It seems that I've started

[dvonk]

It will be (at least I hope) 43" or 45" Tuscan style, corner installation, as a part of outdoor kitchen.
Foundation is made like a floating one (freeze line here is about 150 cm, 60") laying on the hard clay. Foundation size is 190x190 (75"x75"), stand will be 160x160 (63x63), will make it of haydite concrete blocks.
The main problem on the stage of preparation (despite the English building terms and language barrier) is complete difference in trademarks of available materials here, in Russia, so I have to check everything 5 times before making a decision, but this forum and whole FB site helps a lot.
This weekend was spent completely on making rebar and pouring the foundation concrete. Last week was quite rainy so heap of sand dumped, so I spent a huge amount of time and muscle power on screening it out - I was forced to push each shovel of sand through the mesh sieve. Was so tired yesterday so even didn't made a photo of poured foundation.

[Frances]

Originally Posted by dvonk

Was so tired yesterday so even didn't made a photo of poured foundation.

Never mind, with any luck your foundation won't be going anywhere right now, so you can post a photo for us today...

I know what you mean about brand names being different. Same here, with the added difficulty that in Switzerland they don't list any components on cement products and aren't very helpful to non-professionals.

Still, getting hold of the right materials is all part of the fun, and you'll have an even greater sense of achievement once you're finished...

[dvonk]

Originally Posted by Frances

Never mind, with any luck your foundation won't be going anywhere right now, so you can post a photo for us today...

I can't! It's out of Moscow, so I can do that only on weekend. I hope to make stand next saturday - we had orthodox Easter on Sunday, so there is no way to work. But I'm seriously hope that I'll find cured foundation on the same place

[dmun]

The main problem on the stage of preparation (despite the English building terms and language barrier) is complete difference in trademarks of available materials here, in Russia, so I have to check everything 5 times before making a decision

I think it would be a big help if non North-American builders would make a list of materials in their own language, to help future oven builders from their own regions.

I know that in the case of Dvonk most of us couldn't read the cyrillic script, but it would be a useful thing to have on record.

[dvonk]

It won't be a problem, sure

[dvonk]

Yesterday we celebrated Orthodox Easter, so my results of last weekend are pretty modest - just was able to spent 2 or 3 hours on claydite-concrete block stand. And, yes, fortunately I've found the slab on the same place I've left it, so I was able to make a last-week photo.
Two extra courses are due to the estimated floor height of the outdoor kitchen (I'm gonna fill myself as a Mowgly, need to make a kind of staging).

Hope that upcoming weekend (that will be 4 days) will bring me really close to start the dome.

Is, by the way, claydite good to be mixed into perlit concrete? I've tested how the volume of perlit reduce been mixed with water and cement, so, this 1/4 makes me doubt that I bought enough (I would like to avoid the journey for another bag of it - that will gorge the project time, whilst claydite is quite near).

[Frances]

Glad to hear the stand was still there... looks good and solid from here .

Can't help with your question though. What IS Claydite??

[dvonk]

I've got this word from dictionary, so it might be not very exact. It also called keramzit (just like in Russian). In French - "gravillon en argile expansée; keramsite", German - "Blähton"

[sarah h]

I was intrigued by your question so I did some hunting on the internet and found this, from a Russian magazine:

“… producing CaP cement, a new heat insulation material. Claydite gravel was coated with a thin (0.1-0.3mm) film of cement grout, and … as a result, large-pore light concrete, an old builder's dream, was manufactured. … We have succeeded in binding claydite gravel, a highly porous material, into a monolithic large-pore structure. Normally, the space between grains would be filled with cement or cement grout. Now, the cement input is two times less than in regular concrete.”

You can click on this link to read the whole article and switch the language to Russian for easier reading if you like:

They neither See, nor Hear. They Don’t Read Anything — Expert Online 2.0

It sounds to me like claydite is used more like vermiculite or perlite to create a lightweight building material but you still need to add concrete … in other words, it is used with concrete, not instead of it.

I could well be wrong because I am not familiar with this product but I wouldn’t want to see all your efforts go to waste by using materials that aren’t strong enough or don’t bind together properly.

By the way, your work so far looks really good! Just one question – how tall is your base? It looks quite high.

Good luck!

Sarah

[dvonk]

Yes, surely, it should be mixed with concrete, just like perlite. I wondering if it has the same or better thermo insulating properties. Сlaydite is widely used here for that - for floors and walls insulation, and so on. The blocks in my stand is made of the very claydite concrete (I hope that photos will show details).

Two extra courses are due to the estimated floor height of the outdoor kitchen, it will be about 45 cm height from ground. I'm gonna make trap-door in the floor to make useful the aperture of the 5 courses (last course will have an arch under the oven floor).