Chimney growing

The chimney now is 11 ft tall. The finished height will be about 14 or 15 feet. I installed a damper about 5 feet up from the bottom of the hole as you can see in the picture. It is nice to be using bricks, rather than just collecting them!

Chimney Beginnings

I tore apart the existing chimney, leaving just a hole in the ground that connects with the back of the kiln. I then reinforced the walls of the chimney down in the ground by setting in a clay chimney pipe that had a hole cut in the side to allow for an opening into the kiln. I set another clay chimney pipe on the first one just to obtain enough height so that it would stick out of the ground. Now at ground level I will continue the chimney out of bricks all the way up to my desired height... I will also build in a damper right above the level of the clay pipes.

Smoke trail-Stemma chamber

SO before I can work any more on the front of the kiln, I wanted to finish off the back. The old kiln is the smoke trail (or hopefully it will act also as a stemma chamber) but I felt that during firing the walls would crumble and fall into the kiln, thereby blocking the chamber and inhibiting draft. So I crawled in and laid down a brick floor, brick reinforcing walls, and a ceiling to keep it from collapsing. Not easy work as I bruised up my elbows, knees, and ribs...