Casa 90 installation

[Alan]

We had our first pizza last night so I figured it was time to post a summary of my Casa 90 installation. I've stopped until spring, with plastic tarp material protecting the bare Hardibacker walls and a quickly made chimney cap in place.

The whole series, from first cut

to first pizza


is at http://picasaweb.google.com/ajs123/PizzaOven.


We've made pizza on a stone in our regular oven for many years. At our previous house, we had an oven that was basically a brick box with a gas burner that we used constantly through the summer. Our pizza last night was in a class by itself, even with hastily made, ordinary dough.

The last long went in at around 7:30 last night. I put the door in place at about 9:30. Temperatures were in the 40's overnight. This morning, 12 hours later, the oven door was hot, air inside feels like maybe 150, and I could touch the floor only for a moment.

[james]

Alan,

I really enjoyed that series of photos. It's great seeing the family working on this, setting the pieces, and then getting to cook pizza the first time in the oven. I like the design -- can you send a photo when it's finished?

Also, can I put a photo on FB.com?

Congratulations. You have lots of parties to look forward to.

One very small comment. If you keep brushing, you can get the floor really clean and you won't have little bits of ash to deal with.
James

[Alan]

Here's a Google Sketchup sketch showing more or less where we're headed. Bricks will continue around the ledge. I stopped copying and pasting as soon as I had enough to get an idea of what it would look like.

Having never done stucco before and with the weather changing here, I've stopped for the winter but I'll certainly post more when work resumes.

Thanks for the tip regarding thorough brushing. I don't have my outdoor work surface yet so I was carrying pizzas out on the transfer peel and had no place to set it down. After the first one I didn't bother re-cleaning. Nobody seemed to mind!

Update - at 2 PM, 18+ hours after the last log went on, the floor is still uncomfortable to hold my hand on - hot enough to make cold leftover slices from the refrigerator lukewarm.

James, feel free to use pics on the site.

P.S. I just fixed the link to the last picture.