Limited Space!

[Masako Morishita]

Because of the lack of space my my oven hearth measures 49" in width
x 59" in lenght so how small of a pompeii oven can i build or should it be better to go with a small vault type???

[nissanneill]

Hi Masako Morishita
If you build using the standard brick 9 x 4.5 x 3" cut in halves making your oven walls 4.5" thick with 1 or 2" thermal blanket and then 2 or 3" vermiculite cement and topped with say 1" stucco, then you need to allow at east 9" each side for the walls. If my maths still serve me, a 49" hearth will be reduced to 31" inside diameter.
You can increase this amount to a 34" internal diameter hearth if you turn your dome bricks to 3" thick with the same insulation. This will work fine, it will heat up and use less wood (which I think you claimed earlier as a rare or expensive resource) but will not have the thermal mass to hold the extra reserve of heat to cook numerous loads of breads etc but fine for pizzas and a couple loads of bread before cooling down more quickly. There will still be just enough (in my opinion) for a suitable chimney void at the oven entrance.

Neill

[Masako Morishita]

Thanks so much for your advice Neil san！
It isn't easy finding someone around here that can
provide me with the answers needed to build my
oven.
So, I'm very grateful to have found this site, ARIGATO
FORNO BRAVO for all your support!

[christo]

I agree with Neil - my oven is built with the bricks oriented as he suggested and it works great for Pizza and has sufficient heat retention to cook bread and we even cooked a turkey last november - after cooking pizza the night before with no added wood!

Have fun!

Christo

[james]

This is a good thread -- I've moved it to Getting Started.
James