BillFitzmaurice.info

In true diy style, and because I know you guys love watching pictures of thing being built, I want to show you what i've been building for the last week instead of speakers!

My father just got an original Valoriani stone oven and we wanted to build it properly to make delicious pizzas etc.. So we took on quite a project, but its fun and I can't wait to cook in it!

Setting up a spot on the terrace




Here we go building a foundation. We had to leave a bit of room between the concrete blocks so the rainwater can flow to the drain while maintaining the original tiles.




The next step was to build the base of the oven with regular bricks.












The floor of the oven is made from calcium silicate, aka. Gas Beton.


This step is to assemble the oven itself. We had to lay out the refractory stones in the bottom perfectly and then add the oven crown.




The crown assembly had to be stuccoed with special refractory mortar.


Chimney assembly begun.


Adding the door/front of the oven.








The crown of the oven is then covered in two layers of ceramic blanket to retain the heat inside the oven.












We got 600 liters of Vermiculite to insulate the oven. This is poured right on top of the ceramic blanket.












And this is how the oven sits for now. We're adding a zink roof and in the spring its going to be painted completely white while mainting the red color of the bricks in archway.


Fun project! Can't wait to start it up easy next week.. It needs a 7-10 days burn in time where we have to carefully maintain temperature and let it slowly rise over the course of a week to dry out all the water in the oven construction..

That's awesome man! Looks great!

sweet!

Dayum. Thinking this isn't your first masonry project.

Ceramic fiber blanket, now thats insulation. Nothing like the real thing. Great job!.

Beautiful construction.

BTY - You guys might take your pizza way too seriously!

That is awesome!

Thanks guys! I knew you would appreciate something as silly overkill as this

LelandCrooks wrote:Dayum. Thinking this isn't your first masonry project.

We got a hand from a skilled mason, so we weren't all alone in doing this - the oven is way way too expensive to fuck it up by doing something wrong, so we wanted a pro to help us

pumpsfast wrote:Ceramic fiber blanket, now thats insulation. Nothing like the real thing. Great job!.

Yea, its some serious stuff - the 600 liters of Vermiculite is quite insulating aswell.. The oven should be able to do 12-24 hour roasts without lighting it more than once, so it needs to be really really well insulated

Will this be fueled by wood, coal or some other fuel? I agree that you take your pizza way too seriously!

BTW, when's the BFM Forum pizza party?

DJPhatman wrote:Will this be fueled by wood, coal or some other fuel? I agree that you take your pizza way too seriously!

BTW, when's the BFM Forum pizza party?

Only hardwoods - primarily oak and beech..

This oven will be used for all sorts of cooking besides pizza.. We'll bake bread and cook roasts all the time

But yea, we take our pizzas very seriously!

Beautifully executed Michael!

The well loved tools and specific mud buckets gave it away to me that either; you or your Dad's day job was brick / blocklaying or you'd called in a pro to help you out

Good brickies around here can lay up to 1000 bricks a day, even in face work. They generally set their rates, between 50 cents to a dollar per brick laid. They make good coin.

I've toyed with the idea of building one for my folks, but they're selling up over the next 12 months. We built one as a class practical assessment during my Tafe (Technical College) days. The price of refractory bricks turned me off in the end.

Pizza mmmmm food of kings, enjoy!

As someone who makes their own dough you have NO IDEA how jealous I am...

What a great project
Fantastic results!

I'm sure it will be put to good use...

Fantastic build. No doubt that it will get a lot of use. Just remember to go slow in the curing process. It is easy to get carried away wanting to taste the fruits of your labors. Don't forget to get your pizza peel and oven tools sorted before you fire it for the first time. It is a lot easier to have them in place than trying to run out and source them at the last minute. Lovely oven,congrats.

Titanium Hand wrote:Beautifully executed Michael!

The well loved tools and specific mud buckets gave it away to me that either; you or your Dad's day job was brick / blocklaying or you'd called in a pro to help you out

Good brickies around here can lay up to 1000 bricks a day, even in face work. They generally set their rates, between 50 cents to a dollar per brick laid. They make good coin.

I've toyed with the idea of building one for my folks, but they're selling up over the next 12 months. We built one as a class practical assessment during my Tafe (Technical College) days. The price of refractory bricks turned me off in the end.

You don't need special refractory bricks, you can use the type used to make fireplaces, you know when you see a burned down house and all that is left is the chimney? those are the bricks you want.

Also I have to say that while there is a lot of enthusiasm for building wood fired ovens, there's not a lot of real expertise going around, there might be excellent builders of ovens but that's just it, they are builders not bakers, so it turns out that a lot of designs (like Michael's unfortunately), are not also flued at the back, only the front, that means they take 2-3 times longer to heat up because fresh air only goes a little way into the chamber before it gets gets sucked out the top, and you need airflow right to the back of the wood pile to get the temperature up.