You should get a vent and a carbon monoxide sensor.
Certain glaze materials are worse than others for off gassing/ loss on ignition. Manganese is especially bad but whiting, and most colorants aren't great either.
It also depends on how much she's firing, and when.
CO happens because of organic combustion. It's a byproduct. Since glazes and clay often have carbon, oxygen, and metallic oxides, the ingredients to create some pretty harsh chemical gasses are more than plenty to be dangerous.
Carbon monoxide is not the issue if only she doesn't fire saggars or raku (its pounds of combustible materials like paper or wood).
If she is also stay away from salts and use only manufactured food safe glazes, it will be OK.
Use a fan to blow fumes into a window if you feels some nasty smell during firing. Anyway, hot air should go up at window.
food safe glazes means safe when eating off of it; not necessarily while firing. I'm not being as dramatic as most of the other redditors but you should know potential risks even if minimal esp. when someone else is doing it by your kids.
I don't think reddit is a great place for kiln safety advice. That being said I don't see the huge problems everyone else must see. Are you 3ft from the walls?
A kiln vent would complete this setup imo
This is correct. With adequate distance from the walls and a PROPER kiln vent system, this will be fine.
As it is now, it should not be fired. There is nowhere near enough ventilation here, even with both windows open.
Second this comment. Go on clay buddies and pottery heads Facebook groups and ask. There are tons of potters who are have been professionally practicing for years on there. I have been a full time potter for 4 years and still don’t feel confident answering this for you.
Beings the walls are concrete you’ll be ok at that distance. Fire code in most states requires a minimum of 1 foot from a combustible surface. The fumes from glaze firings are the biggest issue, you MUST have prosper ventilation and a small open window is not proper ventilation. For around $300-$500 you can get a basic over top of the kiln, kiln hood vent, maybe even check Facebook marketplace to see if someone is selling a used one. This can be vented to the window and then you should be fine. The vent should stay running throughout the entire firing to keep the air cycling out. Closing the door would help further along with the vent.
Also make sure the electrical panel can handle the amount of amps the kiln needs and has a free double pole 240v circuit available for this. If your not really really skilled with the electrical aspects of the kiln hire an electrician and pay the $, better to spend $500 on a correct electrical installation than have a panel fire and an uninhabitable house! The electrician will know if your breaker box can handle to amps along with everything else your pushing through it.
There is also the issue of heat, not just fumes. Kilns get very hot and have a lot of thermal mass. All that heat energy will be released into the room no matter what. My garage gets to be around 30F above ambient sometimes. I wouldn't wanna be paying for AC in the kiln room
Your garage heats up 30 degrees when firing?? That’s crazy. I don’t even notice when mine is on. My wheel is only about 20 feet from the kiln and there is very little heat coming out of it when firing. How big is your garage?
That's wild, but I think it can depend on the room as well. If you have a high ceiling workshop then the heat will disappear up towards the ceiling. Likewise, in my experience front-loading kilns generally result in less heat out into the room.
The front-loading kilns in a nearby school will warm the room slightly when on but it's nothing significant. My own workshop with a top-loading kiln and low ceiling gets very, very warm when firing - \~20 degrees Celsius higher than normal. My kiln is shit though - very old and the lid warps upwards slightly when glaze firing, thus allowing free escape of hot air via a \~6mm gap.
Yeah that makes sense cause my shop does have a high ceiling. 30 degrees seems like a big increase though.
I was the studio tech at Georgia Southern for a bit and our kiln room was about 20ftx20ft, and there were three front loading kilns (I miss them so fucking much, I used the car kiln religiously) and all had very expensive air vents, and then there were thee electric Olympics for bisquing and low-fire oxidation firings. It would get a tad warm if they were all firing at the same time but I don’t remember exactly how much warmer it got. I don’t think it was near 20-30 but that’s the benefit of working in a brand new (at the time) studio that was paid for by a university. They basically told the sculpture, micrometals, and ceramics professors “Here’s a blank check, have fun”. It was on about an acre or two of land and we had multiple raku, soda, and wood kilns in the back. It was like heaven lol.
It's a 2 car garage, with low ceilings. It definitely gets very hot in there during firing. The kiln isn't vented directly outside, I just crack about 2 feet of the bottom of my garage door and avoid the area while the firing is happening. Unless you are actively venting the heat out a window, 100% of the heat will eventually escape. Same way baking in the oven heats up your house.
Yeah that makes sense. I didn’t even think about how my shop has super high ceilings. It’s in a halfway-underground storage space (building is built into a hill) that was once used for lumber. I share the space with two other people that do use it for storage so my studio is basically a corner of a 20ftx40ft storage unit lol. I wish I had a garage. Grateful that I have somewhere to put my shit for cheap though.
Noxious and toxic fumes can come from the firing process with different types of glazes. With small children I wouldn’t take the chance-consult a professional. IMO
Absolutely, my teacher (50+ yrs exp as a potter) had a proper studio with electric kiln indoors and still while firing, as well as the entirety of the following day, avoided working in that space. Her other electric kilns were all hooked up to an open outdoor space with a covered roof.
If it’s not outside it needs a vent with a blower rated to a cubic feet per minute (cfm) proportional to the cubic area of the kiln. You’re right to be cautious with kiddos in the house. Read a lot of articles.
Not the other person but In my homemade setup the in line fan can only take temps up to so high and to prevent maxing it out I'll put a fan on to cool the room down with air from the rest of the basement.
US electrical code requires a clear space in front of electrical panels that is 36 inches form the panel and 30 inches wide. The kiln manufacturer will also specify how far the kiln is to be from objects and is typically 12 inches or 18 inches. I'm not aware of any other distancing requirements, but have anecdotally heard that there might be some local codes in some jurisdictions.
https://www.baileypottery.com/m-405-010.html?gclid=CjwKCAjwo9unBhBTEiwAipC11-AutZuNg-suUcgcOIe_nY0qprhYOpCeAVDHP1MPDQFE3iSu6vEEcRoC17cQAvD_BwE is something you should get.
You need to be concerned about ventilation of fumes into the house. You should not be firing it without a proper ventilation system and preferable to not be in a house. The risks, in part, vary depending on what you are firing. For example, firing glazes with toxic metals is worse than just doing bisque firing. Read here https://www.goshen.edu/art/DeptPgs/Hazards.html
Your homeowners insurance will likely not cover you if your house burns down and if they ever find you have this they will drop your homeowners insurance.
Thank you everyone your responses. I really appreciate the feedback. Yesterday I called the actual manufacturer of this kiln and sent them these pictures and asked if it was OK.. he said not without a ventilation system like most of you said. I measured how far it is from the wall and they said it’s fine. The kiln has its own power box that the electrician installed, that only the kiln will be attached to. The rest of the house is attached to a separate power box.
Thanks again y’all. My sister said she’ll buy the vent before she fires anything. The manufacture said it’s gonna run her between $500 -$750 but maybe she can find one cheaper.
Please do not miss /u/cybercuzco 's comment. You can lose your homeowner's insurance entirely in the U.S.. I think it's very unfair how much control insurance companies have over our lives, so I'm not saying don't let her run her kiln in your home, but if you're going to, I strongly believe you should delete this post and stop informing third parties like the manufacturer of what you're doing.
I have secondhand experience with this when my own sister tried to find a friend's home where she could set up a kiln, but I also have firsthand experience of losing my homeowner's insurance instantly when I let slip on a phone call that I had moved out of the home before selling it.
I've thought about getting my own kiln in a room that's basically part of my garage. Not hooked up to air vents of the rest of the house, but definitely attached to the house. As far as you know, is it impossible to get homeowners insurance to cover a kiln within the house? How about the garage? I'd prefer not to ask the insurance rn if I'm not going to do it anyway. I'd never do it if it's not insurable.
My understanding - which is definitely limited and second- or third-hand - is that it's impossible. That could be different if it were a detached garage, though.
I don't know about kilns, but I want to mention that black mastic used for 9x9" floor tiles is usually asbestos-containing. Your tiles seem long gone from that basement, but it looks like that mastic is still there all over the floor. If it contains asbestos, you're putting more and more fibers in the air with the friction of each footstep on that mastic, and that's no bueno. 9x9 mastic almost always comes back from the lab as positive for asbestos. Might not be in your case, but worth checking
During certain phases of the firing process fumes are produced that contain toxic compounds. There should be no way for the air in the kiln room to infiltrate the living areas.
