thanks for that mate - glad you like the channel
Great stuff, awesome tip on looking for a broken kiln. Found a big one local with broken electrics for cheap with great bricks!
I see coil winding in my future
it's what I did mate and to be honest I don't worry about doing weird and wonderful things - I have broken that kiln I showed you 3 times already - but as I can rewire it it was no real worry to me - if you have paid thousands and need hundreds to repair it - you do ten to be a bit more careful and worried lol
In
As others have said, many thanks for a great video. Think anything like this could comfortably be 30 minutes if you're expecting people to sit and watch in a single viewing or an hour if you're expecting people to pause it at various points to take notes.
I mentioned on an earlier video about doing some wind turbine experiments, I've had a bit of a setback in the form of an argument with an eBay seller over electrical ratings. Expect a ranting video from me over the coming days as I tear into the seller if they don't offer me an acceptable solution... Once it's resolved one way or other, I'll get the thing up on a pole and take some measurements, really inspired by a lot of the recent videos on this channel as I work through my own alternative power system. Thanks again Robert, keep up the great work.
yeah I have been having trouble with eBay sellers recently I am trying to get the stuff together for a flash graphene experiment - it has proved a nightmare and I have no idea why - so - good luck with it mate and cheers
Great job and info, looking forward to part 3
Coming soon mate
Brilliant! Thanks so much - now I understand a simple kiln, can make or repair one and do a load of things I've always wanted to do with one.
I really like your videos, I appreciate all the knowledge U provide, you're awesome & a great instructor. Sometimes U speak of how much $ U spent on certain projects, but I often wonder (& end up googling) how quid compare to U.S. dollars...lol.
Absolutely awesome. Thank you so much for this video it's great. I wish it was longer.
lol - cheers for that
Excellent! I’ve been waiting this 😀
fantastic mate
Holy sh*t, taking physics in undergrad as a biochem major I never thought I would ever use any of it. Granted I don't for grad school, but hearing about resisters in parrallel and series, as well as V=IR has got me so excited to make a kiln. Finally, I can say some of that awful awful math was useful to me!
You sir, are an artist. ( Spotted the chuck key in the background of another video and I did wonder )
thanks mate - cheers
Thanks for the easy to follow video! Out of interest i'm not here to make a kiln but i have learned exactly what i needed. I'm making a home made vacuum former using kiln wire as my heating element :)
Looking forward to the setup of the PID! I have all the parts to put this together (boxed up when I moved house). It's great information. Thank you.
awesome mate
Great video. Not boring at all. I have a box of heating coils and various ceramic insulators. Watching this video gave me some thoughts to experiment with. Have looked for firebrick locally but could not find any but that was some time ago. Thank You for all you do to get knowledge out there.
Get on your local gumtree or such and search for old kilns😉
cheers mate - I do worry about that lol
Fantastic video, you are a true inspiration !!!
Thanks for the video. I've had an old kiln in the attic that couldn't be repaired by the manufacturer (they no longer make the parts). Now I can do it. Thanks
that is awesome mate
Videos are not too long cuz there's so much information packed into it, great project. Let's see the finished project soon..
it is a finished project mate - the whole project is on video and on the channel
That coil turned out nice 👍
cheers mate - I have made a few and you do get better with practice lol
I'm always happy to gain new knowledge
awesome mate - cheers
While it's probably true that some people would not watch an hour long video, I definitely would! Splitting this up into multiple videos is probably easier on you, so go with whatever works best for you good sir. We're just happy to watch each new thing you upload.
cheers mate
Awesome always enjoy your videos. Thanks for just' simplifying '
Robert, Robert:; you crack me up man! Considering most people have the attention span of a goldfish, are you really surprised they don't watch lengthy videos? I wouldn't miss a moment of your videos, they're priceless; both for the instructive content and just the lift I get from your obvious passion for creativity and sharing your enthusiasm with us... Brilliant work thanks for this instruction Robert....................Tim
cheers mate - thanks for the support and for taking the time to write
Top again today, by the way.... the solid state relays have a zero-pass detector and a softstart built in.
Thank you for creating this wonderful kind of further education.
cheers mate and thanks for the info
Great project thanks for sharing.
