Kiln Day 3, "Pouring the Pad"

Waking up yesterday morning here in Helena, Montana, I was greeted with beautiful, clear-blue skies. I was happy, not only for the weather, but because it was the day to pour the kiln pad. We all made it to Emily and Matt’s place around 9:00 am, talked, drank some coffee… and made it up to Scott’s at about 9:45. We were ready to go! We had just the right amount of hands. Everybody was busy from the get-go. We were shoveling sand, gravel and road mix, measuring cement and water…running the cement mixer, and pouring the mix into the form.We measured with 5 gallon buckets..so each load had 3 buckets of gravel, 2 buckets of sand, 1 bucket of Portland cement and ¾ bucket of water. Remember the ratio? 3, 2, 1 (gravel, sand, cement) Everything went real smooth like and we had the pad finished, clean and with a beveled edge by 1:30. By 2 pm we had things cleaned up and were out of there. I even had enough to time to make soccer practice (I recently joined a rec team..and it's so fun). It was really the perfect day to pour; sunny skies, warm breeze… the kind of weather that reminded us of summer.

The kiln day continued into the evening when my good ole friend from school, Robin DuPont, stopped in to hit the couch on his way back to Utah. It’s always good seeing him but even better this time because in the back of his car he had 4, brand new kiln shelves for me. 30” x 25.5”…and light for their size… possibly only 45 lbs. I’m going to have to cut one or two of them so we can fit them all in the kiln..but…wow.. it’s all coming together!!!

Now that the pad is poured, in three or four days it will be set… and next week we’re planning to get that fist layer of brick down and get it all squared away and level. We originally planned to have the whole kiln finished and firing by the end of November, but we could easily be firing by the middle of October… or sooner. Here’s to good hands, willing backs and a crew that knows what the hell needs to get done. Stay tuned for the next episode of, “Kiln Day”. It’s only going to get better…