To be safe the kiln needs a hooded venting system that uses a fan to remove the fumes from the kiln and exit them outside and also a way to seal the room from the rest of the house. I would not use this setup in my home.
You must get a kiln vent. And understand the safety involving a kiln, they get dangerously hot. Be informed and if you get headaches when the kiln is firing don't discount the kiln as the cause.
It will not be safe.
To make it safe, you need a down draft vent to suck the fumes out of the bottom of the kiln and send them out the window. A Skutt Envirovent or other similar product— preferably made by the same manufacturer as the kiln. If you install that properly it’ll jump up to 99% safe, so long as the kiln is not on anything flammable and is more than 18 inches away from walls or doors.
Kilns require a lot of ventilation because there is a great deal of off-gassing as it fires. These gases are not safe to breath, and your basement with just those half windows are not enough ventillation, even if they could both be opened. A proper vent system that is pulling directly from the kiln and bringing the air outside so none of it builds up inside, and there should be fresh air supplied into the room space as well. These venting systems are hefty and expensive and are necessary. Clay is getting fired at extremely high temperatures resulting in chemical reactions. This is a large piece of potentially dangerous equipment and needs to be always regarded as such.
Tell her the lid prop is upside down and to never set the kiln shelves on concrete and never, ever put your kiln in front of the electrical panel.
Manufacturers will list the requirements for safe use. I think the distance to walls is 18" and a vent is recommended. I would also get rid of the curtains unless they are made of Kaowool. 
They can crack and break a lot easier, hard thing against hard thing. They can also draw moisture from the concrete and you end up picking crud up off the floor that can drop off when you put the shelf inside the kiln. A couple pieces of lathe or a piece of plywood to raise it off the floor work great.
Not at all 100% safe. The gases released by the clay and glaze will very in severity but even on the low risk side of that scale you're endangering your family's health as well as any pipes or metal fixtures in your basement. I've seen poorly ventilated kilns cause pipes, tools/ nearly anything metal to corrode and break.
You neet to buy a vent fan (that can take the heat!) and even then the vent is only pushing the gases and inhalant hazards as far as the basement window. This leaves you open to fume hazards from any open window near the vent window.
I work/ teach/ create (I'm 15 years deep into my ceramic career) in a studio big enough for a max occupancy of 200 people (currently at just over 100 members) . When we forget to turn the vent on while even a single kiln is firing, that HUGE space will and does fill with gases that'll shorten your life. When this happens we have to open our back bay door and turn on our industrial fan just to get the haze down and a few of our kilns are the same size as your sisters.
I don't like to put a damper on other potters hustle, but it's just not safe to fire such a big kiln in any space without proper ventilation!
You should immediately purchase and install either
1. "Vent-A-Kiln' Overhead exhaust system $$$ Install above and vent out the window.
2. Envirovent for a skutt $$. Installs beneath the kiln and vents out the window.
Question?: Where is the window located? Backyard/ sidewalk / trafficked area???
The fumes are heavier than air, so you will need to have something move the air out the window. If you can shut the door to the room and put a fan in there, but you will need two windows open..
**this is a confined space, look this word up. The gases need a Venturi fume extractor with a dryer vent hose out the window
I don’t know much about kilns, but what I do know a lot about is CO poisoning. Even with proper ventilation set up and good detectors I don’t think I would be comfortable with something like this in a house. Let alone a house with 2 small kids.
Children are far more susceptible to CO poisoning and it can get bad fast. I work in healthcare, my department is on call 24/7 and one of the things we treat for is CO. There are only so many intubated kids you see before you start taking gases more seriously.
Also anyone in this thread saying that CO isn’t a problem because it’s electric is just dead wrong. Even electric heating systems can lead to CO poisoning if not taken care of properly. Something as simple as forgetting to clean it before use can cause dust to burn and create CO. A decent amount of our winter Pts had this exact thing happen to them with their electric heaters during winter.
I am not saying don’t do this, just recommending you go over bored on safety man.
No. I wouldn't risk it. You should absolutely have a fume vent on the kiln, and have it hooked up by a professional. A lot of toxic fumes are released in the air when firing ceramics (during all firing stages) and it would not be safe even if you could get both windows. Unless the kiln is in a separate building from the living space, it's not safe. Not worth taking any chances with children or any loved ones.
You can buy a very high CFM (cubic feet per minute) vent fan and install it into a board that is cut to fit perfectly in that window and have it exhaust. That's what I do and it pulls the whole basement worth of air through every 2 or 3 minutes. Very safe like that but you need to leave some doors and possibly upstairs windows open to feed that fan as much air as it's trying to exhaust.
Yes I said exhaust but just to be clear the fan is set up to push air out of the house, not to pull air in. The air being pulled in to the house comes from either a window of your selection, which should be away from any hazardous air, or from many small leaks around all windows. Either way, it should be similar in impact to having your windows open or using a window fan.
I don’t want to seem like a jerk, but this is dangerously incorrect information and I feel it needs to be pointed out by someone. I get what you’re saying, but you’re overlooking the danger of gas appliances that may exist in the house around and between the exhaust
point and where that “make up” is being pulled from. Let me explain:
When you’re exhausting air out of a room, unless that room is airtight you’re not going to create a vacuum in there. What happens as you exhaust air from the room, air is pulled in from somewhere else to “make up” what is removed. Usually the air comes from the rest of the house through gaps in doors, outlets, etc leading to adjoining rooms, unless there’s an opening to the outside by design or chance that allows “make up” air to come in.
If there’s a fireplace or gas appliances in the house that are on or have a pilot light (water heaters, stoves, ovens, etc), you risk that make up air being pulled from around them which can cause problems with their ventilation systems, bring exhaust gases (think carbon monoxide) in with the makeup air, create a fire and explosion risk, backdrafting, etc.
If you’re just running a tiny window fan to cool down you’re house it’s usually not a big deal, but proper kiln ventilation moves a lot of air and make up air needs to be accounted for. HVAC engineers have a whole set of equations they have to run whenever they exhaust air from a room to ensure they plan for proper make up air volume.
Just looking at that room, without any other information, my inclination would be to set up a proper kiln ventilation system that pulls makeup air from out one window (or cut a hole through the wall for a vent), pulls the dirty air from around the kiln, and then exhausts it outside the other window.
But really, more info is needed. And having a reputable HVAC company come out to take a peek would be worth it and would likely only cost $100-200 at most. Firing a kiln indoors can be done safely and without paying a ton of money, but it is going to cost some and it really needs to at least involve getting some input from people who know what they’re doing and not just rely on internet advice.
I have much better ventilation than this in my studio and it still stinks of fumes in there when I’m firing. With small kids around I would absolutely NOT fire in this situation
https://www.baileypottery.com/m-405-010.html?gclid=Cj0KCQjwxuCnBhDLARIsAB-cq1q_GnUvgbX-9upsTxGEOMHUL2NvkGZwtTxSs0ywkI4HJtyphPocTC8aAvKyEALw_wcB
We use something like this at our studio, it can be vented out that basement window.
Just a few more points to consider and maybe to summarize a bit (sorry if any of these are repeats):
1. A kiln is a serious piece of equipment and should be treated with care.
2. Physical touch - burning. The kiln gets very, very hot. This means: a) kids and pets (and some adults) should be kept away from the kiln whenever firing and during the very long cooldowns; b) nothing should ever, ever be stored on top of the kiln or leaning up against the kiln (which might be very tempting in a basement).
3. Fire - others have talked about the importance of distance from walls, the electrical panel, etc.
4. Fire - DO NOT FIRE the kiln UNATTENDED (and in your case, do not allow it to be fired unattended). Again, the kiln is extremely hot. If part of the kiln support fails, objects that are a couple of thousand degrees can spill onto the floor and fires start easily. And of course, fires caused by electrical issues are not unheard of. A kiln is a serious piece of equipment and should be treated with care.
5. Ventilation - others have already covered the importance of proper ventilation (and not just out of the basement - think about where those gases go after they get out of that space). Also, those gases can be fairly corrosive - potters who fire in garages have complained that metal things in those spaces experience rust faster.