Thank you too mate
Thanks for such great information , enjoying all your videos 👍
cheers mate
I like the way you wound the coil. Easy peasey for sure. Keep up the great work fella. Peace too. VF
cheers mate
Awesome I need to build one and this really helps thanks mate
Great job ! 👍👍👍
cheers mate
For better acuracy and clarity, a heating coil isn't just pure resistance. Every alternating current carrying conductor including heating coils have inductive reactance. Although, the relativly few turns and long length of coil and lack of a high magnetic permeability core (compared to an electromagnet) means you can practically ignore the low inductive reactance in an electric heating coil.
for some reason, when you mentioned coils in the first video, I was under the impression this would be an inductance heating kiln, using strong magnetic fields to melt stuff, but this way is good too, and probably simpler. nice video, keep it up :)
cheers mate
Small detail but it is worth making some small squares with the ceramic fibre and cut a slot in the fibre and use it to surround the tails at the back of the kiln to block the hole where the tails come through,Also push some fibre through the hole to block the heat and fumes coming through from the kiln chamber .It saves energy but the main thing is to save the connectors from seizing up,.which can make repairs difficult.
Love the video! I appreciate you filling in the details such as the heating element connections. Very clear explanation and audio (and thank you for leaving out the bloody loud background music)!
BTW heat is bad for electronics, especially power electronics. Relocating the SSRs (Solid State Relays) away from anything that is hot enough to glow during operation, preferably mounted on a heat sink (strip of 1.5mm or thicker aluminum at least) and maybe even with a cooling fan, seems good.
There is inductance in the coils, however the reactance is proportional to frequency; at a 60Hz AC line frequency the reactance is negligible. If this was running at, say, 1MHz or above it would matter.
A fuse in the plug may eventually blow, because it'll run a bit warm; may want to have a spare on hand.
BTW at 11:20, I think you meant the bar was 1.2 cm (not mm).
These cheap, Chinese ssr 's need to be well under rated I've found. Instead of,say, a back to back pair of thyristors on a thick, copper base they are usually one triac on a piece of aluminium with an over long screw which often protrudes and affects heat transfer to a heatsink.
They are not 50 quid like, say a Croydon from RS, but you get what you pay for and I've found it means you pay more than once!
Might be a topic for discussion re under rating and filing the base ?
Enjoying the vids.
I derate Chinese parts by 2/3 generally. Some still get me.
yeah they do blow but it is a piece of cake to change them out - I have had them in the large kiln for over 2 years now - so when they blow it is a nuisance but only a nuisance not a nightmare
@@AtlasReburdened I would use 1/4 and still expect trouble.
@@ThinkingandTinkering I've had 2 years out of one too, suitably under run ( and safety fused, as they can often fail short circuit mode!) but I get 30 years from an Internation Rectifier or similar propper SSR I might have 'found' in a works parts bin.
But obviously the cost isn't justified for a small, home kiln like this for most people.
If you can immerse your kiln in an inert gas [or devise a way to fill it with the inert gas] you can greatly extend the life of the coils, as well as prevent the atmosphere from reacting with the items one is firing or heat treating.
That said, I do not say it is anything easy, so its fairly impractical, unless you have a way to put a relatively gas tight box around the kiln which you can close up when you are closing up the kiln so that you can flood the kiln with argon or some other inert gas
I fully recognize that for most people, this is not necessarily worth the price or the effort, so its more of just a 'point aside' for the really nerdy nerds, especially people like me, who would actually add nitrogen for the express purpose of nitriding metals.
When heat treating a piece of metal, to me, it is a real pain to have to deal with destructive oxidization [scale] which can ruin the surface value of an item [such as a pricey, fancy knife or sword].
it doesn't need to be gas tight you just need to match the flow rate with the loss rate - but you are right it is much more than folks need for most of the time lol
Really love your videos 😀
awesome mate - cheers
Kilns made before 1976 often used asbestos so if buying a very old kiln it might be a good idea to get to know what asbestos board looks like and other forms of asbestos.If you don't mind working with asbestos you might be able to charge the would be seller for removing the kiln.
