Commercial Low Arched Gueulard Bread Oven

[Alf]

Here are some photos of one of our commercial bread ovens we are building in Sheffield. The oven is of a low arched design (300 mm at the sides, 370 mm in the middle) and has a furnace under the ovens floor. The flames and gases enter the oven via a hole in the top of the furnace and are directed down the oven by the cast iron gueulard

Photo 1is of the hole in the existing wall where the oven is to be built
Photo 2 is of the insulated floor going in
Photo 3 is of the ovens side walls being installed
Photo 4 is of the furnace door and baking chamber door being bricked in

I will post some more photos of the finished oven

Alf

[Unofornaio]

Pretty cool ALf. I was not able to see the chimney though, where is it?

By the way can I run my white oven design by you???. Its all ready to go I just have to shoot the plans to you via email.

Check out the span of that opening in the original brick wall..what 10'?

[Alf]

This type of commercial oven is fired from the front to the back. That is to say the heat enters the oven from the furnace situated at the front and under the oven. The gases then travel down the oven and exit via two flue ways situated in the roof of the oven and at the back of the oven.

I will post some photos of the flue arrangement latter.

Sure send your plans, it will be interesting to see them.

The original hole in the wall is 3.2 m (10.5') wide; the baking chamber of the oven is 2 m (6.5'') wide x 2.8 m (9.1) deep

Alf

[trev]

Cool oven, Alf. Will it have a rotating deck? I'm contimplating trying to build one of those from scratch. Seems like there will be quite a bit of metal work involved...

[tmackey7]

I am doing a remodel of an old building that was a bakery in late 1800's early 1900's. Underneath the collapsed rear of the building (an addition)we found this wood fired brick rotary oven. it occupies 2 floors with the basement section being where the clean outs are. The owner had the oven cosmetically fixed and is using it as a centerpoint for the restaurant he is putting in the building. The drive section uses 2- opposing tapered wooden rollers for speed control and a worm gear drive for the turntable. I have not been able to find much info on this type of oven but believe it to possibly be a gueulard type oven. Any info or links to info would be appreciated. It was suggested that I post this in this thread by a member.

[Dutchoven]

This is a link to a similar oven manufactured in Spain...don't know how long they have been making these but it may lead you in the right direction...hopefully Alf will be able to jump back in on this one...really cool oven!!! Good luck!
Dutch
TMB Baking - A Global Concept

[Unofornaio]

This is NOT Gueulard type oven. Gueulard ovens have the Gueulard or Cowel in the front of the oven that directs the flame to the back and sides of a slightly inclined hearth. This typically sits directly above a fire box in the center of the oven front.

This appears to be similar to a Spanish design, several of these ovens are NEW and operating in this country (USA) probably the most famous baker to use this style is Thom Leonard, he used a Llopis oven. Another similar design is called a Farjas, again Spanish.

Good Luck

[Dutchoven]

Thanks Uno I forgot to mention the differences of the guellard oven to this one and I racked my brain trying to remember the other ovens and all I could remember was the llopis.
That is why we have comrades!
Dutch

[trev]

Thanks very much guys.

As it turns out one of our supermarket chains had a go at importing two Farjas's a year or two ago. Naturally I couldn't wait to go have a look. To my disappointment the oven (which took up almost half the bakery space) was out of use due to trouble with it's powerful extractor fan. It concerned me that such a seemingly old and proven design had come to rely on electrical power to function at all. There was also mountains of ash in the bottom fire chamber. The baker seemed to have a love hate relationship with the oven, clearly missing the superior quality bread which emerged from there.

I had a peep at the roof of the oven as well and was further alarmed at loose bags of lime stacked there. The baking platform drive chain was imbedded in this substance. Clearly the Farjas team had not given it their best shot.

A local South African contractor who happens to manufacture the "competition" gas ovens apparently came in and quoted an amount to fix the oven similar to that of completely replacing the oven (ie the sort of amount you could buy yourself a small flat with).

My big decision will be whether to undertake building one of these indirect fire ovens, or stick with the trusty Allen Scot design which has served me so well. I have gotten quite used to the ritual of re-firing and waiting for the next bake...

Trevor

[Dutchoven]

Trev
Research some oven designs that have "lateral throats" as opposed to the inferior throat. You would then be able to refire at will and there is no need to clean the oven floor...could be designed to draw outside air into the firebox and have an outside ash dump(like some fireplaces)...seems to me a AS design could be made to work with a lateral throat!
Good luck!
Dutch