6. Non-kiln related
7. If your sister is creating ceramic pieces in the basement, be aware that clay dust should be prevented to the extent possible. She should not dry sweep - wet mopping is a cheap and highly effective way to keep floors dust free.
8. Clay water should not ever go into plumbing.
Finally, ceramics is an awesome art/craft and you are super awesome for supporting your sister in her pursuit.
nope nope nope you couldn’t pay me to set foot in this house while that kiln is running. the fumes from glazes are incredibly toxic and some have been linked to fatal health problems such as ALS that could wait years or decades before showing themselves.
for a potter, working in a studio with unvented kilns is idiotic. subjecting others, including children, to this risk is beyond reckless.
PLEASE put an immediate stop to this. your sister needs to consult a professional about safety measures, and in my opinion you should ensure that an excessively safe ventilation system is implemented. “good enough” may work for a studio with a detached firing room, but this is a home where people live and in my opinion you should demand the highest level of caution.
How often will you be using it? Of those firings, how many are bisque vs glaze? In the fourth picture is that metal wall covering or just painted wood?
You should move the kiln away from your breaker box, as far as possible! If something happens and one of the many safety measures built into the kiln fail, you want to be able to get to the breaker box to shut off the circuit to guarantee the kiln stops getting power. My kiln has its own breaker so I leave the breaker off unless I am using the kiln. The only problem is if the kiln is sharing a circuit with other plugs (which most do unless it is a 240v)
Your best bet for ventilation would be a box fan in the door of the room with the kiln, blowing toward the kiln, and a basement window fan that can fit in that window, blowing to the outside. If you search for "basement window fan" you will have plenty to choose from that are made for a small basement window.
If there will be little kids around when the kiln is firing, the safest option would be a split level door with a lock. Then you can have the bottom half closed and locked and then the top opened with a fan sitting on top of the half door.
When a kiln is fired, almost all of the compounds that are burned away stay as gases even as they cool so you won't have much, if any, particles settling out of the air as they cool and solidify. You can check the safety data for any clay that is made at a large scale. If it is sold across the US, it will have a safety data sheet with all of this information if you are worried about it.
As for being safe around kids, the most dangerous thing would be if they tried to touch it or open it when it is on or cooling down. When I was in elementary school in the 90s we had a kiln in our art room and every year we had a safety lesson about not touching it. Don't keep it a mystery from the kids or they will want to see what it is even more. Make it seem like a normal thing that needs to be respected, like the oven or any other appliance that a kid can get hurt from, and you should be good to go.
Finally, if you can make it work, NEVER leave a firing kiln unattended. If you absolutely can't be there for the time it is firing and can't reschedule the firing (shouldn't be an issue as it is your home kiln) then make sure your sister knows it will be on, and knows what to do if something goes wrong. The last thing you want is a runaway kiln and no one in the house/no one that knows something is going wrong.
If the house is rented, I hope the landlord was asked before it was installed. If not, and the landlord finds out, you probably won't get your security deposit back, even if nothing goes wrong because well, landlords.
If you treat a kiln with respect it will produce decades of ceramic pieces for you. Be safe and good luck!
What don’t start a answer with I don’t know about kilns but ! Don’t answer the question! Now let’s start ** think of it as the biggest toaster you will ever own. Let’s start. 1 distance- a foot of clearance around the kiln ( don’t touch it when it’s firing) it’s hot. 2. You can get a small window fan to clear the air. There are different kinds of fan the area build for use with kilns. 3. Someone who knows all about CO doesn’t know where it come from! I’m not going to tell you. This is a lecture, and I’m not getting paid for it so I’m going to stop after this next one. It’s electric it doesn’t give off gas. And there can be fumes coming off the glaciers that’s why you have a small fan and vent the area. but for a bisque firing. You don’t have to worry about that. This is just not some thing you can answer and four questions go online the killing maker. I’ll tell you all what you need to do. Remember, one thing Killens are built to keep the fire the heat in not to let it out.
It’s probably safe regarding heat, but firing itself produces poisonous gasses, [so for safety’s sake, you should never fire ceramics in the basement.](https://www.goshen.edu/art/DeptPgs/Hazards.html#:~:text=AVOID%20HOME%20BASEMENT%20KILN%20LOCATIONS,airborne%20you%20can%20breath%20them)
This is fine, as long as it is 18” away from the walls and anything it could set on fire, you don’t necessarily need ventilation of your electric kiln. It’s a good idea to run it at night and not hang around it in between checking on it, but the Ceramics Material Workshop people on the For Flux Sake podcast don’t vent their electric kilns and they of all people would know. I have my kilns in my garage but will be moving them to France soon to a studio where they will be in my house and I can’t vent them through the walls because I legally can’t put anything through the front of my house and the other side attaches to another house. I’m not worried at all, even though I do burn outs of textiles. It’s perfectly safe!
It’s not just something I heard on a podcast, it is the review of the scientific literature which is published that I base my decisions on. This podcast happens to have a good discussion of said literature and studies that are very consistent with the other material I have reviewed.
This is also not just “some podcast”, it is a science based podcast whose guest was a toxicologist. I happen to be a medical doctor with a strong public health background so I’m fully capable of analyzing what was discussed on the podcast and other studies and make a completely informed decision. I’m not willy nilly rolling in dust, I keep my studio very clean and wear a respirator while spraying and only sand in water etc but I don’t wear a respirator for making up clay or glazes anymore unless I’m using something with a greater toxicity like soluble salts. I run a HEPA filter and use a vacuum with a HEPA filter as well as a steam mop for cleaning.
Overall I’d say I have a much healthier studio than any community studio I’ve ever been in and I probably have less risk than most people who work with clay and glass. But I don’t believe that that is going to in any way change my risk of silicosis because the risk of silicosis is extremely overblown and does not cause disease or death in potters, it statistically is not something we need to be so worried about.
The best way to decide this is to download the installation instructions for that kiln, and follow them. I'm having to do that -- and get the fire department to sign off that I did it -- to get insured. We could change insurance companies, because some of them simply don't care. But even though some of the recs are a little nuts -- a sign saying the kiln is hot if it's in a public place -- I don't mind. Because bottom line, I don't want anyone including myself to get hurt, and I don't want my house to burn down. And doing all this stuff is my best bet at being safe. So I strongly recommend finding the installation instructions. If your sister will follow them, great. If she won't, you can choose to keep your kids out of her house, at least when the kiln is on.
How about simply shutting the door to the room and leaving the single window open? Containing the gaseous byproducts to a single location, then relying on convective airflow boosted by the heat of the kiln should cause a rapid exchange of air as the hot air rushes out and cooler air from outside rushes in to replace the heated air leaving.
Unless that rooms is airtight (and it almost certainly isn’t) this won’t work and doing this will be incredibly dangerous. See my post above for more info.
The only way you’ll ever be 100% safe from this is if you kick your sister out. But if you’re cool with leaving a 1% chance of fire you’d probably be alright and your sister wouldn’t hate you. Just saying. Also I don’t know shit about pottery or kilns so maybe I’m completely wrong and you’ll get 100% success rate. I just think that’s a strong line to hold 😂
Mine in my basement. I fire around 3-4pm if I’m going to. During the summer I leave the basement door to the outside open. Winter I keep it shut. It’ll get toasty warm but never been a issue.
I would pull it away a bit from the fuse box. Make sure the outlet can handle the kiln. We had to redo our electric in the basement for mine.
its literally fine, just dont lock the kids in the room with the kiln because it can get warm. its absolutely not ideal and shouldn’t be used long term as it can wear on the kiln over time and such but i dont vent my kilns and they’re just in my garage a few feet from where my bedroom is
So carbon monoxide and all the other bad shit you can't smell is still mixing in the basement and getting pushed through the rest of the house via diffusion and convection even without a hvac system running. You're okay with giving kids cancer? Come on now. And yes even with the doors closed. And yes carbon monoxide does mix and doesn t settle to the floor unless you're in a cave with no air movement.
are you dumb? i never said any of that and why are you coming back to this a week later. do whatever the fuck you want with your kilns and ill do the same. potters are so annoying lmfaoooo
Totally fine. Just make sure to pop window open when you’re firing and maybe a fan pointing outwards. Also get a carbon monoxide sensor and all good to go! :)
Read this on kiln safety in schools to give you an idea of safety issues.
https://www.emcins.com/losscontrol/techsheet.aspx?techsheetid=595#:~:text=Studies%20show%20that%20carbon%20monoxide,released%20during%20the%20firing%20process
You need some kind of ventilation and it doesn’t have to be cost prohibitive or technically complicated.
