Hi Laura, Renee, and Carolyn. I'm happy to address all of this :)

I just responded to two posts regarding flakiness/crawling which you can check out and should help you navigate that issue.

We had a couple of kiln misfires in June that were frustrating. We fire our four kilns non stop and so maintenance issues are expected. With that said, there are definitely some design quirks to our kilns that we feel are challenging. Regardless, when a kiln fails to reach temperature at a particular range, it leads to extra crawling. It's the 1,800-2000 degree range. Whenever we have a misfire that results in this, we always group the work together and leave a note.

@Laura Mintz, crazing is a chemistry issue. Glazes that have high proportions of alkaline metals (sodium and potassium primarily) have high shrinkage rates and result in crazing. In early IF days, I steered away from crazing prone glazes because they can potentially affect how food safe a glaze is. We've decided that there are too many awesome glazes/colors to ignore though. As a reminder, all of our glazes are considered food safe if the glaze is well melted and free of major defects. The glazes that are chemically prone to crazing are:

• Amber Crackle :)

• Archon Blue

• OFF Pink

• Assad Black

It's also worth noting that crazing occurs more dramatically on white clay bodies.

@renee zale, unless your pot was in a section of the glaze pickup shelf that was marked as a misfire, the kiln got up to the right temperature. There are always very minor temperature differences in particular spots of the kiln (mostly the top and bottom shelves) that we monitor.

@Carolyn Emberley, in an attempt to alleviate the infrequent, but consistent bloating we were seeing when we first introduced the charcoal brown clay, we modified are firing cycles slightly. We fire very slightly cooler, with a longer hold at the top of the firing. We did many tests early on to determine that the glazes were all melting properly with this cycle.

Crawling, running and pitting are all individual glaze issues, probably with unique causes. Crawling and running often go hand in hand of course because the glaze is falling off the pot.

Glaze running is basically related to two variables(assuming the kilns aren't over firing which they haven't been): thickness and glaze selection. We have a lot of runny glazes and glaze combinations available. With the right glaze combination, sometimes the glaze is destined to run no matter how quick the dip. Remember that larger pots are much more likely to run because they soak up more glaze. And beware of the new OFF Pink! It's a runner.

Glaze pitting and pinholing(or blistering) are challenging and slightly different issues. Pitting is usually the result of a rough surface texture that creates tiny air pockets when the pot is dipped. If the glaze isn't melty enough, that spot remains bare. Smoothing these areas can help, but often there's already a layer of glaze over the tiny bubbles.

Pinholing is when air bubbles, either trapped or from off-gasing (it's a hot topic in the ceramics world) rise to the glaze surface at the top of the firing, burst, and are then frozen there upon cooling. It's a tough issue without a quick fix. Certain glazes and combinations are more prone than others. Pinholes after the firing don't correlate to the tiny pinholes you see after applying a glaze.

As much as I have to say about glazes and firing, I often get stumped by weird, spooky results. So I'm always learning like you all are.

Thanks for your feedback.

Ned