Sarah's Progress Photos

[Acoma]

I am curious, if we are seeing numerous cracks with the ovens during cures, why not go straight to insulation wrap and Matrilite 18 to seal it. Once this is done, then do some fires? Wouldn't this keep the expansion under better control for cracks? Just wondering.

[Kemo]

Originally Posted by Acoma

I am curious, if we are seeing numerous cracks with the ovens during cures, why not go straight to insulation wrap and Matrilite 18 to seal it. Once this is done, then do some fires? Wouldn't this keep the expansion under better control for cracks? Just wondering.

What is Matralite 18?

[asudavew]

Originally Posted by Kemo

What is Matralite 18?

It is some kind of insulating mixture/covering... waterproof i think... and I believe that Canuck Jim uses quite a bit.

There are a few posts about it. I will see if I can find one for ya Steve.

[Acoma]

Dave and Kemo, Jim talked about the uses of Matrilite 18 on this thread:

http://www.fornobravo.com/forum/28/v...es-2126-2.html (Vermiculite prices)

I suggest you use it. You can go max on insulation as I mentioned earlier with what I will do. Talk about long term maintained heat levels.

[sarah h]

There hasn't been much to post lately and the season seems to have me busy with 40, 000 other things too but there have been some little bitty baby steps of progress ...

We started on a steel stud frame - it really IS there in the pic below (gotta open it to see the snow flakes falling last night), but under the tarp, which doesn't look as though it's coming off any time soon. The weather is keeping us from moving ahead so I had to settle for baking in the regular oven (second pic, though it may be cheating a bit to post a baking pic from a regular oven).

The biggest thing though is that I now have a thermal blanket (Canadian supplier & fairly close, which really simplifies things in many ways; otherwise I would have ordered from FB). Unfortunately, it's still in the box (third pic), waiting for a window of opportunity to open so that I can get it put on the dome. Hard, when I can hardly find time to scan the forum these days!

Hope everyone's holiday season is shaping up nicely!
Hope I have more to report soon!!

Sarah

[gjbingham]

Hang in there Sarah,
You couldn't make me go out in that snow and work. Spring is just around the corner.

[Acoma]

Looks like almost a foot of fresh snow. Get a tent over it, an electric heater, and start the insulation.....you can do it..

[Frances]

Wow, I'm not going to show that picture to my kids - they'd LOVE to have snow like that already!

[gjbingham]

Hey Frances,
I thought you lived in the land of everlasting snow.

[Frances]

Up in the mountains, yes. Down where I live we usually get a week or two of snow sometime during the winter. Or not, as the case may be. It can easily hit -15 C, but some years you just hover around freezing all the time.

From the looks of it Sarah knows a lot more about winter than I do...