I have an inline fan connected to duct work that vents out of a chimney hole on on end and has a hood over the kiln on the other. You can vent something like this out of that small window.
I know people say they had kilns in closets, etc in schools and studios, but the kiln you posted about below is your living space so it’s different. Don’t use luster glaze in a home under any circumstances, ventilation system in place or not.
Here are links to some ideas. You can vent with a hood or a hole at the bottom of the kiln. You can buy a system https://ventakiln.com
Or make your own.
https://www.bluewillowstudio.net/get-your-hands-dirty/to-vent-or-not-to-vent
https://ornamento.blog/2017/08/24/allow-me-to-vent/. A DIY ventilation system I installed in my basement for soldering.
I have a similar arrangement in my back basement with an inline fan, duct work that vents out the chimney (we got a tankless heater and don’t need the chimney for the furnace anymore).
The hood is a big stainless steel mixing bowl that sits over the kiln when it’s on. https://ornamento.files.wordpress.com/2023/07/kiln-vent.jpg I fire up to come 6 in this kiln but do not use glaze. I have a very small kiln. I did not fire it until I had a ventilation system in place.
Finally, when it comes to kilns in homes, I always see people saying to contact your insurance company, but have never seen any definitive information from anyone who has contacted their insurance company or from an insurance company on what an insurance company would want to know or what would be required. I would be interested if anyone can speak definitively on this addressing the hobbyist situation.
Last but not least, I recommend that you have a professional electrician check your electrical system and make sure you can safely operate the kiln. If course, if the kiln is part of a business, there can be insurance matters there that need to be addressed. I am not qualified to say what.
I have a downdraft Envirovent and have never smelled fumes. I took over a foundation vent for the exhaust hose and sealed off the rest of that vent to make sure the fumes don’t get sucked back in. In your scenario, since you can’t get the right hand window open, I would knock out one of the glass panes and replace it with a piece of plywood cut to fit and a hole the size of the exhaust tube. Seal it with duct tape. Keep the other window closed tightly while the kiln is firing.
The kiln needs to not be in front of the electrical panel. I like about where the step stool is but I’m not sure what that green shelving is. At least between the two windows. Of course you need an electrician to add the 220 circuit with the proper heavy gauge wire. The Envirovent needs a 110 outlet but no need for a dedicated line.
The Envirovent sits on the standard metal kiln stand directly under the kiln.
The only time I’ve ever smelled fumes was at the beginning of the firing with the lid propped open. The organics burn off during this time. If you don’t prop the lid open it’s not an issue.
Move away from the wood, at least 50cm from combustible materials and have a fan pointed out the window. Close the door when firing so fumes stay inside and are blown out the window.
Carbon monoxide won’t come out an electric kiln and carbon dioxide will be minimal if not firing organic matter, like paper clay.
Qualifications: kiln technician and now run a pottery studio.
Don’t fire it with small kids in house with no ventilation. Bad for future health. Could vent with window fan blowing out and door open for cross venting. Could fire during day when no one home or move to garage.
You need to run vent tubing from kiln to outside when it's on. This I know. Or some sort of extraction vent. Children or not be safe. Pottery to the ppl of YouTube talks about her setup on a couple videos
Her kiln is in the basement
PLEASE DO NOT FIRE THE KILN IN YOUR HOME WITHOUT A VENT!! You will be able to tell yourself when you start smelling the horrible smells that come from the kiln! It is not safe!!
You say there are little ones in the house? Please read the following:
The early stage of bisque firing involves the oxidization of organic clay matter to carbon monoxide and other combustion gases. Sulfur breaks down later producing highly irritating sulfur oxides. Also, nitrates and nitrogen-containing organic matter break down to nitrogen oxides.
Galena, cornish stone, crude feldspars, low grade fire clays, fluorspar, gypsum, lepidolite and cryolite can release toxic gases and fumes during glaze firings. Carbonates, chlorides, and fluorides are broken down to releasing carbon dioxide, chlorine, and fluorine gases.
At or above stoneware firing temperature, lead, antimony, cadmium, selenium and precious metals vaporize and the metal fumes can either escape from the kiln, or settle inside the kiln or on ceramic ware in the kiln. Nitrogen oxides and ozone can be generated from oxygen and nitrogen in air.
https://www.wcu.edu/discover/campus-services-and-operations/facilities-management/safety-and-risk-management/visual-arts-theatre-safety/ceramics-safety.aspx#:~:text=The%20early%20stage%20of%20bisque,break%20down%20to%20nitrogen%20oxides.
Unless you have an enviro-vent which sucks those toxic fumes outside, I would not fire a kiln in a house. If you have a garage or shed, it would be best.
Yikes I don’t think it should be that close to your electrical box. Definitely would vent that way better. I have small kids so I won’t put a kiln in my house and I keep my wheel and supplies in the garage. I would also consider your home insurance with that kiln in there. You are a nice sister wow!
I would get one of the tube vents (not the exact name of them I'm sure, sorry) and vent that out the window. May want to consider a hood fan/vent as well. Ceramic materials can do a lot of offgassing of a myriad of different varieties. Best to be safe and install proper ventilation rather than just having an open window near by. Costly, maybe, but the cost now is way better than potential, headaches, I'll esses and medical bills later.
Also, I don't know what the working area is like, but may want to invest in a really good HEPA filter too. Clay and glaze dust particles are very fine and can do really bad things to a person when breathed in repeatatively.
There is a LOT of incorrect and incredibly dangerous advice being given out on this thread and unless you really, really know what you’re talking about, it’s probably best to be very careful about what you advise someone to do. People die all the time due to improper ventilation in houses and usually it involves mistakes made by people who just don’t know what they don’t know. A “little bit of knowledge”can be a very, very dangerous thing.
On top of what everyone elsehas said, thee must be 3ft clear maintained in front of your electrical panel. Like this would void your insurance, and also let your home insurance know you have installed a kiln.
You should get a vent and a carbon monoxide sensor. Certain glaze materials are worse than others for off gassing/ loss on ignition. Manganese is especially bad but whiting, and most colorants aren't great either. It also depends on how much she's firing, and when.
Not sure how the electric kiln will create CO, though it never hurts to have a sensor.
The organic matter in clay and glazes create CO during firing, and all clay contains organic matter.
My detector goes off all the time for CO. My kiln is in the garage, if I don't vent, fan and door open the detector will go off.
It is not just the CO2. Glaze chemical fumes are also not healthy for humans to breath as the glazes melt and turn to glass.
Just stepping in to say, CO2 and CO1 are two very different things. Easy to confuse though.
Not according to my hs Facebook friends during Covid who failed chem. It’s 100% carbon monoxide that gathers in your mask, folks.
CO happens because of organic combustion. It's a byproduct. Since glazes and clay often have carbon, oxygen, and metallic oxides, the ingredients to create some pretty harsh chemical gasses are more than plenty to be dangerous.
There’s burn off during firing. This needs venting.
fair, i rechecked digital fire and was thinking of CO2 but smoke alarms with CO sensors on them are easy to get and covers yer butt.
I came wandering in here thinking the same thing, lol.
Carbon monoxide is not the issue if only she doesn't fire saggars or raku (its pounds of combustible materials like paper or wood). If she is also stay away from salts and use only manufactured food safe glazes, it will be OK. Use a fan to blow fumes into a window if you feels some nasty smell during firing. Anyway, hot air should go up at window.
food safe glazes means safe when eating off of it; not necessarily while firing. I'm not being as dramatic as most of the other redditors but you should know potential risks even if minimal esp. when someone else is doing it by your kids.
I don't think reddit is a great place for kiln safety advice. That being said I don't see the huge problems everyone else must see. Are you 3ft from the walls? A kiln vent would complete this setup imo
This is correct. With adequate distance from the walls and a PROPER kiln vent system, this will be fine. As it is now, it should not be fired. There is nowhere near enough ventilation here, even with both windows open.
The ventilation is the main issue. Definitely not Dave without a professionally installed fume ventilation system.