I don't mind the long videos, great job as always
thanks for the kind words mate - cheers
I agree with other comments. It's been a long held media assumption that people want "short and sharp". But that's proved to be false, taking for example the world's most popular podcast, Joe Rogan who's episodes regularly exceed 3 hours! I think the type of people watching your videos, myself included, are the type who are genuinely interested in what you have to say - all of it. You're clearly someone with an incredibly broad and advanced knowledge base, and me, like many relish in the opportunity to learn from what you have to share. Please, never let time be an issue, let the quality and content of what your sharing determine the time and not vice versa.
Honestly Rob, you could do 8 hrs of livestream from the lab and you would have an avid audience. You'd just need someone to insert interesting content for bathroom breaks, like what's in your store! I'd tune in for those Eureka!! moments for sure. Crank up some tunes, whistle or think out loud as you do. Imagine the compilation videos of wisdom and laughter! Cheers & be well.
lol - it's an idea mate
Great video
cheers mate
Great stuff Rob. Your winding of the coils reminded me of learning to make chain mail years back. Seems like I coiled up miles around a bit of bent rod stock, for a manual crank handle, jammed through two holes drilled through an old .50 cal. ammo box used to catch the links. Fun memories, though I'll wager your coils will be far more useful for modern purpose than my chain mail hauberk was! :)
lol - I don't know mate - the chain mail sounds awesome
Well lol - It's a great way to get some fantastic repetitive circular pattern bruises when fighting in it at the S.C.A. (and looking cool at parties..;) outside of those two (and perhaps as a survival suit when giving the cat a bath) I haven't really found much use for it. Your kiln on the other hand...I can see lots of uses for. :)
I love your approach. Just a thought on sizing the heater coil. A more important factor is how hot you want the wire to get. Your calculation in the video is for the minimum length (maximum amperage). You probably need half of that, which reduces the temperature of the wire and extends its longevity. The wire has a life versus temperature curve. What you need is the heat loss versus temperature, easily calculated for that geometry and thermal conductivity of the fire brick. That establishes your minimum power required, from which you can then determine the required amperage and resistance. Compare this to the power available, and hopefully you can pick a point between these two limits - minimum power required versus maximum power available. Lower power also means your controller has an easier time staying on temperature.
thanks for sharing that mate - cheers
Great stuff. New subscriber.
Awesome, thank you!
One channel I like to watch, Shadon HKW, recently did a video on how he makes coils for kilns that he builds for sale. He included several interesting tips. One tip that was mentioned was to double and twist the ends of the wire together to reduce the resistance and heat until the wire is actually in the kiln. That saves having red hot wires outside the kiln and going into the relay.
I will check it out - cheers mate
Once your project is completed it would be funny to see you bake a loaf of bread in it. Great video, looking forward to the next. Cheers.
lol - cheers mate - I am probably going to make some gCN in it
@@ThinkingandTinkering I have no idea what gCN is..
I nearly watch or listen to you for hours a day while I do my thing anyway! Your like background noise that I learn from! So , the optimal video length for me would be an 8 hour live stream, lol!!!
lol - cheers mate
I hadn't noticed it being long, onto the next
Make your coil ending a bit longer, bend them back to the coil and twist them, so you have double wires going into the heating chamber. It spread the current, lowering the temperature on the outside wiring and keep the wire colder when going through the holes (which cannot dissipate the heat, leading to a failure point).
Thanks for the tip mate - but you really don't need to bother - I have used this arrangement in my big kiln for four years and had no issues
very helpful, thanks!
glad you liked it mate - cheers
Genius!!
glad you like it mate - cheers
Thanks. Just thought if you have a small furnace you could make use of your mwave transformer secondary with really thick wire elements and a bonus of mains isolation!
for sure mate
Curious about the effect the diameter of the coil has on the temp of the coil. You determined the size of your coil based on the size of your channel but I read somewhere in an old pdf that the Diameter of the coil affects the performance. My question is how? smaller coil = hotter element? Anyone know this relationship?
