Pizza Oven - London Ontario

[igatbgs]

I started my Pompeii style Pizza Oven the last week of April and completed the project by the end of June. We are now enjoying pizza at least twice a week.

I followed the Forno Brava plans - making a 42" by 21" high interior dome. The base ended up being quite large - 7 coarses of cinderblock high - because I wanted to build it into the deck which was 24" off the ground.

I ended up with a stucco exterior keeping the igloo shape. The counter out to the right provides lots of work space and wood storage. Under the oven, the area my wife refers to a "bomb shelter" provides for additional wood storage.

I ended up getting the Pre-Mixed Fire Mortar, FB Blanket and FB Board from AlphaTherm in Markham Ontario. The remaining materials I was able to find locally. I had a hard time sourcing vermiculite, ended up buying 20 smaller bags of it at Home Depot. I also ended up forming the chimney cap, as the ones the local retailer had were for a 10" chimney flu.

This was my first brick/masonary project. I have worked with cememt before, but never to this degree. Oven functions really well, and the exterior dome is barely warm after having the oven fired at 700 degrees for several hours.

My final cost of the oven came in just over $3,000.00, partly because of the size of the support structure and counter. I guess we will just have to eat a lot of pizzas to get our money's worth. (This doesn't include the deck work which was above and beyond that price)

Ian Gray