George's Pompeii progress Pompeii Oven Construction Discuss George's Pompeii progress in the Pizza Oven Design and Installation forums; Hi all, I decided that my cast vent weighed just too much to put up on top of the arches. ...

[gjbingham]

Hi all,

I decided that my cast vent weighed just too much to put up on top of the arches. Should I use it as an anchor or planter??? Cast your vote!

I'm continuing in my shameless imitation at Ken's fine work. I have neither the skill or patience to match his quality though. It's way too cold outside!

Here's my version of the vent transition from the arches. I'm pretty well out of full bricks now, so I'm using leftover cuttings. It leaves me with some gaps here and there, which I'm just filling with mortar.

You can see that I blew the width of one of the cuts on the final chimney anchor plate platform. I broke one of the bricks tapping it into place too. My
hands and body are just too cold to make me want to pull out the saw and cut again. Regardless, it's square and level. I have no idea if it's the right size for the anchor plate as I've yet to order one.

A few more days and I'll pull out the arch form. Then we'll see if this all needs to be done again.

Ciao for now!
George

[Kemo]

George,

that looks pretty damn good! will you be going to duratech chimney or continuing with brick?

[gjbingham]

Duratech. That's likely to be the most expensive part of this whole project.
G.

[Kemo]

Originally Posted by gjbingham

Duratech. That's likely to be the most expensive part of this whole project.
G.

and will probably be the quickest part of the project too

[gjbingham]

I sure could use an easy part to this project. Sure has been fun, but I'm ready for some work where my hands aren't wet all the time.

Have you started curing your oven yet?
G.

[Kemo]

started making fires yesterday...made about 5 small ones today. will keep with the small ones till next week when my insulating blanket comes in...

[Ken524]

Originally Posted by gjbingham

I decided that my cast vent weighed just too much to put up on top of the arches. Should I use it as an anchor or planter??? Cast your vote!

Planter... Definitely a planter.

I'm continuing in my shameless imitation at Ken's fine work. I have neither the skill or patience to match his quality though. It's way too cold outside!

Nonsense! You aren't shamelessly imitating me, you're shamelessly imitating Balty's vent (which I also shamelessly imitated ). His vent is fancier than either of ours :

Balty Knowles chimney transition:


If you need to do some planning, the 8" Duratech anchor plate sold by FB is 12"x12". I wouldn't sweat it if it overhangs.

George, it looks great!

[gjbingham]

Wow,
That is nice work by Balty. Somehow I missed his thread/pics.
Thanks for your help and vote of confidence, Ken.
G.

[gjbingham]

Well, patience was never one of my virtues.

I pulled the arch form after 6 days. Amazingly enough, no disaster!

My song for the day, just for Frances, (Elton) I'm still standin', yeah, yeah, yeah........

Rain's a comin', then snow(?), then the big freeze. As the old saying goes in Washington State, "if you don't like the weather, just wait five minutes".
I'll get this thing completely cured someday.... probably not this week though.

In the mean time I guess I could deal with my screw-ups. I'm slightly out of square out front. My concrete forms moved about a quarter of an inch during the last concrete pour (under the entryway). I was rushing to get it done 'cause I'd promised the wife I'd take her shopping. Once I got about half the mud in there, I noticed that the forms had moved a bit, and there was no pushing them back into place at that point.

Nothing a masonry saw blade and grinder won't fix with a few hours effort. You can see where I ended up chiseling away the excess along the right hand side. I figure it's easier to cover up low spots than deal with high ones.

Anybody have any ideas about finishing this ugly monster? The corner installation seems to remove some of the more traditional options, other than igloo. I'd love to hear suggestions.

Many thanks
George

[Frances]

A song for me? Cool

The vent looks really good, very professional, very solid (despite all your talk of broken bricks etc...)

If you don't like the idea of an igloo oven, you could always go for a pyramid shape. Or triangular maybe? What kind of finish did you have in mind?