How to determine if the firing was a success

[lyubovberezina]

Hello everyone!

I'm totally new to metal clay and I have been studying all the books and forums I could get a hold of. But I have a question I cannot find an answer for.
I have a Paragon SC2 kiln and I created several test strips out of PMC3. I let them dry for 24 hours.
I then fired two of them in the kiln for 2hours on 1650F. I let them cool inside the kiln and then quenched them in cold water.
When I looked at them after firing they were NOT covered in the white substance I always see on the youtube metal clay videos. My strips were silver-colored with something like silver shimmer (just like in the nail polish). After I polished them with the metal brush they became just silver, without the shimmer. And after they finally cooled they became quite strong.

But I wonder if the firing was successful. In every video and book and tutorial I've seen the silver comes out of kiln covered in white "powder" which is then being polished off by a brush. But in my case there was no such a powder but the strips were silver with small shimmer which was polished off.

Can anyone give me some advice on this matter? I'm not sure if I was firing them correctly...

Thanks a lot!

[medusa]

when I fire PMC3 I get a similar experience. I would say that there is nothing wrong with your firing technique. The only thing I might suggest is giving a longer dry time if you make thicker pieces. I usually give mine two days, but then I do live in perpetual damp and fog!

[lorraineflee]

The white surface is not a powder it's the natural, unreflective, state of the fired silver. The brushing and burnishing harden the surface and give the shine to the piece. I agree that you really need to make sure that your pieces are throughly dry before firing, I use a food dehydrator for mine.

Lorraine