soft firebrick damage

marekz

marekz

Joined
Jun 16, 2008
Messages
1,699
hello--i just got a electric kiln. it arrived - i opened it--then i opened the door to the kiln. Some of the soft fire brick had crumbled on both sides. on the door and on the actual kiln. Question how can i repair this? is there some kind of paste/cement i can patch it with.? the door still seals the chamber fairly well,however, i counted about 4 pieces of brick that have bits missing. to replace the bricks might be difficult for me. thanks mark
 
You can try using ITC-100 on them. Im not sure of the difference in their refractory properties. Darren ellis has firebricks and from what I can tell they are not hard to work with.
 
If they are small bits, you don't have to worry about it. You could get some refractory cement to repair them or you could buy bricks from Darren. I think they run $4 each from him + shipping.
 
The first thing to do is contact the manufacturer and ask them how THEY will deal with this problem.
 
Yeah! Or you can go to your local pottery supply house and pick up some soft firebrick. they are probably like 4 bucks a piece. I would call the manufacturer though! Did you go with the Evenheat Knife Oven?

I did some patch jobs with Satanite from Darren Ellis. Works good!
 
i went with the sugar creek because of the price and good reviews. i sent them an email. im waiting for a return message.im just hesitant to pull/scrape out about 4 bricks. some are angled. then there is a part on the inside of the door that is firebrick small pieces attachted to the big firebricks. i was just going to try the refractory cement to fill it in. im sure they will call/email me. maybe they can help somehow. im not paying to send it back---to properly secure it in a box is almost impossible--they used foam styrofoam---i guess you spray it on and it hardens around the kiln--thanks
 
Well there's no reason you should have to pay full price for a kiln and have it arrived damaged and then have to repair it yourself
 
sue from Sugar creek emailed me and said she will help me in the am. she is nice and proffesional mark
 
Definitely let Sugar Creek make it right. May help for them to know (if you start to have trouble getting this taken care of) that there are hundreds of knife makers online waiting to see how this turns out. No sense paying big $$$ for something and not getting what you paid for.

Good luck, and again, let them make it right.

--nathan
 
well i let yall all know in the morning. i dont know what they can do except send me some bricks and cement. thanks mark
 
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They can send you a new kiln and give you a call tag to have the old one picked up! That's what a company with excellent customer service will do! You should not have to do anything other than plug your kiln in and have it work like it was intended to do! Plus, they insure their kilns for damage i'm sure as firebrick becomes like powder if there's even a slight little crack to it!
 
well i talked with them and they were very helpful. they did offer to fix it, but i choose to have them send me some replacement supplies instead. i feel pretty confident i can patch this up . the employee there was very helpful and taught me alot about it. if i find that im not satisfied with the material or kiln, im sure they will have no problems exchanging it. The kiln itself is awesome, and i did fire it up last night. it held the heat well. i cant wait to patch it up and start HT some o-1. Yall sugarcreek is a consumer friendly place willing to do whatever is needed. I hope noone here took this trhread negatively. There are many people who love sugarcreek and i am one of them. thanks mark
 
I'm guessing unless there are som holes (that let heat escape to the outside) you can probably heat treat right now as some missing areas of the brick aren't gonna affect it. lol....I have a few spots in my kiln missing (over the years) and it still fires up just great! Good luck!
 
thanks leu custom you sure would make a great consumer advocate. if i run into any trouble with a business i will pm you. Im not usually to agressive with people ( businesess ) but if there not willing to make things right - i guess that leaves us no other choice. thanks mark
 
I think any company with a good reputation or that would like to keep a good one, will fix the problem :)
 
question--can i take some soft firebrick turn it to dust and mix it with kiln cement to patch up problem areas? i would probably use a 3-1 mixture--the 3 being softbrick and the 1 being kiln cement--what do you stink---thanks mark
 
Yeah it means you can do it because it's all meant to be in the kiln cooking at whatever temperature the kiln can handle. Only thing is, don't mix too much in otherwise you'll make the mixture possibly not as sticky since the mixture will still have to fight gravity!

I have personally used Satanite to "glue" pieces/chunks of firebrick that fell off the ceiling after my kiln, and after fired it up and after the firing, the Satanite changes to a very light color unlike that of the dark gray color it started out as.

Got a camera? Take some photos! Would love to see the chunks missing in the kiln!
 
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