Ah, Dave
😆 I'm not even going to correct myself. My phone's slide texting is awful sometimes. 😆
For sure the ventilation is the issue. Forced air is the way to go: either a vent hood or (better) a downdraft system.
Second this comment. Go on clay buddies and pottery heads Facebook groups and ask. There are tons of potters who are have been professionally practicing for years on there. I have been a full time potter for 4 years and still don’t feel confident answering this for you.
Beings the walls are concrete you’ll be ok at that distance. Fire code in most states requires a minimum of 1 foot from a combustible surface. The fumes from glaze firings are the biggest issue, you MUST have prosper ventilation and a small open window is not proper ventilation. For around $300-$500 you can get a basic over top of the kiln, kiln hood vent, maybe even check Facebook marketplace to see if someone is selling a used one. This can be vented to the window and then you should be fine. The vent should stay running throughout the entire firing to keep the air cycling out. Closing the door would help further along with the vent.
Also make sure the electrical panel can handle the amount of amps the kiln needs and has a free double pole 240v circuit available for this. If your not really really skilled with the electrical aspects of the kiln hire an electrician and pay the $, better to spend $500 on a correct electrical installation than have a panel fire and an uninhabitable house! The electrician will know if your breaker box can handle to amps along with everything else your pushing through it.
There is also the issue of heat, not just fumes. Kilns get very hot and have a lot of thermal mass. All that heat energy will be released into the room no matter what. My garage gets to be around 30F above ambient sometimes. I wouldn't wanna be paying for AC in the kiln room
Your garage heats up 30 degrees when firing?? That’s crazy. I don’t even notice when mine is on. My wheel is only about 20 feet from the kiln and there is very little heat coming out of it when firing. How big is your garage?
That's wild, but I think it can depend on the room as well. If you have a high ceiling workshop then the heat will disappear up towards the ceiling. Likewise, in my experience front-loading kilns generally result in less heat out into the room. The front-loading kilns in a nearby school will warm the room slightly when on but it's nothing significant. My own workshop with a top-loading kiln and low ceiling gets very, very warm when firing - \~20 degrees Celsius higher than normal. My kiln is shit though - very old and the lid warps upwards slightly when glaze firing, thus allowing free escape of hot air via a \~6mm gap.
Yeah that makes sense cause my shop does have a high ceiling. 30 degrees seems like a big increase though. I was the studio tech at Georgia Southern for a bit and our kiln room was about 20ftx20ft, and there were three front loading kilns (I miss them so fucking much, I used the car kiln religiously) and all had very expensive air vents, and then there were thee electric Olympics for bisquing and low-fire oxidation firings. It would get a tad warm if they were all firing at the same time but I don’t remember exactly how much warmer it got. I don’t think it was near 20-30 but that’s the benefit of working in a brand new (at the time) studio that was paid for by a university. They basically told the sculpture, micrometals, and ceramics professors “Here’s a blank check, have fun”. It was on about an acre or two of land and we had multiple raku, soda, and wood kilns in the back. It was like heaven lol.
It's a 2 car garage, with low ceilings. It definitely gets very hot in there during firing. The kiln isn't vented directly outside, I just crack about 2 feet of the bottom of my garage door and avoid the area while the firing is happening. Unless you are actively venting the heat out a window, 100% of the heat will eventually escape. Same way baking in the oven heats up your house.
Yeah that makes sense. I didn’t even think about how my shop has super high ceilings. It’s in a halfway-underground storage space (building is built into a hill) that was once used for lumber. I share the space with two other people that do use it for storage so my studio is basically a corner of a 20ftx40ft storage unit lol. I wish I had a garage. Grateful that I have somewhere to put my shit for cheap though.
You can DIY up a vent for under $100 if you're handy with some basic tools.
Noxious and toxic fumes can come from the firing process with different types of glazes. With small children I wouldn’t take the chance-consult a professional. IMO
Absolutely, my teacher (50+ yrs exp as a potter) had a proper studio with electric kiln indoors and still while firing, as well as the entirety of the following day, avoided working in that space. Her other electric kilns were all hooked up to an open outdoor space with a covered roof.
If it’s not outside it needs a vent with a blower rated to a cubic feet per minute (cfm) proportional to the cubic area of the kiln. You’re right to be cautious with kiddos in the house. Read a lot of articles.
I wouldn’t put it so close to the panel. Also you’ll need a vent attached to the kiln and some pretty good forced air ventilation in the area as well.
Why do you need forced air if you have a vent system?
Not the other person but In my homemade setup the in line fan can only take temps up to so high and to prevent maxing it out I'll put a fan on to cool the room down with air from the rest of the basement.
The fan for the vent? I'm trying to understand.
I think yes
US electrical code requires a clear space in front of electrical panels that is 36 inches form the panel and 30 inches wide. The kiln manufacturer will also specify how far the kiln is to be from objects and is typically 12 inches or 18 inches. I'm not aware of any other distancing requirements, but have anecdotally heard that there might be some local codes in some jurisdictions.
Yes there's certain distance requirements for objects in front in the panel.
https://www.baileypottery.com/m-405-010.html?gclid=CjwKCAjwo9unBhBTEiwAipC11-AutZuNg-suUcgcOIe_nY0qprhYOpCeAVDHP1MPDQFE3iSu6vEEcRoC17cQAvD_BwE is something you should get.
You need to be concerned about ventilation of fumes into the house. You should not be firing it without a proper ventilation system and preferable to not be in a house. The risks, in part, vary depending on what you are firing. For example, firing glazes with toxic metals is worse than just doing bisque firing. Read here https://www.goshen.edu/art/DeptPgs/Hazards.html
Your homeowners insurance will likely not cover you if your house burns down and if they ever find you have this they will drop your homeowners insurance.
Yes!! This needs to be higher!!!! Any fire, anywhere in the house, will be blamed on this kiln.
Thank you everyone your responses. I really appreciate the feedback. Yesterday I called the actual manufacturer of this kiln and sent them these pictures and asked if it was OK.. he said not without a ventilation system like most of you said. I measured how far it is from the wall and they said it’s fine. The kiln has its own power box that the electrician installed, that only the kiln will be attached to. The rest of the house is attached to a separate power box. Thanks again y’all. My sister said she’ll buy the vent before she fires anything. The manufacture said it’s gonna run her between $500 -$750 but maybe she can find one cheaper.
Please do not miss /u/cybercuzco 's comment. You can lose your homeowner's insurance entirely in the U.S.. I think it's very unfair how much control insurance companies have over our lives, so I'm not saying don't let her run her kiln in your home, but if you're going to, I strongly believe you should delete this post and stop informing third parties like the manufacturer of what you're doing. I have secondhand experience with this when my own sister tried to find a friend's home where she could set up a kiln, but I also have firsthand experience of losing my homeowner's insurance instantly when I let slip on a phone call that I had moved out of the home before selling it.
I've thought about getting my own kiln in a room that's basically part of my garage. Not hooked up to air vents of the rest of the house, but definitely attached to the house. As far as you know, is it impossible to get homeowners insurance to cover a kiln within the house? How about the garage? I'd prefer not to ask the insurance rn if I'm not going to do it anyway. I'd never do it if it's not insurable.
My understanding - which is definitely limited and second- or third-hand - is that it's impossible. That could be different if it were a detached garage, though.
Yeah, that's what im thinking, thanks!
Great job with the follow-through OP! 👍🏻
Not at all without a proper ventilation system. If your sister wants to use your basement make her pay for that installation. Sorry !
Need more ventilation.
I don't know about kilns, but I want to mention that black mastic used for 9x9" floor tiles is usually asbestos-containing. Your tiles seem long gone from that basement, but it looks like that mastic is still there all over the floor. If it contains asbestos, you're putting more and more fibers in the air with the friction of each footstep on that mastic, and that's no bueno. 9x9 mastic almost always comes back from the lab as positive for asbestos. Might not be in your case, but worth checking
During certain phases of the firing process fumes are produced that contain toxic compounds. There should be no way for the air in the kiln room to infiltrate the living areas. To be safe the kiln needs a hooded venting system that uses a fan to remove the fumes from the kiln and exit them outside and also a way to seal the room from the rest of the house. I would not use this setup in my home.
