Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

[tractorman44]

Hello everyone. We are building a (two) limestone outdoor oven(s) from the materials used in the oven built by our Great Grandfather in the 1880's. Taking liberties with the design, we are not attempting to build back the same style of oven he built. All of the limestone used are the materials mined, shaped and skidded into location on the farm by means of a mule and a hand hewn sled.

Committed to the design chosen, I now accidentally stumbled onto this site and am wondering where it would be appropriate to post some pictures of our project as I'm not really finding an individual forum for limestone construction.

I'm sure there is plenty wrong with our design (and also with our stonesetting), but hopefully the second one will incorporate improvements as we figure out the flaws with the first one after completion.

[hodgey1]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

Hello Tractorman

Welcome to a great resource for information on your project.

You can post pictures on the "Brick oven photo" section, two tabs below "introductions". If you want, you could also click at the upper portion of the main page on "Post Photo" and post there. I look forward to seeing your progress, good luck.

[stonecutter]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

I'll be watching this build with special interest. Be sure to post plenty of pics when you get started.

[Toomulla]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

Hello everyone. We are building a (two) limestone outdoor oven(s) from the materials used in the oven built by our Great Grandfather in the 1880's. Taking liberties with the design, we are not attempting to build back the same style of oven he built. All of the limestone used are the materials mined, shaped and skidded into location on the farm by means of a mule and a hand hewn sled.

Committed to the design chosen, I now accidentally stumbled onto this site and am wondering where it would be appropriate to post some pictures of our project as I'm not really finding an individual forum for limestone construction.

I'm sure there is plenty wrong with our design (and also with our stonesetting), but hopefully the second one will incorporate improvements as we figure out the flaws with the first one after completion.

Welcome to the forum we recently had quite a discussion on the use of limestone for an oven, you mention that your grandfather built a previous oven in limestone and I am sure that we would all be interested both the life of the old oven and your new build experiences

[wotavidone]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

I'll be watching this build with special interest.

Me too.
Reading the original post, it appears you are using the stone previously shaped and used by your great grandfather?
Do you have any photos of your great grandad's oven?

[tractorman44]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

Me too.
Reading the original post, it appears you are using the stone previously shaped and used by your great grandfather?
Do you have any photos of your great grandad's oven?

First, thanks to all of you for steering me in the right direction....and yes, I have pictures of the original limestone bread oven as built in the 1880's except for the 16' chimney that was knocked down by a tree decades ago. Unfortunately the oven is in somewhat of a deteriorated condition, overgrown by poison ivy and brush.

I will give a bit of narrative along with the pictures of us dismantling and relocating of the original oven's material and try not to bore you all too much.

And yes, all of the limestone being used to build the two new ones is the stone from the original, cut 135 years ago or more, by our Great Grandfather. We are currently about 90% done with the first build, so any suggestions given can only be incorporated into the second one. And any and all suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

[wotavidone]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

First, thanks to all of you for steering me in the right direction....and yes, I have pictures of the original limestone bread oven as built in the 1880's except for the 16' chimney that was knocked down by a tree decades ago. Unfortunately the oven is in somewhat of a deteriorated condition, overgrown by poison ivy and brush.

I will give a bit of narrative along with the pictures of us dismantling and relocating of the original oven's material and try not to bore you all too much.

And yes, all of the limestone being used to build the two new ones is the stone from the original, cut 135 years ago or more, by our Great Grandfather. We are currently about 90% done with the first build, so any suggestions given can only be incorporated into the second one. And any and all suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Trust me, we won't be bored.
Seeing an oven built so long ago, and getting to see what the materials held up like, is a real treat and very valuable knowledge.
Bring on the photos, and if your great grandad was kind enough to leave behind a description of the mortar he used, publish that too, along with your assessment of what the mortar was like when you demolished the old oven.
We all wanna know.

