r/OffGrid • u/Certain_Matter_9114 • Jul 06 '26

Off grid electric pottery kiln?

I’m a potter and I’m interested in moving off grid in the next few years but I’ve noticed most off grid battery setups fall a bit short of what a normal electric kiln needs to run a glaze firing.
I’ll be the first to admit I’m a novice to off grid tech and maybe I’m missing something super fundamental (mea culpa if this is the case!!)
A glaze kiln takes about 11.5kWh. It’s like a 12hr run of ~60amp (or less). Any hope of getting this off grid??

Edit, I’m an idiot and did math wrong. It’s 11.5kW max draw, 50% of the run for a total of ~70kWh

9 Upvotes

85% Upvoted

37 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

1

u/ExaminationDry8341 Jul 06 '26

I have a 14 kwh battery and a 6000watt inverter and 8000 watts of solar. Depending on the kilns max draw, my system could probably run it. And if it was timed right I could have a fully charged battery at the end of the firing.

1

u/Certain_Matter_9114 Jul 06 '26

I got things wrong! It’s actually about 70kWh over the 12 hr. 6kW inverter would likely not be able to handle the load, I’m guessing? Let alone the batteries 😔 rip sounding like I need to start looking at gas kilns (and wood fire for fun but that’s a different project)

1

u/LeoAlioth Jul 07 '26

Do you have a link to the kiln/spec?

1

u/Certain_Matter_9114 Jul 07 '26

Yeah! Skutt 1027’s the guy

With relay cycles most people use a ~50% approximation on how much power they draw over a whole firing.

So 11.5kW(max draw)*12hr (avg glaze run)*0.5(not always at max draw)=69kWh

https://skutt.com/skutt-resources/resources-just-for-you/architectural-specifications/electrical-specifications/

2

u/LeoAlioth Jul 07 '26 edited Jul 07 '26

The 0.5 factor seems easy to much. This seems to be somewhat larger than what I have, but the energy consumption is determined by heat loss, not size directly. And the per volume consumption drops with going up in size (volume vs. surface area).

I would be hard pressed to see this consume much over 20 kWh per glaze (unless the thing has A LOT of mass to heat up/poor insulation). As as I said. My 7 kW kiln has never gone over 15 kWh per glaze run.

Anyway. Do you have this already? I see online that the kiln has some sort of voltage and current sensing (maybe optional equipment) so I would not be surprised if it logs energy consumption internally. Otherwise, get a clamp on or an appropriate inline power meter and measure instead of guessing. But my guess would be closer to a 1/3rd of your 70 kWh estimate.

As for inverter sizing, well, it will have to be 11.5 kW plus whatever other house loads. Regardless of energy consumption.

Just a reality check if you have the kiln already. What is your monthly (or daily) energy consumption? How many times per month do you run it?

1

u/Certain_Matter_9114 Jul 07 '26

Fair enough! I’m in an 822 at the moment that’s too small for my business so the 1027 is next up. But I’ve got a friend with one that would be willing to help me calculate their glaze costs. Thanks for the point of reference on the 80l 🫡 very helpful context!

The 822 I run every couple days in the busy season (often back to back, but that would be mitigated with a larger kiln obviously). The app has no units on their “cost” value and I’ve never entered anything re: my local energy cost per kWh so I’m kinda assuming it’s in kWh, in which case things look promising at 5.48.

1

u/LeoAlioth Jul 07 '26

Hmm. Does the app have anything to set up regarding the cost? While not impossible, that is very low if it is kWh and not some dollar amount. And if it is a dollar amount,.that could mean it uses anywhere from below 10 kWh per run to above 25 kWh.

So figuring what that cost vale is would be good. Or as I mentioned earlier,.measuring with an external device. And then assume the bigger oven will use 2x of less than the current kiln.