Gracias por compartir amigo.
de nada
I love all of your vids! What do you use your kiln for? I'm asking because I blow glass and would love to see what you make. I'm in the process of setting up our property with wind and solar and your videos have helped out a lot. If love to hear back from you and look forward to more videos! Keep up the good work!
we would watch
awesome, ive been looking for screw connectors to interface power to some heater coils as i am rebuilding a small jewelry vacuum atmosphere kiln. found some bannaa plug connects in the back of the vacuum chamber are for the power, got a good k type sensor and controller, sadly im going to have to so the kaowool and waterglass direction for the insulation, because its round and odd sized.
that is a shame because it will limit your temp - but as long as you hold it down below 800 or so it'll be fine
When using coils in parallel you need to make sure their ohms are the same or one will draw more than the other.
Also what type of wire are you using, stainless, titanium or something else?
One last question, do you use a thermostat in the kiln or is that something you have not got to yet. I only ask because I don't remember you drilling a hole for one.
for sure mate on the resistors in parallel - I am using Kanthal and I will be using a K type thermocouple with a PID controller
Making them balanced makes sense if you want equal amounts of heat in each. Making them exactly balanced is not be a strict requirement, if it makes sense to put more heat into one area than another. However the lower resistance coil, if otherwise identical, is going to get hotter and have a shorter life.
Great series on kiln building. Any reason not to use a electric stove top spiral heating element in a kiln instead of using nichrome wire?
These are cool are there ceramic element who could be more efficient?
i'm thinking maybe u can use ur ink to make a new type of kiln
i guess this method can reduce the size of the kiln to only the size of the the cup that is holding the material u want to heat
another idea
same ink can be applied to clay pot then put inside a microwave
i've seen someone do that on youtube i dont remember why guess it was a pottery application for his ink and it got out glowing red
sorry if those ideas were already applied or thought of by you, i still havent got through all ur so much valuable videos
wish i could replicate each and every thing u share but its really really hard to get the materials
for now i'm still trying to find ammonium chloride or even ammonia to try make a graphene from sugar and that i will replace the kiln if i get ammonium chloride with good old fire and i will try the pipe fitting trick for that "i'll make sure to keep it a lil bit loose for air to escape "
thanks again for all the knowledge u share
cheers
Most interesting. Your video has just galvanised me into doing what I have been thinking of doing for quite a while now and that is, building an electric kiln. So, would you be using Kanthal or Nicrome wire for your heater elements. The reason I ask is because I believe that I had read somewhere that Kanthal has a lesser tendency to spall / oxidise / or otherwise fail due to moisture, thermal shock etc etc. I could be wrong of course...
I use Kanthal mate - it gives a good life - not forever obviously - but good
I think Robert might be surprised at how many of us would watch an hour-long video.
Just came across this build, thanks Rob.
I'm planning to build an electric kiln for knife making & finding it immensely difficult to find out how much wire to use & size etc...
I must be a bit of a dummy I guess but as clear as your video is…for most people if find the info confusing, online calculators etc...don’t help either, maybe someone can help.
My kiln is very small internal is about 200x200x400.
I need it to get to 1100c for heat treating stainless steel.
What size circuit breaker do I need?
Whats the best size Kanthal wire to use?
What diameter & length should I coil the wire at?
Can anyone help?
Hi many thanks for all the information and easy build instructions. I can source insulating fire brick, cement and ceramic blanket from Vitcas UK but I'm struggling to source 1.2mm 1.72 ohm resistence wire ? non on e-bay or amazon and can't find it via google, any sugestions ?
Thanks for your time. Danny
I was looking at the *flash graphene* stuff, I was waiting for more news to leak as I cannot access the paper, turns out your video with water welding machine prove it can be possible lol and your lab kiln is the remaining hints!
- the main requirement is temperature above 2000°c celsius in an instant, typical electric arc can reach up to 6000°c I found out, graphite rod melt at 3600°c, so this requirement is easy to obtain
- there is unspecified amount of pressure applied (so far)
- the material of the electrode is unspecified
- quartz casing is mention, but quartz melt at below the required temperature, I think it's protected by the speed of the reaction, I wonder what other material would be used and not react.
