Starting your fire

[dbegler]

Re: Starting your fire

Excellent advice from the Firing Squad. I'll report my progress after the next few fires. Thanks!

[Archena]

Re: Starting your fire

Psst!!!!

You can use the Edit button to fix your post - near as I can tell it's not set to a time limit.

It's at the bottom of your post (you can only see it on your own post - hence using my sig for the example). Just click it and it'll let you back into the reply screen so you can make changes.

[CanuckJim]

Re: Starting your fire

RT,

I guess we all have to get used to this. After years and years of building fires in fireplaces and woodstoves to generate heat for the interior of buildings, it took a while to get my head around building fires meant for spontaneous combustion. Once you get there, you'll never go back. The brighter the fire, the more flame you have, the better off you are.

Jim

[RTflorida]

Re: Starting your fire

should have ended:

My oven burns white in about 50 minutes

[RTflorida]

Re: Starting your fire

Jim,

Having been a bit of a pyromaniac all my life, building a monster fire is about as cool as it gets. I'm not ahamed to admit that I am fascinated watching it.
Your right, the air seems to be on fire, wood instantly ignites.
I'm still a rookie at this and have errored on the side of dangerous. Twice I have built fires that had flames rolling out the oven entry as well as up the chimney. I've lost my left eyebrow twice in a month as well as my left temple (only once)
The past 2 weeks I have scaled it back a bit - nice, big, flames roling down the sides, contained fires (no more flames shooting out at me or up the chimney). My oven burns white in about minutes.

RT

[Archena]

Re: Starting your fire

Eh, that's not much of a fire - it only ate one red shirt!


























Trekkies (or Trekkers) Unite!

[CanuckJim]

Re: Starting your fire

James,

It's kind of a joke of mine. When I say plasma, what I really mean is that when the fire is really, really right, the air seems on fire. Think Star Trek: "Spock, what is it?" "Fascinating, Jim. The Tricorder says it's pure energy, but it's intelligent. Look out, Bones, it's already eaten Ensign Smathers!!"

When the oven is firing like this, it takes about a nanosecond for the next piece of wood to start burning. My feeling is, after reading posts from beginners in this area, that there's a reluctance to build Bob Musa's "monster fire." A MONSTAH is just what it takes: well seasoned, hard, of the right diameter.

This is a tough thing to describe and easier to show, hence the pics.

Jim

[james]

Re: Starting your fire

Way to go Jim,

Very nice photos. What does "plasma" come from? It sounds like that perfect oven, where you put on one piece of wood, and it immediately combusts into a wonderful flame, with no hint of taking any heat out of the oven while it heats up.

Does anybody have a good photo of the wavy lines that come out of the chimney?

I joke that I can manage my oven from the kitchen, a couple hundred feet away, just by watching what was coming out of the chimney.

James

[CanuckJim]

Re: Starting your fire

Maver, Dbeg,

I'm posting two pics here that might help. The photo of the fire shows what I call the "plasma" stage. When it was taken, the oven floor was at 900 F. I wanted a long burn for multiple bakes in my high mass oven. The one of the chimney was taken while this fire was burning. As you can see, there is no smoke at all, only clear gasses escaping. I was hoping to capture that wavy heat effect, but the camera just wouldn't see it.

The wood I used during the burn was hard maple and white birch, well seasoned. I always split larger diameter logs to speed up curing and for better ignition.

Hope that helps some.

Jim

[maver]

Re: Starting your fire

It sounds suspicious for wet wood if it starts to catch and then goes out. I know in my area the wood never gets really seasoned as it is just too damp. After your next bake, once you rake out the coals and the oven has cooled down to about 400-500 (give it an hour or so with the door off and no coals) place some of your wood (enough for a few fires) in the oven and place your door or some bricks over the opening to get a fairly good seal. Just leave it there until you are ready to fire the oven again. Take some of this wood apart with a hatchet for kindling. If this doesn't burn very easily then you have some other major airflow issue, and I don't think the log holder alone explains this. You may need to consult with a boy scout for further tips. And I agree with Archena, you may be going too fast from small to big, but 5 minutes ought to be enough time to get a well seasoned log burning.

[Archena]

Re: Starting your fire

You're putting too big a log on too small a fire. Go from tender (twigs) to kindling (small branches) and then to the actual logs. You want the kindling to be burning well before you put the first log on. Once the logs catch well it should burn okay. Never tried an oven but I suspect it will take a bit more tending just because it's so enclosed.

[dbegler]

Inconsistent flame intensity

Hello - I've used my oven about 6 times (post-cure) now, and while I've gotten it pretty hot (white dome) and made the best pizzas I've ever had(!), my oven firing seems to be giving me trouble.

I start out with a bunch of kindling and fire starters, which gets going nicely, and then I put on a 3 diameter inch log, which seems to catch for 5 or so minutes, and then the flame dies and it smolders a bit.

So I throw some more kindling on to get the flame going again.

Sometimes when I put on a new log and try to move it into place (or push the fire to the side), the flame smothers completely, and I have throw on more kindling to use my safety lighter to nudge it back to life. My kindling supply is dwindling rapidly.

I guess I was expecting that I could start a big fire and keep it going rather easily, instead of having the size of the flame ebb and flow, requiring me to be paying constant attention to it, which makes me fall behind in the pizza prep.

I am using almond that seems fairly well seasoned, and it's taking me about 2 hours to get a white dome.

I did just order the log holder, so maybe that will help.

I have the feeling I am getting some basic firemaking technique wrong.

Any clues, advice?

Thanks a lot. -- David

[Chris]

Re: Starting your fire

I've got that Harbor Freight weed-burner torch, although without the pushbutton ignition. It works great. Don't put it inside the oven and open it full blast. It uses up all the oxygen inside the oven in about five seconds, and snuffs out. I set the flame on low, and put it under the wood pile for a few minutes. It acts as kindling, without having to scrounge for small sticks, etc.

[james]

Re: Starting your fire

I can't wait to see how the geo-dome ovens work. Christo -- go slow.
James

[christo]

Re: Starting your fire

Looks like a torch similar to Roberts is on sale at HF. I put the coupon below.

No financial intererst and I don't know how good it works....