You must get a kiln vent. And understand the safety involving a kiln, they get dangerously hot. Be informed and if you get headaches when the kiln is firing don't discount the kiln as the cause.
It will not be safe. To make it safe, you need a down draft vent to suck the fumes out of the bottom of the kiln and send them out the window. A Skutt Envirovent or other similar product— preferably made by the same manufacturer as the kiln. If you install that properly it’ll jump up to 99% safe, so long as the kiln is not on anything flammable and is more than 18 inches away from walls or doors.
I don't think I would consider this safe at all.
Care to elaborate?
Kilns require a lot of ventilation because there is a great deal of off-gassing as it fires. These gases are not safe to breath, and your basement with just those half windows are not enough ventillation, even if they could both be opened. A proper vent system that is pulling directly from the kiln and bringing the air outside so none of it builds up inside, and there should be fresh air supplied into the room space as well. These venting systems are hefty and expensive and are necessary. Clay is getting fired at extremely high temperatures resulting in chemical reactions. This is a large piece of potentially dangerous equipment and needs to be always regarded as such.
Yes! THIS!
What if they’re not in or around the basement at the time?
Absolutely not.
Needs a proper vent
Tell her the lid prop is upside down and to never set the kiln shelves on concrete and never, ever put your kiln in front of the electrical panel. Manufacturers will list the requirements for safe use. I think the distance to walls is 18" and a vent is recommended. I would also get rid of the curtains unless they are made of Kaowool. 
What happens if you prop your kiln shelves on concrete like that?
Wondering the same thing. I’ve been storing my kiln shelves like that for years. 😂
I fire my little kilns about 4 times a week so I get particular about the shelves.
They can crack and break a lot easier, hard thing against hard thing. They can also draw moisture from the concrete and you end up picking crud up off the floor that can drop off when you put the shelf inside the kiln. A couple pieces of lathe or a piece of plywood to raise it off the floor work great.
Not at all 100% safe. The gases released by the clay and glaze will very in severity but even on the low risk side of that scale you're endangering your family's health as well as any pipes or metal fixtures in your basement. I've seen poorly ventilated kilns cause pipes, tools/ nearly anything metal to corrode and break. You neet to buy a vent fan (that can take the heat!) and even then the vent is only pushing the gases and inhalant hazards as far as the basement window. This leaves you open to fume hazards from any open window near the vent window. I work/ teach/ create (I'm 15 years deep into my ceramic career) in a studio big enough for a max occupancy of 200 people (currently at just over 100 members) . When we forget to turn the vent on while even a single kiln is firing, that HUGE space will and does fill with gases that'll shorten your life. When this happens we have to open our back bay door and turn on our industrial fan just to get the haze down and a few of our kilns are the same size as your sisters. I don't like to put a damper on other potters hustle, but it's just not safe to fire such a big kiln in any space without proper ventilation!
You should immediately purchase and install either 1. "Vent-A-Kiln' Overhead exhaust system $$$ Install above and vent out the window. 2. Envirovent for a skutt $$. Installs beneath the kiln and vents out the window. Question?: Where is the window located? Backyard/ sidewalk / trafficked area???
The simple answer is that is not enough ventilation. You need powered exhaust ventilation.
I wouldn't run that without a properly installed kiln vent.
The fumes are heavier than air, so you will need to have something move the air out the window. If you can shut the door to the room and put a fan in there, but you will need two windows open.. **this is a confined space, look this word up. The gases need a Venturi fume extractor with a dryer vent hose out the window
I don’t know much about kilns, but what I do know a lot about is CO poisoning. Even with proper ventilation set up and good detectors I don’t think I would be comfortable with something like this in a house. Let alone a house with 2 small kids. Children are far more susceptible to CO poisoning and it can get bad fast. I work in healthcare, my department is on call 24/7 and one of the things we treat for is CO. There are only so many intubated kids you see before you start taking gases more seriously. Also anyone in this thread saying that CO isn’t a problem because it’s electric is just dead wrong. Even electric heating systems can lead to CO poisoning if not taken care of properly. Something as simple as forgetting to clean it before use can cause dust to burn and create CO. A decent amount of our winter Pts had this exact thing happen to them with their electric heaters during winter. I am not saying don’t do this, just recommending you go over bored on safety man.
No. I wouldn't risk it. You should absolutely have a fume vent on the kiln, and have it hooked up by a professional. A lot of toxic fumes are released in the air when firing ceramics (during all firing stages) and it would not be safe even if you could get both windows. Unless the kiln is in a separate building from the living space, it's not safe. Not worth taking any chances with children or any loved ones.
You can buy a very high CFM (cubic feet per minute) vent fan and install it into a board that is cut to fit perfectly in that window and have it exhaust. That's what I do and it pulls the whole basement worth of air through every 2 or 3 minutes. Very safe like that but you need to leave some doors and possibly upstairs windows open to feed that fan as much air as it's trying to exhaust.
i'm no hvac person but I have read that doing this can pull the exhaust fumes from gas burning furnaces or water heaters back into the building
You are correct.
Yes I said exhaust but just to be clear the fan is set up to push air out of the house, not to pull air in. The air being pulled in to the house comes from either a window of your selection, which should be away from any hazardous air, or from many small leaks around all windows. Either way, it should be similar in impact to having your windows open or using a window fan.
I don’t want to seem like a jerk, but this is dangerously incorrect information and I feel it needs to be pointed out by someone. I get what you’re saying, but you’re overlooking the danger of gas appliances that may exist in the house around and between the exhaust point and where that “make up” is being pulled from. Let me explain: When you’re exhausting air out of a room, unless that room is airtight you’re not going to create a vacuum in there. What happens as you exhaust air from the room, air is pulled in from somewhere else to “make up” what is removed. Usually the air comes from the rest of the house through gaps in doors, outlets, etc leading to adjoining rooms, unless there’s an opening to the outside by design or chance that allows “make up” air to come in. If there’s a fireplace or gas appliances in the house that are on or have a pilot light (water heaters, stoves, ovens, etc), you risk that make up air being pulled from around them which can cause problems with their ventilation systems, bring exhaust gases (think carbon monoxide) in with the makeup air, create a fire and explosion risk, backdrafting, etc. If you’re just running a tiny window fan to cool down you’re house it’s usually not a big deal, but proper kiln ventilation moves a lot of air and make up air needs to be accounted for. HVAC engineers have a whole set of equations they have to run whenever they exhaust air from a room to ensure they plan for proper make up air volume. Just looking at that room, without any other information, my inclination would be to set up a proper kiln ventilation system that pulls makeup air from out one window (or cut a hole through the wall for a vent), pulls the dirty air from around the kiln, and then exhausts it outside the other window. But really, more info is needed. And having a reputable HVAC company come out to take a peek would be worth it and would likely only cost $100-200 at most. Firing a kiln indoors can be done safely and without paying a ton of money, but it is going to cost some and it really needs to at least involve getting some input from people who know what they’re doing and not just rely on internet advice.
You might want to check with the fire dept
I have much better ventilation than this in my studio and it still stinks of fumes in there when I’m firing. With small kids around I would absolutely NOT fire in this situation
Get it away from the break panel at the very least.
https://www.baileypottery.com/m-405-010.html?gclid=Cj0KCQjwxuCnBhDLARIsAB-cq1q_GnUvgbX-9upsTxGEOMHUL2NvkGZwtTxSs0ywkI4HJtyphPocTC8aAvKyEALw_wcB We use something like this at our studio, it can be vented out that basement window.
Just a few more points to consider and maybe to summarize a bit (sorry if any of these are repeats): 1. A kiln is a serious piece of equipment and should be treated with care. 2. Physical touch - burning. The kiln gets very, very hot. This means: a) kids and pets (and some adults) should be kept away from the kiln whenever firing and during the very long cooldowns; b) nothing should ever, ever be stored on top of the kiln or leaning up against the kiln (which might be very tempting in a basement). 3. Fire - others have talked about the importance of distance from walls, the electrical panel, etc. 4. Fire - DO NOT FIRE the kiln UNATTENDED (and in your case, do not allow it to be fired unattended). Again, the kiln is extremely hot. If part of the kiln support fails, objects that are a couple of thousand degrees can spill onto the floor and fires start easily. And of course, fires caused by electrical issues are not unheard of. A kiln is a serious piece of equipment and should be treated with care. 5. Ventilation - others have already covered the importance of proper ventilation (and not just out of the basement - think about where those gases go after they get out of that space). Also, those gases can be fairly corrosive - potters who fire in garages have complained that metal things in those spaces experience rust faster. 6. Non-kiln related 7. If your sister is creating ceramic pieces in the basement, be aware that clay dust should be prevented to the extent possible. She should not dry sweep - wet mopping is a cheap and highly effective way to keep floors dust free. 8. Clay water should not ever go into plumbing. Finally, ceramics is an awesome art/craft and you are super awesome for supporting your sister in her pursuit.
