Virginia Beach 42" WFO Getting Started Discuss Virginia Beach 42" WFO in the Pizza Oven Design and Installation forums; OK I have finally started my 42" WFO project. I always laugh about how addicting this project is. This is ...

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OK I have finally started my 42" WFO project. I always laugh about how addicting this project is. This is allot of fun, I have a greater respect for the many trades that I will "dabble" in while assembling this project. Concrete, Brick and Block masons and Carpentry to name a few. I tip my hat and raise a glass of homebrew to you all, Cheers. I have attached some photos of the start of the project. I always have my little helper around, and his ball is always in the way. I should have left the ball in the footer but he removed it first.

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It starts out with a load of concrete and my opinion buy a concrete mixer you will use it alot with this project. I placed the rebar in the footer and mixed and placed the concrete. After the concrete set, I placed the block and backfilled the foundation.

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I placed my footer blocks and filled the cells with concrete. As you can tell inspector Jake checked out the work. Then added 4 feet of concrete to the pool deck. For this concrete I had John Clodfelter from Anchor Concrete help me. Then I had my slab for the stand.

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I set my blocks and built up the stand to be 4 blocks high. I then cut out a template; I finally realized how big the oven is. Inspector Jake is checking for plumb and level. 300 bricks and the only way to carry them is with brick tongs; buy two so you can carry them with equal weight on each side. The forms are in place waiting on rebar. If you place your bender a set distance from a block all your bends will be the same.

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The block stand and hearth elevation worked out great. You can bend a 10' piece of rebar to fit between the cells. I placed the rebar on 8" centers. Then I set the mixer at dump level, let the mixing begin. I mixed almost (50) 60lb bags of Quickcrete. The first few were soupy so I could fill all the block cells. Then float the top and cover it with poly to slow the evaporation. Two days later I removed the forms and centered up the hearth. TIP: After you snap your chalk lines use clear spray paint to seal the lines so you don't smudge them.

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The first picture is of a mockup of my first course with a wide landing. The next is my router jig, which I used to cut out circles for the round forms for the insulating slab. I made my insulating slab 6". Because if 4" is good 6" has got to be better. Just kidding I wanted my finish floor height to be a little higher so I don’t have to bend over too much when looking into the oven. I picked up three bags of Perlite and mixed them using (2) 5 Gallon buckets of perlite and (1) 2 Gallon bucket of Portland for a 5:1 mix for the insulating slab. And dont forget Jakes Ball which is always in the way!! I am going to bust my ass on that ball.

[dougrappe]

Nice documentation, keep the pictures coming. I like the tip about preserving chalk lines, great idea.

Have fun!

Doug

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I mixed all the dry material at once and placed it on a large trashcan with a can liner. I found out that it was not necessary for the insulating slab material. You can mix these materials as you go. Once I placed the material I tried not to tamp the material, harder said than done. Finally a completed slab, funny stuff to work with. If I was to do it again I will increase the perlite mixture to 6 or 7 to 1. Once dry, I test fit the floor and cut the outline. Then the soldier course was cut on an angle determined with an improvised "indispensable tool" .

[dbhansen]

Nice work! Looking great.

[jrparks]

Looks like you are off to a great start! I used that same level on my build. I checked ever other brick as I laied them to see that they were with in 1 deg. of my CADD layout.
It also reminded me of how cold it was.
Cheers,