Sound like a kitchen experiment to me lol
I have looked at it - still waiting for parts - I have ordered twice and had the orders refunded - I am guessing cover screw up - but I will get round to it sooner or later
Building one now getting rdy cut coil ports in brick
When finished, I'd love to watch you use your $50 Kiln to turn $5 worth of Granular Urea into $500 worth of [Iodized] graphitic Carbon Nitride...It wont take much of that doing to really make the whole project worthwhile. Then, try that material on cheap commercial GoreTex, for comparison to standard Platinum/Nafion for PEM Fuel Cell and Electrolyzer applications. Being perhaps two Orders-of-Magnitude cheaper, it doesn't have to be quite as good to have profound applications. The reason for pursuing that is that both the gCN and the IgCN Impregnated GoreTex would be very easy, high-margin materials for FWG to make and add to your store, along with the Conductive Inks. If you can manage to get the IgCN/GoreTex even in the ballpark with Platinum/Nafion in terms of performance (as some papers have suggested), it could be your biggest impact on Batteries, SuperCaps, Fuel Cells or Electrolyzers of all.
That's a good idea mate cheers and I have made gCN before - even made a video on it
@@ThinkingandTinkering I know, that's what intrigued me to look it up and see the hidden potential its got. When I priced the Urea @ $200/Tonne vs the gCN @ $200/Kg, the difference floored me! Then I saw that paper about Iodizing it into nanoplatelets with a simple ball mill, and, Wow!
Ohms law on AC love it. Only problem is when the frequency goes up them we are in the impedence zone. Was that about 1.7 ohms per 1 cm or 10 cms.
for sure mate but at 50 or 60 Hz with a massive resistance and very very very tiny inductance and capacitance - would you bother lol
Could you please list the info on the PID controls, thermocouple and the solid start relay.
You kiln me!
Awsome video, electric kiln. What about a gas version?
great video! is there a reason I shouldn't use frax fiber board instead of those heavy firebricks? it seems a hell of a lot lighter. thank you!!
Generally speaking, small DIY kilns use silica fire bricks for the walls and roof of the oven and a more dense and harder fire brick for the floor. Silica bricks are very light and easy to cut and channel with an ordinary hacksaw. Different story for the heavier floor. I would use a diamond or ceramic cutting disk in an angle grinder for that. I am not a safety nazi but inhaling silica particles can lead to silicosis.... Bad way to go. Use a respirator or if you have a problem with that, keep the silica bricks wet when you cut them.
Hey Robert I do also enjoy your vids.
Question can we suggest topics if we join the membership.
yes mate you can
I'm planning on building a small kiln for borosilicate glass annealing and I already have a bunch of copper for the heating coils. Is there a reason I don't want to use copper? If not what do I need to use?
I know this is old but it looks pretty dangerous on 240 volts due to the exposed heater coils at mains voltage. I've seen many similar builds for 120 volts, which is not as bad.
The most dangerous error someone could make would be withdrawing a very hot metal or graphite container and accidentally touching one of those coils.
Options to make safer (admittedly max temperature may be reduced with some of them) would be:
High temperature braid or ceramic tube over the heater coils.
Protection grill over the coils preventing accidental touch.
A door interlock, only allowing power when the door is closed.
Enclosed heating elements, e.g. grill elements for electric ovens. These have the heating coils enclosed in an earthed metal tube with a mineral powder between the tube and element. Most of them can be re-bent to different shapes, alternatively unformed bendable elements are available off the shelf from various suppliers.
I have been wondering about a quartz halogen infrared kiln. Similar to this, but use quartz halogen elements from an old infrared heater. I was thinking of putting them in quartz tubes to protect them from dirt and the rear of the quartz tubes could be silvered or otherwise coated to direct the infrared more inwards.
The issue would be temperature control as the temperature of whatever is being heated could be much higher than the air temperature inside the kiln. It would also depend somewhat on its infrared absorptivity. An infrared thermometer or camera could be used, but a hole or window in the kiln would be needed. For automatic control something like an Arduino could be used connected to the infrared sensor.
I just saw your next video with a door interlock switch on the heater elements!!!
