81 Inch First Build (and first post)

[lwood]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

How many pies can you do at once?

[GianniFocaccia]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Roger,

Thank you for taking the time to share your entire project with us. Your build has been most impressively completed and its wonderful to see it operational. If you have a minute, I would love to know your overall assessment of the soapstone performance.
John

[windage]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Well, we have been open over 4 months now and business has been good. I would not have done anything different and really enjoy the benefits of the larger size. I am losing heat out the sides due to my perlcrete mix being too dense (too much water) as I was thinking that pouring it in, vs troweling it on, would be easier. The cure; trowel on a layer over the entire oven in spring.
As it is now, I lose heat out that side area unless I keep a healthy layer of ash piled around the perimeter of the oven....not too hard to do.
Consumption is around a pick-up load of hardwoods a week...mostly green, $50 per load.
Bake time for our thicker crust pizza with loads of toppings; 8 minutes or so. We build the pie on a pan first, then slip the pan out halfway through the bake to crisp the bottom. Corn meal provides the "lube".
Ideal temps in our oven for these typically thicker "American" pies; dome..700 to 800f, floor...500 to 600f.
Occasionally I will make a very thin, scantily topped pie and go from peel to hearth for a thin, crunchy pie and bake time shrinks down to 5 minutes.
thanks everyone for making this thread one of the most viewed!
Rog

[C5dad]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Dave,

What an incredible build. I can say for myself that I am bowing east towards KY! Next time I am somewhat out that way, I will be there for one of them pizza's to just say I snatched a morsel from a giant!

[mn8tr]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Dear Godzilla oven builder aka Windage

Do you have any current photos, I would love to see the finished product and hear how your oven is performing.

[tpd]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Incredible, wish I lived close enough to stop in for dinner.

[calipizzanapoletana]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Windage,
Could you post some pictures of the oven in action and the light setup?
What would you have done differently the next time?

Amazing build and dedication.
Best of luck with the opening!!

[windage]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Terry and all,
Wow, we had our first "open house" tonight for friends and family....20+ folk cramed in to eat 18 pizza made...average bake time; 2 minutes. Rave reviews. Hope to open this coming week.
Thanks to everyone for the support and kind words that helped keep me going over this past year. Pics coming.
If I have one thing to say to the person waiting to start till you learn "more, or enough"...get going now. Post your triumphs and failures, folks here will help you get through.
Happy baking!

[cannyfradock]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Windage

I have followed your build from the start of this thread to it's final glory.

Although I have built a wood-burning oven myself, I have learned a great deal from your " 81" first build". I love your approach and the technique's you have used in achieving your final result.

Your last picture looks really good, but to anybody that hasn't followed your thread, won't appreciate the work that's gone into achieving your goal.

Many thanks for sharing this special build with us

Terry

[lwalper]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

You're about 5 hours from my house, but I can almost see a day trip coming. Get it cooking and I just might drop in on you.

BTW - don't use alanthus for firing your oven. It stinks (smells like coal oil, and no, there's no creosote in my oven) and gives a bit of an "off" flavor to the product. Pretty nasty stuff!

[drogers]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

Your business would be a great stop for the Food Network program " Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives". It would give your community some nice exposure.

[woodfried]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

I want one!

[windage]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

tile on wall and oven hot

[lwalper]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

And I thought my oven was hungry?? Wow that pizza looks great! That's our plans for tomorrow, so have the fire lit now. If the dough was ready we could have pizza tonight - 745? on the hearth, 780? in the dome after 4 hours of fire with "junk" wood (a alanthus snag fell in the yard a few days ago so thought this would be a good way to do some yard cleanup). The hearth 5 inches deep is 535?. I'll let this fire burn down to saturate the dome and see what we have in there tomorrow.

[windage]

Re: 81 Inch First Build (and first post)

So far the oven has exeeded my expectations...after a week of slow fire, then 2 weeks rest, I fired for another week, building more fire each day till I hit 1,050f, then let off for a couple hours till it "cooled" to 850 to 900f and got the pizza in under 2 minute thing.
I stop feeding it bits of dry wood at around 8 pm and oven coasts from 800 down to 500 by next morning (with no door yet). To bring it back up takes a whole bushel basket of small, dry hardwoods feed over 3 hours. I don't have my various thermocouples hooked up, so I don't know how deep the heat is going just yet. I am using less than a pickup truck load of hardwood per week and around 2 trash cans full per day of small hardwood pieces from a local cabinet factory.
Lots of cracks everywhere, but none threatening. Outside the dome temp seems to be ambient, it's hot here, but dome around 90-95f. Have a few hot spots around the "girdle" which was poured and therefore more dense/less air entrapment and is not as good an insulator as the top portion of the dome, which was troweled on "fluffier".
43 bags of perlite, 10 bags of CA cement, 12 bags of regular portland cement, 1 bag lime, 3 bags fireclay, over 1,000 firebricks and uncounted hours of labor...just to get some good pizza! more pix coming.