Barrel Vault in So. Cal.

[OzOvenBuilder]

Great to see another vault mate, looking forward to the progress pics!

Russell.

[WJW]

If you squint your eyes real hard and use your imagination you can almost imagine that this will be an oven someday.

Not the tightest, straightest, or most consistent joints I've seen, but I had very low expectations going in so I'm happy to this point.

The small brick in the second course of the back wall was a rookie mistake. Forgot to lay out the bricks dry going accross and did the two corners and worked toward the middle. Now I need to try to do something on the next two courses to make it look like I planned it. Maybe do one on eiither side of the center in the next course, and then do a single one in the center on the next one, etc. ??





As you can see, I haven't been as neat as I might have been...anyone have any hints on how to clean up the mortar residue I left all over the place?

Bill

[brickie in oz]

Originally Posted by WJW

anyone have any hints on how to clean up the mortar residue I left all over the place?

Bill

Yeah, be more careful where you splatter it.

Are you using premixed mortar, I have forgotten? If so the joints are way too big.

[WJW]

No pre-mix. The only one I could source locally was Sariset and I got scared off by the experiences of others. I also took into account that fact that my masonry skills are so poor that I'd be hard pressed to maintain the 3mm joints required.

I went with the home brew...3,1,1,1...mix. Seems to be working fine so far.

No kidding on the sloppiness...need to work on that.

Bill

[GianniFocaccia]

Bill,
I adhered to a process that allowed me to clean up my homebrew mortar as I went. Any mortar that squeezed out of the joint I would trowel off and back into the bucket. I would go back to placing the next four or five bricks doing the same thing. Then I would return to the first brick and wipe it off with a wet towel. After wiping off all of the bricks I would leave a large wet towel on the row over night. Easy peasy.
John

[WJW]

Progress continues....

I was about done with my sidewalls when it occurred to me that, with the way I was going, they would not tie into the entry transition at all. So I tore out a couple of bricks to allow me some place to tie the the entray to the walls. (By the way, the home brew seems to set up diamond hard. Of the four bricks I took out, three had been aid somewhere between ten minutes and twelve hours earlier. No problem there. One of the bricks had been laid forty-eight hours earlier. Rock hard. Had to use my angle grinder to cut the joint.)

Anyway, the first pic is a shot of my entryway dry stacked. The second is a bird's eye view showing how I tied the entry way to the sidewalls. I did that on two courses....the ones below were too cured to do anything about.





Do most people tie the entry transition to the walls? I don't know that I've noticed one way or the other before...just seemed to me to make sense.

The final shot was tonight's work. Not the cleanest or straightest work I've seen...but just about ready to lay out my arch and make som forms.

[brickie in oz]

I dont know if Id be using a steel lintel to hold the front up, a really flat arch would do the job.
The arch only has to rise 10mm (3/8") or so to hold.

I did incorporate a steel lintel in my build but its wrapped in ceramic blanket at the fire face.

Edit:-
Those little triangle pieces you have cut for the inside of the oven will probably come adrift and fall off, small bits of brickwork tend to do that without the added heat, and with them working as the door stop even more so.

[WJW]

I wondered about both of the issues you raise.

Am I better off cutting a larger peice of brick (which would be bonded to a larger surface)?

I've been worried about the expansion of a peice of steel..thinking of either an arch of some type or a concrete lintel.

Thoughts?

Bill

[brickie in oz]

Try this......

[brickie in oz]

Originally Posted by WJW

some type or a concrete lintel.

As cast refractory concrete lintel would be far better.