Fires

[Dutchoven]

Some neat pics my niece took of the fires! Thought they were good for the "How big is big" questions!
Dutch

[gjbingham]

Re: Fires

Nice pics Dutch. How long does it take to fire your oven from ambient (assuming it ever gets that cold).

[Dutchoven]

Re: Fires

Thanks George!
We usually allow for about 3 hours of a good burn...including startup if we are doing pizza and it is really ready a bit before then...sometimes we have to let the floor cool a bit even. For multiple loads of bread maybe 90 minutes more and then let it soak and stabilize...a total of about 6 hours or so...which gives us 375F+ for about 8 or 9 hours. I think the coldest we went from at startup was in the 30's after a week of quite cool temps...it was for bread and it took about 5 hours of active burning
Best
Dutch

[gjbingham]

Re: Fires

Soak and stabilize? Whazzat?
Six hours from start to the first load?

I'd love to have a bread oven too. Baking and selling artisan breads is really intriguing, but the getting up at 3 AM is definitely not for me!

[Dutchoven]

Re: Fires

Don't have to be up at 3...I just fire it overnight...load the bugger with the usual amount of firewood...spark it up, check on it once to be sure it's burning good and then off to slumberland until about 6...clean out and bake in an hour
Dutch

Soak and stabilize? Whazzat?
Six hours from start to the first load?

I'd love to have a bread oven too. Baking and selling artisan breads is really intriguing, but the getting up at 3 AM is definitely not for me!

[edschmidt]

Re: Fires

When you fire at night do you get flames shooting out of the chimney, I LOVE when that happens.

[Dutchoven]

Re: Fires

I try not to let it that SCARY! I have at times gotten a nice orange glow out of the top though...scary fires can be fun
Best
Dutch

When you fire at night do you get flames shooting out of the chimney, I LOVE when that happens.

[gjbingham]

Re: Fires

Geeze, fire out the top of the chimney? I've got an eight foot chimney. I hope I never see that!

[Dutchoven]

Re: Fires

That is when your wife says..."That can't be safe..."
I hope you never do...with chimney that tall you should never have that problem though...our chimney is short
Dutch

[RTflorida]

Re: Fires

I've had flames coming out of my spark arrester cap, at the end of my 4' run of Duravent a couple of times.....thought I was going to burn down the palm tree next to the oven and the oak behind.....I've since scaled back to flames being pulled up the pipe...not out the top. BIG BIG FIRE is REALLY REALLY COOL. During every fire.....the little kid comes out and whats to play Backdraft (the movie)........that little is me, amazed with fire.

RT

[Acoma]

Re: Fires

Isn't the sound awesome?! Love that locamotive sound as things heat up and the flame is racing up the flue.

[gjbingham]

Re: Fires

I don't push my darling that hard anymore. I coax her along. I rub her back and make her moan quietly. (Fire out the chimney is just wasted fuel). I believe that a nice moderate fire is all that is needed to get her dome hot enough to get cooking hot for me. It takes a little longer, but is more efficient in the long run, and nicer to her brickwork inside. Once she's clean and hot, I give her another half hour to really warm up to the chore. Then comes the big push! Spread her fires to the side, slide the hot burning wood into her and watch her fires burn wildly. I thrust and turn that pizza in her hot inferno. Viola! Pizza!

Yes, I'm bored! Sorry. Fire out the chimney is heat not doing what it is intended to do - heat the oven). Might as well throw the wood away. Better a nice long slow burn than a blazing 30 minute burn. They both achieve the same effect, but the rapid heating of the interior of dome cannot be better than a slow, more methodical approach. Just my 2.5 cents. (inflation!)

[Frances]

Re: Fires

... whew!

....you really never know what to expect on this forum...

...so let me guess, your oven would be one of the female ones George?

[Ed_]

Re: Fires

[softcore pizza porn omitted] Viola! Pizza!

Viola pizza? What an odd choice of toppings. I suppose it's probably better than trombone pizza, but still a bit crunchy for my taste.

[Acoma]

Re: Fires

Frances, his wife is not home much