The Auber seems popular in the States. They have no presence over here so I have not tried them myself.
Both AutomationDirect and Omega sell a nice controller that seems to do everything the Auber will do, but which also holds 4 different sets of PID settings from tuning at 4 different temperatures, and automatically chooses the PID values from the tuning temperature closest to the setpoint.
http://www.omega.com/pptst/CN7800.html
http://www.automationdirect.com/adc...ers/1-z-16_DIN_Size_(SL4848_Series)/SL4848-VR
It's the same controller with a different badge, at least as far as I can tell. I have built 6 HT kilns so far and used whichever brand was cheapest at the time.
The one to get in each case will be the one with a pulsed DC output to drive an SSR (the CN7823 or the SL4848VR).
None of the above is a plug-and-play option though: there is some wiring needed and, because it is an industrial controller, the programming needs something akin to an "industrial" level of knowledge/understanding, rather than an "end user" level. Once the initial setup is complete, entering the actual ramp-and-soak profiles is not too bad, but is less intuitive than the controllers fitted to the Evenheats and Paragons.
There are Plug-and-Play controllers out there which are very easy to use, aimed primarily at potters, etc. I had looked at these and discounted them for my HT kilns because none of the ones I could find would give short enough output cycle times to provide the fine control I wanted for HT.
The output cycle time is the time for the element to cycle on, off and back on. If the controller is calling for 50% output, the element will be powered for 30 seconds and off for 30 seconds with a one minute cycle time. With a 2-second cycle time, the elements will be powered for one second and off for one second.
The actual kiln temperature will rise while the elements are powered and fall when they are off, giving a saw-toothed temperature profile above and below the setpoint. Using a short cycle time means the tooth pitch is smaller and the deviations from the setpint are smaller.
I did some testing on my first couple of HT kilns and found that a 5 second cycle time was noticeably smoother than a 10-second cycle time and that the equipment I had could not measure any improvement below a 2-second cycle time. The shortest cycle time I could find on a kiln controller over here (UK) was 30 seconds. I felt this was too long. If I could have found a unit with a 10-second cycle time, I would have jumped at it.
