My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

[KraemerBAC]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Post away...You have endured thus far, let your freak flag fly high and show us the pictures!!! I took a look at your photobucket pics and want to see more. It looks like an awesome project overall. Also Happy Anniversary

Peter

[perks1018]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

I have 102 photos of the project from ground-breaking in March to the inaugural pizza burn on June 24, our wedding anniversary, the oven being what my wife considers a dubious reward for having endured 22 years with me. Anyway, I'm trying to figure out how to post them without burning what final bridges I may still have left with the Forno Bravo folks.

[luca]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Thanks for the reply Perks! I too would love to see some pics of the finished oven; I made a cobb (clay) oven with barrel vault several years ago and never even thought about vault support issues (I assume clay forms a solid, one piece arch with its own inherent strength both in the dried clay and vault design). I'm now building a brick one in another location (the clay still works great but the mud wasps love it!) and have been puzzling over this issue of trimming the bricks to increase strength vs. going with a double thickness of bricks. So, don't be shy about giving us your opinions!!!(BTW, there are pics of my cobb oven here somewhere!)

[GianniFocaccia]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

I have gone so far "off the reservation" with the design and construction of this oven that it is unlikely, after this post, that I will be allowed to do so again

Huh? This design appears highly unlikely to collapse and architecturally capable of operating indefinitely. If a hemispherical Pompeii dome without soldiers doesn't require dome buttressing why would this one? Although there are cooking-space limitations to this oven, I say keep on cooking (like TScarborough) and indeed, time will tell.

John

[perks1018]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

I have to get this off my chest. I have gone so far "off the reservation" with the design and construction of this oven that it is unlikely, after this post, that I will be allowed to do so again. First, the vault design. It works, and doesn't require either massive support or preformed structures. There, I said it. Next, and this us even more heretical, I hadn't read far enough ahead when I designed the flue and chimney. They are integral to the vault. Before anyone asks "how do you retain the heat?" Ill answer- a damper. My fires start and stay lit until I need them to start heating the vault, and then I close the damper. Works flawlessly. I know, I'm apostate, but that it is part and parcel of design. Love my oven!!!

[perks1018]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Arch cannot spread since I dumped an inch of firestop between soldier course and enclosure wall. True, time will tell, but thirty pizzas and many smoked delights later, the design functions well and efficiently.

[luca]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

I'm hoping to start my barrel vault soon, and am interested in what Perks1068 finally decided to do regarding the arch structure debate. Did you simply increase the thickness of your cladding after the arches were mortared in? Any other design suggestions other than the double-brick "wythe" structure?

[Neil2]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Unless you have a structural backing, you have to relay on gravity and friction alone to prevent spreading as Tscarborough has done.

Other wise, the heat/cool cycles and resulting expansion will defeat any "glue" and in time the arch will spread and eventually a brick may drop on your pizza.

[Tscarborough]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

I won't hurt, you just don't need the extra mass. It may be your best alternative at this point, but I wouldn't go more than an inch.

[perks1018]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

So why wouldn't concrete cladding, especially if fiber reinforced, be beneficial? Seems it would provide the missing structure.

[Tscarborough]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Here is how I managed it, note that this is a specific type of masonry construction devised just to allow this type of vaulting (Guastavino tile - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). It is double wythe, and I used the base 2 courses to absorb the lateral load, keying in the inner layer and using a parge coat to add mass and act as a tensioning member.





As yours is built, the entire structure relies on the ability of the mortar to resist tension when it is designed to be used in a compression mode. Any cracking, which is natural, will lead to the failure of the arch.

[Tscarborough]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Because arches have outward thrust, and are not able to self-support the thrust, especially on a stack bond single wythe.

[perks1018]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Fire brick is enough to hold the heat? I'm good with that. Now, why the bracing? I'd need a sledge to break this thing up as it sits now. Heat Bond really sets like a rock.

[Tscarborough]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

You don't want or need the 2" cladding.

[perks1018]

Re: My Modified Barrel Vault in Texas

Permit? I'm off the grid. After all, I'm building a wood-fired oven. Anyway, not house- garage, with air gap between brick and insulation and rockwool on the other side of the brick. Full bricks for floor set on top of 2" ceramic fiber board, on top of 4" block. Planned to do a 2" concrete cladding on top of the vault for additional heatsink, and perlcrete on top of that. Running bond would have been impossible for me to do, advancing the arches one at a time from the rear. Thanks for the input though. I will no doubt heavily insulate this.