New guy with smoke and heat question...

[GianniFocaccia]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

Plus you used the universal inch symbol "

Maybe so, but guys have been stretching the truth of measurements in inches for centuries.

[lwood]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

I guess this is what happens when you leave something to chance. Go back and look at the post with the dimensions. There was no units indicated in the post. No """, nothing.

There are people on this forum from all over the world. Just because you are from NYC doesn't automatically mean you are speaking in English units. I am from the US and I hate English units but can work with any units, if specified. If I write 300 deg. Is it clear whether I'm talking about deg C or F just based on geography?

I think we all need to be more precise when asking/giving advice on the forum. Don't presume we know what you are talking about.

[dmun]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

If it's at the local brickyard or mason supply it's almost certainly low duty. It's what they sell to masons to build fireplaces and the like. They're unlikely to tell you the manufacturer, perhaps they don't even know: they just stock what their wholesaler sends them.

You don't get into the medium and high duty firebricks until you get in to the refractory dealers that are selling materials to build furnaces and kilns. You really don't need higher duty firebricks unless you're building a commercial oven that will be fired every day.

[NYC]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

Iwood, sorry for the confusion. Personally I always take units to mean inches and feet and temperature as F. Didn't mean to upset you.

Dmun, they didn't have a clue as to what grade it was. I guess I will have to research it or order the bricks but trying to avoid having to get heavy stuff shipped. Any idea what the shipping costs are for the 36" Pompeii kit to NYC would be?

[lwood]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

No offence NYC, maybe it a pet peeve of mine. My message was really for everyone in being more precise in their descriptions. The difference in 1 inch and 1 cms is approximately half or x2, which ever way you look at it. It's easy to mistake inches for cms and visa-versa. Temperature is another one where people say 300 deg. 300C is a big difference from 300F.

Ok, I will get off my soapbox now. Thanks for listening.

[brickie in oz]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

Ok, I will get off my soapbox now. Thanks for listening.

If we all revert back to cubits then there will be no problem....

[lwood]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

btw, shouldn't the place where your buying the brick have an MSDS on it? In Ca they are required to have an MSDS on everything in the store.

[Les]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

If we all revert back to cubits then there will be no problem....

ahhh - those were the days! (right - whats a cubit? Insert Bill Cosby here)

[NYC]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

btw, shouldn't the place where your buying the brick have an MSDS on it? In Ca they are required to have an MSDS on everything in the store.

Not sure what is required but in NYC things don't exactly get done like the rest of the country. People are grumpy.

[DrakeRemoray]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

They are probably low or medium duty, either of which would be fine. Find out how much one weighs. Regular low duty 9" firebricks weigh about 8-9 lbs (i think that is right). If they are super light then they would be high duty. But as Dmun says, they are likely low duty (which is really what you want!). High duty are more expensive.

[Forno Gator]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

My biggest issue is dismantling the existing oven and enlarging the stand to accommodate the flue landing for a 36" Pompeii. I read the 70+ pages of the plans. Is this a DYI for someone who is very handy (built a few bathrooms from scratch) or would you recommend a mason?

How is it going?

I'd not dismantle. Check into making the chimney longer if that helps with draw.... some wood stoves will only draft if the chimney is longer. And to reduce the opening size look at a custom build enclosure for the top of the archway. There is an indoor Forno Oven at an Italian supermarket here, and its bigger than 42" and there are no smoke marks at the opening. They have about 6 inches of stainless steel sheet metal covering the top 6 inches of the archway. This would improve the ratio of your chimney to archway. I am also guessing you could hook up a 600 cfm fan to that and use it only when getting the oven hot. This would be much cheaper than starting over.

We have a smoke issue too which I'm looking at getting a custom metal worker to work out a fix.... to keep the front archway smoke free. Could be a newbe trying to heat the oven too quickly. The oven is 42" and brand new, just don't like smelling like a camper every time I get the oven fired up... and would like some custom stainless steel metal work to make it more aesthetic.

If you found a fix let me know.... try a work around before changing your oven.... and it may settle down.

[lwood]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

NYC, what did you decide to do?

[NYC]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

Well, the manufacturer has been completely useless. When I pointed them here they said they know their product works and not to listen to a "bunch of Internet know it alls."

Needless to say I was less than impressed with the demeanor. They also said they would send someone to look at it and instead sent a long email asking for all this engineering and scientific data like wind direction etc. It is obvious they are dodging the real issue which is design flaw, lack of insulation, etc. I have not ruled out legal action.

The installer is still cummunicating and while I do not think it is right to have had 7 weeks pass since expressing concern and no one has given me any solutions or come here to see it, they say they will send someone this week. We shall see what happens.

[dmun]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

not to listen to a "bunch of Internet know it alls.

I'm not a know-it-all, but I know one thing: How to build an oven that fires up every time with a minimum of smoke leakage, that gets up to temperature on a couple of armfuls of wood, and that works every time, winter and summer, for years at a time. I know this one thing because I did it myself, and I've listened to hundreds of people show their own builds.

I also have a pretty good idea of how to build an oven that doesn't work well. That's because about one person a month comes through here with an oven problem. Improper venting, no insulation/wet insulation/bad insulation. We've heard it all. Saddest of all is when someone has paid a ton of money to an "authority" and still not gotten an oven that works. I wish your oven was the only example of this.

[DrakeRemoray]

Re: New guy with smoke and heat question...

And we tend to see that "authority" make these mistakes a lot, becuase they have not built them themselves, and in theory, it seems pretty simple. But some mistakes are impossible to correct...