At 1:22 we started the fire. It was a little tricky to get going because of the wind, and kept collapsing. We added more kindling. We also tried to use a probe to take the temperature once the fire started, but it didn’t work, so we used a thermometer gun for the rest of the experiment.
At 1:36 we took the first fire temperature – 627 degrees celsius. Then we took the weights of the loom weights, in grams.
Group member | Weight of Loom Weight #1 | Weight of Loom Weight #2 | Weight of Loom Weight #3 |
Margie | 190 | 193 | 201 |
Eliot | 191 | 195 | 197 |
Hal’a | 201 | 192 | 192 |
Dane | 168 | 168 | 179 |
Phoebe | 171 | 156 | 156 |
The dimensions were the same for all of our weights: 3 inches across, 1 inch hole, 1 inch thickness. However, Dane’s were 4 inches across, 1.5 inches in the hole, 1 inch arm, and had a 0.75 height.
Then we put them by the fire. I took temperatures at various times throughout the experiment. Across the top of this table are the times when I recorded the temperatures. The row all the way to the left are the individuals’ pottery pieces. In the table, I list (1-3) the temperatures (in degrees Celsius) of their 3 pieces of pottery. There is a lot of variation, as the placement of the pottery around the fire REALLY made a difference because of the wind. After each temperature reading, each piece was moved closer to the fire.
1:51 | 1:54 | 1:59 | 2:09 | 2:17 | 2:32 | |
Halia | 22, 27, 19 | 35, 35, 33 | 100, 80, 63 | 213, 261, 280 | 394, 163, 113 | |
Eliot | 50, 40, 45 | 83, 65, 94 | 88, 68, 59 | 101, 94, 96 | 222, 374, 320 | |
Margie | 26, 25 24 | 107, 100, 62 | 282, 283, 200 | 430, 320, 150 | ||
Phoebe | 21, 24, 25 | 63, 41, 46 | 75, 68, 271 | 386, 138, 103 | 230, 329, 357 | |
Dane | 25, 21, 30 | 58, 74, 63 | 148, 115, 101 | 150, 80, 127 | ||
Fire | 604 |
At 2:36, we stacked the pyramid to make a “teepee.” Here are the fire temperature measurements:
Time | Temperature (celsius) |
2:51 | 790 |
2:54 | 893 |
2:56 (SMOTHERED the fire with sawdust) | 813 |
The next day, we went to check out the results of smothering. The sawdust was gone. 3/15 of our pottery pieces had broken: 2 were Margie and Eliot’s non-bisque fired pottery. The third was Hali’a’s.
The middle of the fire was 19 degrees celsius, and the temperature of the regular ground was 13 degrees celsius.
Each piece of pottery stayed the same weight, except for Dane’s, which went up one gram each. Margie and Eliot tried to rebuild their pieces, and their weights were 176 and 141 grams, respectfully. We had 33 grams of miscellaneous broken pottery pieces left over.
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