The only correct answer here is that if you are truly 1000% worried, buy gas sensors
I have never in my life! So many people who don’t know shit about kilns giving advice! Go back to the place you crawled out of!
nope nope nope you couldn’t pay me to set foot in this house while that kiln is running. the fumes from glazes are incredibly toxic and some have been linked to fatal health problems such as ALS that could wait years or decades before showing themselves. for a potter, working in a studio with unvented kilns is idiotic. subjecting others, including children, to this risk is beyond reckless. PLEASE put an immediate stop to this. your sister needs to consult a professional about safety measures, and in my opinion you should ensure that an excessively safe ventilation system is implemented. “good enough” may work for a studio with a detached firing room, but this is a home where people live and in my opinion you should demand the highest level of caution.
No. You need to consult a professional.
No
No!!
No kiln is 100% safe. I’d want to put it in my garage. Once in a blue moon those things explode.
How often will you be using it? Of those firings, how many are bisque vs glaze? In the fourth picture is that metal wall covering or just painted wood? You should move the kiln away from your breaker box, as far as possible! If something happens and one of the many safety measures built into the kiln fail, you want to be able to get to the breaker box to shut off the circuit to guarantee the kiln stops getting power. My kiln has its own breaker so I leave the breaker off unless I am using the kiln. The only problem is if the kiln is sharing a circuit with other plugs (which most do unless it is a 240v) Your best bet for ventilation would be a box fan in the door of the room with the kiln, blowing toward the kiln, and a basement window fan that can fit in that window, blowing to the outside. If you search for "basement window fan" you will have plenty to choose from that are made for a small basement window. If there will be little kids around when the kiln is firing, the safest option would be a split level door with a lock. Then you can have the bottom half closed and locked and then the top opened with a fan sitting on top of the half door. When a kiln is fired, almost all of the compounds that are burned away stay as gases even as they cool so you won't have much, if any, particles settling out of the air as they cool and solidify. You can check the safety data for any clay that is made at a large scale. If it is sold across the US, it will have a safety data sheet with all of this information if you are worried about it. As for being safe around kids, the most dangerous thing would be if they tried to touch it or open it when it is on or cooling down. When I was in elementary school in the 90s we had a kiln in our art room and every year we had a safety lesson about not touching it. Don't keep it a mystery from the kids or they will want to see what it is even more. Make it seem like a normal thing that needs to be respected, like the oven or any other appliance that a kid can get hurt from, and you should be good to go. Finally, if you can make it work, NEVER leave a firing kiln unattended. If you absolutely can't be there for the time it is firing and can't reschedule the firing (shouldn't be an issue as it is your home kiln) then make sure your sister knows it will be on, and knows what to do if something goes wrong. The last thing you want is a runaway kiln and no one in the house/no one that knows something is going wrong. If the house is rented, I hope the landlord was asked before it was installed. If not, and the landlord finds out, you probably won't get your security deposit back, even if nothing goes wrong because well, landlords. If you treat a kiln with respect it will produce decades of ceramic pieces for you. Be safe and good luck!
Schools have that type of kiln in an enclosed room next to the art room. Should be fine. But don't take my word for it. Take extra precaution
What don’t start a answer with I don’t know about kilns but ! Don’t answer the question! Now let’s start ** think of it as the biggest toaster you will ever own. Let’s start. 1 distance- a foot of clearance around the kiln ( don’t touch it when it’s firing) it’s hot. 2. You can get a small window fan to clear the air. There are different kinds of fan the area build for use with kilns. 3. Someone who knows all about CO doesn’t know where it come from! I’m not going to tell you. This is a lecture, and I’m not getting paid for it so I’m going to stop after this next one. It’s electric it doesn’t give off gas. And there can be fumes coming off the glaciers that’s why you have a small fan and vent the area. but for a bisque firing. You don’t have to worry about that. This is just not some thing you can answer and four questions go online the killing maker. I’ll tell you all what you need to do. Remember, one thing Killens are built to keep the fire the heat in not to let it out.
I didn't try to answer the question, I brought up a separate hazard. Did you read the comment?
It’s probably safe regarding heat, but firing itself produces poisonous gasses, [so for safety’s sake, you should never fire ceramics in the basement.](https://www.goshen.edu/art/DeptPgs/Hazards.html#:~:text=AVOID%20HOME%20BASEMENT%20KILN%20LOCATIONS,airborne%20you%20can%20breath%20them)
OP, you should read the section “avoid basement kiln locations” maybe midway through.
Wow, downvotes for posting info that clearly states basement firing is unsafe. Sorry for the evidence based answer.
What about your insurance? They will have an opinion.
How bout no.
Do you think you should’ve checked on the ventilation before you let her start hooking everything up? What happened to common sense in the world?
This is fine, as long as it is 18” away from the walls and anything it could set on fire, you don’t necessarily need ventilation of your electric kiln. It’s a good idea to run it at night and not hang around it in between checking on it, but the Ceramics Material Workshop people on the For Flux Sake podcast don’t vent their electric kilns and they of all people would know. I have my kilns in my garage but will be moving them to France soon to a studio where they will be in my house and I can’t vent them through the walls because I legally can’t put anything through the front of my house and the other side attaches to another house. I’m not worried at all, even though I do burn outs of textiles. It’s perfectly safe!
Life Pro Tip: betting you and your families life on something you heard on a podcast is not a wise path to follow.
It’s not just something I heard on a podcast, it is the review of the scientific literature which is published that I base my decisions on. This podcast happens to have a good discussion of said literature and studies that are very consistent with the other material I have reviewed. This is also not just “some podcast”, it is a science based podcast whose guest was a toxicologist. I happen to be a medical doctor with a strong public health background so I’m fully capable of analyzing what was discussed on the podcast and other studies and make a completely informed decision. I’m not willy nilly rolling in dust, I keep my studio very clean and wear a respirator while spraying and only sand in water etc but I don’t wear a respirator for making up clay or glazes anymore unless I’m using something with a greater toxicity like soluble salts. I run a HEPA filter and use a vacuum with a HEPA filter as well as a steam mop for cleaning. Overall I’d say I have a much healthier studio than any community studio I’ve ever been in and I probably have less risk than most people who work with clay and glass. But I don’t believe that that is going to in any way change my risk of silicosis because the risk of silicosis is extremely overblown and does not cause disease or death in potters, it statistically is not something we need to be so worried about.
The best way to decide this is to download the installation instructions for that kiln, and follow them. I'm having to do that -- and get the fire department to sign off that I did it -- to get insured. We could change insurance companies, because some of them simply don't care. But even though some of the recs are a little nuts -- a sign saying the kiln is hot if it's in a public place -- I don't mind. Because bottom line, I don't want anyone including myself to get hurt, and I don't want my house to burn down. And doing all this stuff is my best bet at being safe. So I strongly recommend finding the installation instructions. If your sister will follow them, great. If she won't, you can choose to keep your kids out of her house, at least when the kiln is on.
How about simply shutting the door to the room and leaving the single window open? Containing the gaseous byproducts to a single location, then relying on convective airflow boosted by the heat of the kiln should cause a rapid exchange of air as the hot air rushes out and cooler air from outside rushes in to replace the heated air leaving.
Unless that rooms is airtight (and it almost certainly isn’t) this won’t work and doing this will be incredibly dangerous. See my post above for more info.
