36" in Seattle

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

First curing fire today!

The brickwork started at about 50F. At full force the apex of the dome hit about 115F, basically perfect if I understand things correctly. I might take it slow and do a few of these wimpy paper and cardboard fires before pushing it. No rush seeing as I don't have the necessary tools to do much cooking anyway. I'm working on that (see next post).

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Started making pizza peels. I already have a short and a long-handled wooden peel. I bought a rectangular aluminum 12" peel with a ridiculously short handle, removed the handle, and replaced it with a 48" dowel. I also bought some 6"x18" 16 gauge steel and started cutting out a small circular peel. I realize these peels are usually 8" but 6" was the size of the piece. If it is really problematic, I'll make or buy another one. The metal blade that came with the HF jigsaw (specifically labeled steel) ground all the teeth away long before I could finish so I switched to the angle grinder (which ate this steel for lunch, almost frightening), but which can't cut some of the necessary corners, so I'll have to get another jigsaw blade to finish it.

Cheers!

[ThisOldGarageNJ]

Re: 36" in Seattle

congrats on your first fire.......

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Well, I just couldn't let it go. I had to fill the holes in the dome-arch merges. This is maximum OCD. Oh well.

Sets my curing schedule back a few days too. Sigh.

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Started constructing the hardibacker frame for the first vermicrete terrace. Also making steady progress on my totally ridiculous circular pizza peel.

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

My pizza peel adventure continues. The 12" rectangular isn't much different from earlier pics, except for the addition of two brass bolts to hold it firmly together. The six inch circular peel is done...to the extent that it won't turn out to be a failure. It might be too small (most people use eight inch circular peels I believe), and the forward nut on the underside, although filed down and tapered as best as I could, still might catch on the edges of the floor bricks, sooo, I'll see.

I strongly considered buying a rivet punch, but the bolts through the handle are way too long for that. Nevertheless, a rivet would be very helpful at the end of the circular peel, to minimize the profile and the risk of catching edges. Question to myself: should I buy an entire rivet punch and a box of rivets for literally one rivet? Sigh.

I put a very slight elbow on the circular peel such that when the peel is flat on the floor, the handle angles up very slightly. I'll see how that goes once I start cooking.

What I really need to make is a rake. The curing fires are going to quickly fill the oven up with ash.

BTW...what do people *do* with their ash? Where does it go? Do you just scatter it around the yard? Is it, perhaps, good for the plants? I can imagine it might be.

[vintagemx0]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Is your ash a super-fine white/gray dust, or does it contain a lot of black chunks. I ask because I have only had to clean out my oven once, (after several long firings for meals) and it was only a small dust pan full. If your stuff is mostly black, I would guess that you just haven't reached max temps yet. Just leave it in there because when it gets hot enough, it will burn to completion. (If it's black, it's carbon)

It does make sense to throw the ashes in the garden, or even fling them over your grass. It has minerals that certainly can't hurt anything.

Nice progress by the way. Your dome is very well built. Keep the updates coming!

The Morgans

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

I've only done a single curing fire, just a handful of balls of newspaper, so I really don't have a feel for what these ovens are like when they get fired up. Maybe ash won't be a problem. Thanks.

[tfasz]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Looking nice Keith - great progress over the past couple of months. Especially considering the Seattle weather we have been having. I'm keen to see your enclosure completed - I have contemplated a similar approach, but am still leaning towards an igloo.

Oven looks great - look forward to hearing some of your cooking stories.

[david s]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Try adding the ash to your compost.It is quite alkaline but that maybe an advantage particularly if your compost has a lot of leaves which tend to be acidic. I usually dump at least 1/2 the coals into a bucket of water, because my oven is small and I need the space. The coals are also excellent in the compost, great for holding water.

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Thanks. The first thing I need to do with my ash is thoroughly rake it over the floor of the oven to fill up the cracks. I'm a little nervous about exposing the InsBlock 19 to a cooking area, but I fully expect to have the cracks filled from the curing fires before I put any food in there...nevertheless...

[ThisOldGarageNJ]

Re: 36" in Seattle

hey keb,,,
I put my ashes in a metal pail if they are hot.... I also have 2 holes in they yard where i am digging out tree stumps that i didnt finish before the winter and i dump them in there, Yes they are "ashholes" After a few fires the space between your bricks will fill up quickly so i wouldnt worry about the insblock....

There are also video's on youtube telling you how you can make lye soap with the ashes, You will need rain water or softwater, I am collecting rainwater in a plastic 55 gal drum and will make some lye in the spring.. I hear that stuff can be very caustic though...

I also put some in the garden and compost pile.. and since were having the snow out here now many people recommend it for putting on sidewalks for a non slip on ice,,

Heres a link to a thread, I also asked this question a few months ago

http://www.fornobravo.com/forum/f30/...shes-8169.html

P.S. I like your peels

Cheers
Mark

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

I poured the vermicrete for the first (of three) terraces today. This was my first time mixing vermicrete. It was as weird as everyone said it would be.

The photos show that I went ahead and inserted bolts with offset washers through the hardibacker to lock the hardibacker to the vermicrete. This is unnecessary since the hardibacker will (presumably) stick to the vermicrete, but whatever. I wanted to use nylon bolts to minimize loss of heat, but I couldn't find them over two inches. There won't be much heat loss through the bolts since they start outside several inches of InsWool HP and then a few inches of vermicrete.

I used 300 quarts (60x5 quart increments, very close to 10 cubic feet) of vermiculite mixed 8:1 with portland. I then converged after a few tries on a water mixture of about 1/3rd to the dry mix which is in close correspondance to other reports on FB.

I made the dry mix in a garbage bag the same way you coat chicken with flour (shake & bake style): Put the vermiculite and portland in the bag, twist the end closed, turn it over loosely a few times and dump it in the wheel barrow. Worked like a charm. I found that for mixing the water into the dry mix, I used a combination of a trowel and gently digging elbow deep through the wheel barrow with no tools (gotta love those long masonry gloves). This was by far the most effective way to get the wet mix evenly yet gently mixed up.

I made two videos of mixing the vermicrete:
YouTube - mixingVermicrete1

YouTube - mixingVermicrete2


Photos continued in next post.

Cheers!

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Continued from previous post.

Photos continued in next post.

[kebwi]

Re: 36" in Seattle

Continued from previous post.

Second curing fire. Instead of one fire in the middle, I did two fires on the side, to even things out a bit.

Cheers!