Dominick's Pizza Oven Brick Oven Photos Discuss Dominick's Pizza Oven in the Good Background Information forums; Question - Are the oven floor brick mortared? I ask because this would be contrary to the directions from James ...

[pzachef]

Question - Are the oven floor brick mortared?

I ask because this would be contrary to the directions from James in the Forno-Bravo Plans.

If they are mortared please give some comment on the descision to do so.

Thanks, Bob

[Nick]

So sorry I've been out of the loop for SOOOO long! Your question brings me right back. I collected some photos from 2 computers and took some new ones and I will try to post them. Wish me luck!

[Nick]

The floor now has bricks as per the FB plans. Photos to follow...I hope!

[Nick]

Here are more photos of the oven-building process.

[Nick]

Some of those were duplicates, I guess. The question about the mortared floor threw me off.

Okay, here are five more that take off from there....

More will follow in a few minutes....

[Nick]

I should note that the dome of the oven was stuccoed with insulating cement and then an insulation blanket purchased from FB was placed over that.

Then the wall was raised around it and filled with vermiculite.

Then, as you'll see here, that was covered with mortarboard and painted with some special purple paint. Then the slate roof was installed.

[Nick]

The insulation works REAL well! In one photo here, I am making pizza in January 09. It's snowing. The thin layer of snow on the roof of the oven did NOT melt. When this photo was taken, the oven had been hot for at least 90 minutes.

[Les]

Interesting approach to get the floor to a comfortable cooking height. How do you keep the water out of your storage area?

Les...

[Nick]

Here are a couple of recent photos.

My daughter and her BFF pressing the pizza oven into service toasting marshmallows. What else?

And a roaring fire.

The oven makes a nice fire. I usually get flames licking out the front and up the chimney.

There's definitely a learning curve, and I'm still near the bottom.

I use untreated charcoal and an electric starter to get the fire started now. I was a boy scout for only 3 weeks and never learned how to get a good fire going, so I cheat.

I usually get a huge fire going at first, but I've recently learned that a smaller fire might work better because the oven doesn't get filled up with embers.

I've measured temperatures over 1000 degrees and cooked pizzas in 20 seconds. But that's really too fast. Now I usually don't start cooking when the oven is that hot.

My first load of wood was not ideal. Pieces too big. Next time I'll be more careful about where I get the wood.

The "pit" design: I sank the oven because I didn't want it to dominate the landscape. It can be a pain cleaning out the "pit," but I would do it that way again.

I'll try to answer any questions....

[Nick]

To answer Les's question:

There are several holes drilled in the concrete floor. The concrete is about 10 inches thick. Below that is crushed stone.

Water drains well. The original plan was to put a brick floor over the concrete. I haven't done that, mainly because I ran out of steam and wanted to see how the floor drained first. I have a few blocks there now and I've grown accustomed to it. As you can see, there is much finish landscaping to be done.

When I do store wood in those compartments, I raise them up off the floor because it does still get wet. If I covered the openings it would stay dry, although the pitch of the concrete floor is not perfect.

I hope that answers your question.