Need a Kiln, Make a Kiln…

SolarStorm50 said:
I was nervous at the start, and although not as pretty (although I started painting it gold and black) I am quite happy how it turned out. I would only build as big as you need though. This does take a while to heat up to temp. Not as long as the pottery kiln, but still a good 3.5 hrs to get to 1600. Anyone know what an Evenheat of similar size takes to heat up? My wife’s Skutt kiln takes about 5 hrs.
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My 10x10x10 240v Evenheat will get over 1600 degrees in less than 30 minutes
 
When folks say it takes hours to heat up a home built HT oven I usually ask if they are ABSOLUTELY POSITIVE that the coils are running on 220, and not 110. This happens easily if you are not used to wiring and electrical circuits. There are many reasons, like wrong wiring, bad SSRs, improperly wired SSRs, etc.

My Evenheat KF24 with an old Set-Pro controller takes about 20 minutes to heat up to 1500°F and about 30 to stainless temps.. I let it soak for another 30 and then put in the blades. Only thing I have ever done to it was change the thermocouple after about 10 years.
 
I checked the last heat log on my 240v Evenheat and in 20 minutes it had hit 1677 degrees, on its way to 2100
 
Would you put a multimeter on where the elements connect to the 10ga wire at the pigtails to measure that? I measured between pin #1 on both SSR's and then on Pin 2 of both SSR's and got 233 volts.
 
hmmm, Im fairly certain ive got 220. for the guys with the evenheats that are getting sub 30 min. to 1600. How big is the kiln? Im not complaining of my time as it is faster than my wifes pottery kiln. I have 6.5" x 7" x 40" (1.05 ft cubed)
 
DOH! I wired the heating coils in series! I have two 14a coils. they should be in parallel. Sometimes I am amazed at my own stupidity. (Not really)
 
That is what I expected. Either wrong voltage or wrong arrangement. Parallel and series confuses many people when calculating resistance and wattage.
 
Honestly, that's why I wanted to use a single element! I am still trying to learn the electrical stuff, so that kept it a bit more simple for me. I am learning to use my multimeter to test different components and stuff to try to chase down issues and mis wiring on my part.
 
I have a 120v Evenheat oven as well that I use for tempering. I actually had trouble with it overheating at low temperatures when it was new. Evenheat ended up installing a "1/4 Power" switch as they called it which is essentially a resistor, I believe, that cut the input down to 25%. Anything under about 600 degrees I flip that switch to 1/4 power and it works great. I realize this is the opposite problem you are having but I thought it might be a useful idea to get a heat treat oven to run more consistent.
 
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