Damper and door questions

[brokencookie]

All of the doors I have seen look like they close the oven before the vent/transition. Has anyone considered installing a damper in the chimney and putting doors on the outside of the oven, after the vent? I can think of a few advantages to this type of design.
1. controlling heat flow by adjusting the draw of the oven via the damper
2. This design would allow for hinged doors rather than a wedged door.


Any thoughts ?

Thanks
Bruce

[dmun]

If the point of the door is to keep heat in for baking, you want to confine the area kept hot to the smallest and best insulated part of the oven, the dome. Most commercial dampers are intentionally leaky, to prevent people from asphyxiating themselves with interior wood stoves.

External hinged doors look fine but they aren't too functional. You might want a fireplace type damper in the flue to keep heat in the house in an inside oven, but I don't think you would use it to regulate anything. When that fire is going, you want to vent it all out the best way possible.

[DrakeRemoray]

I agree with Dmun on this. Can't really see any benefit to a Damper, though someone has one...who was that?

[Les]

I think it was Luis (AKA arevalo53anos)

Les...

[DrakeRemoray]

After some searching here is a thread that discusses dampers. Both Xabia Jim and Marcel have dampers, neither seems to use them...

Drake

[cvdukes]

I put a damper in the chimney on my ferro-cement constructed pizza oven. At the time I was building it, I didn't know if the damper would be needed but it was easy enough to add, so I stuck it in there. Having fired the oven up 6-7 times now for cooking, I can't say that the damper has any use. My oven has an internal door that I wedge in the oven for bread baking and an external door to close off the antechamber that feeds to the chimney. My thinking was that I could damper the chimney to reduce the heat with the external door in place, but really it doesn't seem to do anything. Just something else to play with...

[brokencookie]

Thanks for the info. All of your input makes sense. I think I will leave out the damper idea. However, I will probably make both an interior and exterior door. I have a really bad cat problem in my area. After a cold night I always have to check the engine compartment for cats before starting the car. Same problem with the house. When winter hits all the mice want to invade the warm house.I can foresee having to check the oven for critters before starting a fire. Hopefully a set of exterior doors will deter them.

Bruce

[dmun]

It's true - cats are heat-seeking missiles. Those piles of wood ash look awfully like cat litter.

[jwnorris]

Originally Posted by brokencookie

<snip> I can foresee having to check the oven for critters before starting a fire. <snip>
Bruce

Why bother, just roast in place for a new taste sensation. Better and fresher than roadkill.

J W

[jeff]

Just read your post re cats.
You're a bad bugger JW: gotter lovit.
Luddite Jeff.