[Tscarborough]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

If possible, my only advice would be to use the stuff that has been out of the ground and/or been used for the longest as the heatface of the oven.

I too look forward to some photos, as well as the geology of your stone if you know it. If not give us the lat long and we can probably find the most likely drift.

[stonecutter]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

First, thanks to all of you for steering me in the right direction....and yes, I have pictures of the original limestone bread oven as built in the 1880's except for the 16' chimney that was knocked down by a tree decades ago. Unfortunately the oven is in somewhat of a deteriorated condition, overgrown by poison ivy and brush.

I will give a bit of narrative along with the pictures of us dismantling and relocating of the original oven's material and try not to bore you all too much.

And yes, all of the limestone being used to build the two new ones is the stone from the original, cut 135 years ago or more, by our Great Grandfather. We are currently about 90% done with the first build, so any suggestions given can only be incorporated into the second one. And any and all suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

You must know, this is a great privilege you have. What I wouldn't give to own a tool, work the same stone or even see the work my great,great grandfather did. He was quite the mason by the information I have about him...he won a couple medals for his work on the Simplon Tunnel. The gold medal was one of only 150 given out. That would be a real treasure to have....

This is much more than an oven build.

For info on your limestone, there are geological surveys that are easy to find for every state. I did a quick google search and found one for Missouri, but I'm on my phone and lost the link.

[stonecutter]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

Trust me, we won't be bored.
Seeing an oven built so long ago, and getting to see what the materials held up like, is a real treat and very valuable knowledge.
Bring on the photos, and if your great grandad was kind enough to leave behind a description of the mortar he used, publish that too, along with your assessment of what the mortar was like when you demolished the old oven.
We all wanna know.

I would most definitely have it analyzed. I could kick myself for not saving some the mortar from all the early beehives I helped restore. From memory, I would guess they were lime-rich mortars with brick dust added, because all of them predated Portland cement mortar by at least a century...a couple were from the 1600's too. But that's just guessing what the make up was....it's hard to say exactly, and that was over 15 years ago now.

[tractorman44]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

I hadn't really thought about saving some of the lime/sand bonding material and as though some has remained with the stone, it is not much. I also hadn't really thought about the significance of having some analyzed..

I've been uploading photos through photobucket in a new thread in the suggested forum, but when a preview is done, the pictures are HUGE and only 2/3 the width of the text shows up.... Not too savvy with computers OR limestone oven builds, I may need help figuring the photo upload process. All my photos are in Photobucket....so do I resize them there then upload....or how does the thumbnail attachment work ?? Remember, we are just a couple old brothers with 137 years between us.

Thanks guys, I'm itching to show you some pictures.... Thanks, everyone.

[Gulf]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

Select the Go Advanced button when replying to your post. From there select the small paperclip at the top of the page. A Manage attachment box will then pop up. At the top of it click on the Choose File button. It will allow you to choose a few pics form your computer to upload.

Now, click back on your reply. From there click the small paperclip again. The box will come back. This time, something like select all , should be one of the options, if you have uploaded multiple pics. Or you can include them one at a time if you want to space them out in your post .

[tractorman44]

Re: Limestone Oven Build in Missouri

Select the Go Advanced button when replying to your post. From there select the small paperclip at the top of the page. A Manage attachment box will then pop up. At the top of it click on the Choose File button. It will allow you to choose a few pics form your computer to upload.

Now, click back on your reply. From there click the small paperclip again. The box will come back. This time, something like select all , should be one of the options, if you have uploaded multiple pics. Or you can include them one at a time if you want to space them out in your post .

Thanks for this and other above suggestions for picture posting, but I couldn't figure out the subleties to get them from photobucket to an attachment. By trial and error I was able to post directly to the forum with fair sized pictures by resizing one by one to 576 x 432 in photobucket edit.

So, I've finally started a thread in the brick oven forum, two down from the intro forum and hope everyone can see the photos adequately. Thanks again I'll work on the attachment thing more....