Starting Over

[Acid_BuRn]

Hello all, So today I tore down my Barrel oven, Which was my 1st oven I made. Well now that I seen all the mistakes I made on the 1st one won't try and do them again.
The barrel took me all summer to do, But it was fun. I cooked 3-4 10" pies, But it never cooked the bottom well. Heat was escaping very rapidly and using a ton of wood, Not that wood was expensive here in NC
Can get some good oak, Maple, ash, mulberry and pecan, most are free. But anyway back to the oven. So Now im between crossroad between the Neapolitan or Tuscan oven. I'm thinking of something in between. I like the lower look of the Neapolitan But the Tuscan look less trouble making..So any1 ever do an oven in Between both, and if so could you pass the design back to me..thanks for this site.

[RandyJ]

I can't remember which builds were done in the style that you are looking for but I am sure it has been done. What you would have to do is put a turn bucket in the middle of your indispensable tool. Then you could take and lower the height of the dome by turning in the end point a fixed amount each row and lower the ceiling. You would need to figure out how much you were looking for and plan back from there. Also you will want to insulate the floor much more. That will help with cooking the bottom. Good luck with your planing.

Randy

[deejayoh]

Congrats on getting rid of the Barrel oven. They can work, but most published designs seem to be atrocious.

I think that by definition, a Neapolitan oven is supposed to have a lower profile than a Tuscan oven - so I am not sure which you are wanting to build. To get a lower dome, you can use a turnbuckle in your IT, Or you can
1) Mount the IT on a lazy-susan so it is slightly off center
2) Mount the IT so the pivot is below the cooking surface of your dome

Any of these will let you build a lower than perfect hemispherical dome

But to my knowledge, most builders on this site go with something close to a hemispherical dome - which would probably be more "tuscan" than neapolitan (to the attached link.)

In practice, I am not sure it really matters so much. It's nice to have a higher door to get turkeys in and such. Both will get plenty hot enough to cook great pizzas!

FWIW, I was just in Italy last month and the best pizza I had was in Florence. Liked it better than what I had in Naples.

[JRPizza]

Larry P recently built a low dome oven that he seem happy with (see middle link). One thing I have noticed that most folks that build a low height dome reinforce or buttress the lower dome to counteract the higher thrust forces that result from the flatter top. Per the FB plans, there is only 3.5 inches difference in height between a 36" low vault and high vault oven, so if you are looking for a "tweener" you could get there with an offset IT, either using a lazy susan as discussed above or by offsetting your IT like I discussed in this post

https://community.fornobravo.com/for...165#post393165

[gastagg]

You may want to consider use refractory concrete and cast the dome. If I were building another oven, that's what I'd try. Speed and cost seem to be both improved. Also, in your case, you can make your form to acheive your lower dome height. david s is the forum's cast expert. If you check out my pics, you'll see that I tore down my first entry arch and rebuilt with a cast entry arch. There are some great cast oven builds on the forum.

[gastagg]

ironpony is one to look at