About my pension plan...

poppy dish

It is over 100 degrees today, so why not add to the heat by firing up the kiln? The poppy dish was yet another study in "think about it a little longer." This was a three-stage firing when it should have been two stages--one to fuse, and one to slump. The fusing went well.

There are two molds involved in the slumping process. The fused red flower with a black center is slumped on a ring mold that is set on top of a base mold (green on clear part) and both parts drop into shape. The top of the base and the bottom of the slumped flower meet and fuse during the second firing, at 1325 df for 40 minutes. Just like some marriages, though, this joining didn't work out the first time around. It took a third firing at a higher temperature, 1350 df for another 30 minutes to get the two parts to agree.

What I didn't think about (measure everything) is that the base mold is wider in diameter than the the top of the cone of the flower (ring mold).

The ring mold (way cheaper in cost than the base mold) had to be destroyed.  And to think I wanted to do this for a living when I retire. My pension plan better grow like mad at this rate.