WOW, a safety switch inside a lathe chuck. What will they think of next?
lol
Awesome project. I am wondering were you get these wonderful materials from. Coincidentally i am working on a kiln just like yours but it took me ages to find such fire bricks and even though i got them now i can't start with the building because i can't get hold of a resistive heating wire. Where do you get the wire from? Is it sold commonly where you live? In Austria, where I am, it seems like it isn't sold on the public market. I have to contact companys which produce these items on an industrial level. Do you have any tips for me on how to get such a wire?
ebay mate
When buying the wire, which would the be the more important bit, the diameter or the resistance? Cause I can find a 1.71 Ω per meter but it's .9 mm, the 1.2mm they carry is 0.96Ω.
you can weld the bricks? or what do you mean by welding everything? minute 2:30+. for what would you need to weld other then the case and the case for the display and what else is there?
What's the gauge of the Nicrom wire and do you have a wiring diagram for this
Thank you mate for going into such detail on how to wire up a kiln, Of course I do live in the US and I'm glad you mentioned the gauge wire needed. So would the same relay switch work in the US, I'm assuming it would being that the volts were lower than 110 volt? Again, Thanks mate.
As for the video, it was not even close to being long enough. Oh and LOL, my wife listens to you as I am watching the video, she said she loves the way you talk. She said he has a bit of a story telling voice doesn't he, wouldn't it be nice to just sit back and listen to him talk for hours. See mate, your videos are not even close to long enough, lol
Hey, it might be an idea to have another channel that does bed time stories. Kind of like reading about Tesla and other electronic inventors, that would be awesome. She could fall asleep but my eyes would be wide open on the topics and you could even do them kind of like discovery channel or history channel does, LOL
lol
Do the coils need to be protected in some way to prevent accidental touching of them when they are live? Would it not be quite easy to get an electric shock if you accidentally touch the coils when putting something in or out of the kiln?
mate - this is a kiln like every other kiln - it works like every other kiln - if you don't know how to use a kiln safely, learn that first - you would burn your hand (if you loaded it while it was on - why would you do that?) long before you got a shock
what is a cooker socket/shower socket? it's rated by default to higher amp draw? do you use a "special" socket for your refurbished kiln?
suposedly the answers are yes ... and i don't have a higher rated socket, what i would need to do is mount a higher load fuse to the panel of the house for the circuite i want to use?
15 minute video on the Main Channel
Commentors: Too long!
Hour long video on the Members Channel
Commentors: Too short!
lol - it just goes to show the difference doesn't it mate lol
Thanks Robert. I wish I had seen this video about 2 years ago when I began designing and making my own small kilns and foundries. A problem that has been a regular cause of failure is the elements falling out of the channel, touching something I am heating, invariably becoming a fluxing material for the Nichrome or Alchrome wire and melting my elements. So, will you include some staples or similar fastenings to stop the element from flopping out when it gets beyond 1000˚C? Usually happens to me after a few heat cycles.
I cut my channel quite deep with c cross section mate - to be honest I have never had that problem
Kiln brick is very soft so you could just use some 25 mm threaded rod to grind a trough to hold the elements.
Hi Rob! Any tips on where your resistance wire came from? I'm after rewiring a pottery kiln (small one, 12"cubed) on a 13A plug. Using the old elements I was able to reach 920 degrees C but the goal is ~1300C for stoneware firing. I've seen 'Kanthal A' seems to be popular but I can't seem to find any competitors, and yours looks like it might be something else, as Kanthal's resistance comes in lower per metre than yours. Any idea if your wire is rated as high as 1300C? I'd be grateful on any tips if you can share them.
what material is the cols mad out of & where do we get it from? les Thompson It not a suggest I have much do with kiln thank you tip of weir is it stables?
it's nichrome wire - eBay or amazon have it but there are kin shops that sell it too - a google search for kiln wire will turn it up
Would it be possible to share a link to the resistance wire you used in this video? Thickness of wire obviously affects resistance but how does it affect what temperature it can handle? Do thinner wires break faster under prolonged heat?
I can make a box and line the walls with fire brick.
But can I just rip apart a electric heater, slap the electronics on the back and the coils inside ?
The only thing that would make me hesitate is the intended crazy high in energy costs to come (Aug. 2022) otherwise a great project.
Do you know a way to easily guesstimate the max temp in your kiln in relation to size and wattage? I did a quick search and only found some complex math, kind of finite element calculations IIRC.
around 1200 degrees C mate