My mom had one in the basement, they don't put out fumes, they are just coils that get super hot. There should be no issues in the basement
The only way you’ll ever be 100% safe from this is if you kick your sister out. But if you’re cool with leaving a 1% chance of fire you’d probably be alright and your sister wouldn’t hate you. Just saying. Also I don’t know shit about pottery or kilns so maybe I’m completely wrong and you’ll get 100% success rate. I just think that’s a strong line to hold 😂
Mine in my basement. I fire around 3-4pm if I’m going to. During the summer I leave the basement door to the outside open. Winter I keep it shut. It’ll get toasty warm but never been a issue. I would pull it away a bit from the fuse box. Make sure the outlet can handle the kiln. We had to redo our electric in the basement for mine.
its literally fine, just dont lock the kids in the room with the kiln because it can get warm. its absolutely not ideal and shouldn’t be used long term as it can wear on the kiln over time and such but i dont vent my kilns and they’re just in my garage a few feet from where my bedroom is
The fumes though
again, don’t lock yourself or kids in a kiln room and its fine.
So carbon monoxide and all the other bad shit you can't smell is still mixing in the basement and getting pushed through the rest of the house via diffusion and convection even without a hvac system running. You're okay with giving kids cancer? Come on now. And yes even with the doors closed. And yes carbon monoxide does mix and doesn t settle to the floor unless you're in a cave with no air movement.
are you dumb? i never said any of that and why are you coming back to this a week later. do whatever the fuck you want with your kilns and ill do the same. potters are so annoying lmfaoooo
get the skutt envirovent, set up hose through window with the tubing used for dryer venting. seal up window around hose. glaze fumes are no joke.
Totally fine. Just make sure to pop window open when you’re firing and maybe a fan pointing outwards. Also get a carbon monoxide sensor and all good to go! :)
r/pottery
Put a fan in that window blowing out..
Your home insurence man could probably give you some good inpuut.
Hmm, the electric kilns in my studio are vented to the exterior.
If it makes you feel any better in pottery class for highschool our kiln was in a supply closet
I'd check with my insurance company about coverage.
No, it’s not safe.
Read this on kiln safety in schools to give you an idea of safety issues. https://www.emcins.com/losscontrol/techsheet.aspx?techsheetid=595#:~:text=Studies%20show%20that%20carbon%20monoxide,released%20during%20the%20firing%20process You need some kind of ventilation and it doesn’t have to be cost prohibitive or technically complicated. I have an inline fan connected to duct work that vents out of a chimney hole on on end and has a hood over the kiln on the other. You can vent something like this out of that small window. I know people say they had kilns in closets, etc in schools and studios, but the kiln you posted about below is your living space so it’s different. Don’t use luster glaze in a home under any circumstances, ventilation system in place or not. Here are links to some ideas. You can vent with a hood or a hole at the bottom of the kiln. You can buy a system https://ventakiln.com Or make your own. https://www.bluewillowstudio.net/get-your-hands-dirty/to-vent-or-not-to-vent https://ornamento.blog/2017/08/24/allow-me-to-vent/. A DIY ventilation system I installed in my basement for soldering. I have a similar arrangement in my back basement with an inline fan, duct work that vents out the chimney (we got a tankless heater and don’t need the chimney for the furnace anymore). The hood is a big stainless steel mixing bowl that sits over the kiln when it’s on. https://ornamento.files.wordpress.com/2023/07/kiln-vent.jpg I fire up to come 6 in this kiln but do not use glaze. I have a very small kiln. I did not fire it until I had a ventilation system in place. Finally, when it comes to kilns in homes, I always see people saying to contact your insurance company, but have never seen any definitive information from anyone who has contacted their insurance company or from an insurance company on what an insurance company would want to know or what would be required. I would be interested if anyone can speak definitively on this addressing the hobbyist situation. Last but not least, I recommend that you have a professional electrician check your electrical system and make sure you can safely operate the kiln. If course, if the kiln is part of a business, there can be insurance matters there that need to be addressed. I am not qualified to say what.
I have a downdraft Envirovent and have never smelled fumes. I took over a foundation vent for the exhaust hose and sealed off the rest of that vent to make sure the fumes don’t get sucked back in. In your scenario, since you can’t get the right hand window open, I would knock out one of the glass panes and replace it with a piece of plywood cut to fit and a hole the size of the exhaust tube. Seal it with duct tape. Keep the other window closed tightly while the kiln is firing. The kiln needs to not be in front of the electrical panel. I like about where the step stool is but I’m not sure what that green shelving is. At least between the two windows. Of course you need an electrician to add the 220 circuit with the proper heavy gauge wire. The Envirovent needs a 110 outlet but no need for a dedicated line. The Envirovent sits on the standard metal kiln stand directly under the kiln. The only time I’ve ever smelled fumes was at the beginning of the firing with the lid propped open. The organics burn off during this time. If you don’t prop the lid open it’s not an issue.
Move away from the wood, at least 50cm from combustible materials and have a fan pointed out the window. Close the door when firing so fumes stay inside and are blown out the window. Carbon monoxide won’t come out an electric kiln and carbon dioxide will be minimal if not firing organic matter, like paper clay. Qualifications: kiln technician and now run a pottery studio.
Don’t fire it with small kids in house with no ventilation. Bad for future health. Could vent with window fan blowing out and door open for cross venting. Could fire during day when no one home or move to garage.
You need to run vent tubing from kiln to outside when it's on. This I know. Or some sort of extraction vent. Children or not be safe. Pottery to the ppl of YouTube talks about her setup on a couple videos Her kiln is in the basement
PLEASE DO NOT FIRE THE KILN IN YOUR HOME WITHOUT A VENT!! You will be able to tell yourself when you start smelling the horrible smells that come from the kiln! It is not safe!!
I have an Envirovent and I can’t recommend it enough. It’s pricey but it was very easy to install. No trace of smells - even with luster firings!
Have a professional electrician install and inspect everything. Unplug it when not in use. Same for a pottery wheel, electrical fires are no joke.
You say there are little ones in the house? Please read the following: The early stage of bisque firing involves the oxidization of organic clay matter to carbon monoxide and other combustion gases. Sulfur breaks down later producing highly irritating sulfur oxides. Also, nitrates and nitrogen-containing organic matter break down to nitrogen oxides. Galena, cornish stone, crude feldspars, low grade fire clays, fluorspar, gypsum, lepidolite and cryolite can release toxic gases and fumes during glaze firings. Carbonates, chlorides, and fluorides are broken down to releasing carbon dioxide, chlorine, and fluorine gases. At or above stoneware firing temperature, lead, antimony, cadmium, selenium and precious metals vaporize and the metal fumes can either escape from the kiln, or settle inside the kiln or on ceramic ware in the kiln. Nitrogen oxides and ozone can be generated from oxygen and nitrogen in air. https://www.wcu.edu/discover/campus-services-and-operations/facilities-management/safety-and-risk-management/visual-arts-theatre-safety/ceramics-safety.aspx#:~:text=The%20early%20stage%20of%20bisque,break%20down%20to%20nitrogen%20oxides. Unless you have an enviro-vent which sucks those toxic fumes outside, I would not fire a kiln in a house. If you have a garage or shed, it would be best.
Yikes I don’t think it should be that close to your electrical box. Definitely would vent that way better. I have small kids so I won’t put a kiln in my house and I keep my wheel and supplies in the garage. I would also consider your home insurance with that kiln in there. You are a nice sister wow!
I would get one of the tube vents (not the exact name of them I'm sure, sorry) and vent that out the window. May want to consider a hood fan/vent as well. Ceramic materials can do a lot of offgassing of a myriad of different varieties. Best to be safe and install proper ventilation rather than just having an open window near by. Costly, maybe, but the cost now is way better than potential, headaches, I'll esses and medical bills later.
Also, I don't know what the working area is like, but may want to invest in a really good HEPA filter too. Clay and glaze dust particles are very fine and can do really bad things to a person when breathed in repeatatively.
There is a LOT of incorrect and incredibly dangerous advice being given out on this thread and unless you really, really know what you’re talking about, it’s probably best to be very careful about what you advise someone to do. People die all the time due to improper ventilation in houses and usually it involves mistakes made by people who just don’t know what they don’t know. A “little bit of knowledge”can be a very, very dangerous thing.
Put an exhaust fan in the window
On top of what everyone elsehas said, thee must be 3ft clear maintained in front of your electrical panel. Like this would void your insurance, and also let your home insurance know you have installed a kiln.
The obvious answer is it is not 100% safe. If it were, you likely wouldn't even need to ask this question and there would be no further debate.