Does rain or snow halt progress on a Beehive Kiln?

[Professor Dragon]

Does anyone know if rain or snow will halt the progress on a Beehive Kiln?

I put in a fairly full load with 9 x 24 peat bricks, and came back to find all the peat consumed, but still raw items.

I'm curious if I should have just gone for a 9 x 32 peat brick stack, or if I need to cover the hole in the Beehive Kiln "chimney".

My base is in a Rainfall "Almost all the time" area.

My prior runs have completed, so the kiln setup is fine in general.

Same question for the Cementation Furnace (steel making), although my guess is that is immune.

I can test this out, but I'm hoping that someone knows already.

Thanks, Professor Dragon.

[Echo Weaver]

2 hours ago, Professor Dragon said:

I put in a fairly full load with 9 x 24 peat bricks, and came back to find all the peat consumed, but still raw items.

Does the beehive kiln work with peat? I thought it required charcoal or equivalent. I guess you say you've fired your pottery successfully with peat before.

I did not think the beehive kiln cared about rain, and the structure itself looks like it would be rainproof.

[zand]

Greetings Professor Dragon,

I did a lot of testing with the beehive kiln and burning piles a while back, and I don't believe that rain would stop it from working. For a beehive kiln to start heating the items inside, you need the 9 stacks of fuel to be burning at the same time. If one of the stacks doesn't ignite or runs out of fuel, then the items will stop heating. Once the items heat up to a temp (950°C), they should start progressing to their baked versions. If the temp drops below 950°C before it is done baking, it stops progressing but keeps its current progress. Starting at 0°C, the entire process takes about 10.9 in-game hours.

To start off, you would have to consider possible user errors, like the beehive kiln not being complete or one of the stacks of fuel not having enough items, which for peat I think is 22 in each stack. I think the latter is likely the reason because, due to fire spread being random, I had cases where about 3 of the items burnt in the first stack I lit before the other 8 started burning. Because of this, I would recommend 26 pieces of fuel per stack. Both peat and logs have the same burn time when in a pile.

The other possibility is that it didn't finish due to a bug.

[Professor Dragon]

1 hour ago, Echo Weaver said:

Does the beehive kiln work with peat? I thought it required charcoal or equivalent. I guess you say you've fired your pottery successfully with peat before.

I did not think the beehive kiln cared about rain, and the structure itself looks like it would be rainproof.

Thanks for the advice.

Yes, the Beehive Kiln works marvelously with peat bricks. And, unlike charcoal, burning stacks don't fall over.

The inside hole definitely lets rain and snow through.

34 minutes ago, zand said:

I did a lot of testing with the beehive kiln and burning piles a while back, and I don't believe that rain would stop it from working. For a beehive kiln to start heating the items inside, you need the 9 stacks of fuel to be burning at the same time. If one of the stacks doesn't ignite or runs out of fuel, then the items will stop heating. Once the items heat up to a temp (950°C), they should start progressing to their baked versions. If the temp drops below 950°C before it is done baking, it stops progressing but keeps its current progress. Starting at 0°C, the entire process takes about 10.9 in-game hours.

To start off, you would have to consider possible user errors, like the beehive kiln not being complete or one of the stacks of fuel not having enough items, which for peat I think is 22 in each stack. I think the latter is likely the reason because, due to fire spread being random, I had cases where about 3 of the items burnt in the first stack I lit before the other 8 started burning. Because of this, I would recommend 26 pieces of fuel per stack. Both peat and logs have the same burn time when in a pile.

The other possibility is that it didn't finish due to a bug.

Thank you. I appreciated the details.

Definitely nine squares with 24 peat in each. I lit the front three rows, rather than load and light. The progress indicator ticked off and was moving along nicely.

I'm guessing that my very full load of the Beehive Kiln simply exhausted the fuel while I wasn't paying attention.

I used the falling block technique to triple stack Storage Vessels and large flowerpots, along with some floor to ceiling shingle stacks, but that looks like it was being too greedy for the fuel supplied.

I'll fuel up and give it another go. Maybe I should just not skimp out and stack it with 32 peat bricks, but I was trying to econimise. Oh well - lesson learned!

Good to know it wasn't the rain - although I'm going to keep an eye out on that "Just in Case", however unlikely.

At some point I'll test if you can block the chimney. I think I read somewhere that does halt the Beehive Kiln functioning, but perhaps a block above the kiln or two blocks above would not.

Back to coloured ceramic production.

Thanks both, Professor Dragon.

Edited October 21, 2025 by Professor Dragon

[Echo Weaver]

I guess I must've assumed that the beehive kiln required (char)coal because the cementation furnace did. Lesson learned!

[Professor Dragon]

1 minute ago, Echo Weaver said:

I guess I must've assumed that the beehive kiln required (char)coal because the cementation furnace did. Lesson learned!

Yes, this puts it in the realm of early game! It just needs fireclay and any fuel source such as firewood, peat or coal.
https://wiki.vintagestory.at/Beehive_kiln/draft#Fuel_Efficiency

If I had truly appreciated this, I would have built my Beehive Kiln BEFORE my THREE Cementation Furnaces, because then I wouldn't have fired all of those refractory bricks in pit kilns. I had it stuck in my head that a Beehive Kiln was a "late game' item and that I should get steel first. Another lesson learned.

Besides, the coloured ceramics is really where it is at for me, so I just can't believe now (after the event) that I didn't do it sooner.

It's a bit of a monster to keep stacked with ceramics and fuel though.

Professor Dragon.

 

[Echo Weaver]

30 minutes ago, Professor Dragon said:

Yes, this puts it in the realm of early game! It just needs fireclay and any fuel source such as firewood, peat or coal.
https://wiki.vintagestory.at/Beehive_kiln/draft#Fuel_Efficiency

If I had truly appreciated this, I would have built my Beehive Kiln BEFORE my THREE Cementation Furnaces, because then I wouldn't have fired all of those refractory bricks in pit kilns. I had it stuck in my head that a Beehive Kiln was a "late game' item and that I should get steel first. Another lesson learned.

Besides, the coloured ceramics is really where it is at for me, so I just can't believe now (after the event) that I didn't do it sooner.

It's a bit of a monster to keep stacked with ceramics and fuel though.

Professor Dragon.

 

I totally did this -- made over a dozen pit kilns to fire the refractory bricks for the cementation furnace -- I only have one, and it hasn't finished its first load because I found the treasure trader and wandered off to find the Resonance Archives before it was done . Definitely learned my lesson! I also hadn't taken colored ceramics seriously because my attention was on steel. 

Wish this thread had happened last month!

[zand]

11 hours ago, Echo Weaver said:

I guess I must've assumed that the beehive kiln required (char)coal because the cementation furnace did. Lesson learned!

It's kinda understandable as the code for burning piles of coal is hard-coded while the other GroundStorable items rely on burnHoursPerItem property being set. Fun fact, you can also use planks which have 1/3rd the per item burn time as firewood or peat or use bamboo, which has 1/5th the per item burn time.