Firing 24 continued

Turned out to be a good firing.
Light north easterly breeze, frost and a crescent moon rising at 5 in the morning. Sunshine most of the day and only a little snow first thing!
Slow fire through 900ºC as there was one raw platter to consider then a gradual and steady rise in temperature without any stalling.
First soda in at 1130º after 10 hours (250g soda)
Cone 7 bending at 1199º after 12 hours
Cone 8 bending at 1220º after 13 hours
and cone 9 going down after 14 hours.
I finished the firing at 7.45 just short of 15 hours having reached a top temperature of 1255ºC and cone 10 nicely down.

I wonder why this firing was so smooth. Perhaps the weather direction, no gusts of cold air around the kiln. Perhaps I was more relaxed with it being a last minute decision and not too concerned about the contents. It followed the same pattern as firing 23 even to the exact same temperature of 1130º after 10 hours, but the previous firing seemed to stall later on and it was a struggle to get cone 9 down.

photos of the results to follow