Moving Pompeii Oven

[Indysailor58]

After three summers of blood sweat and tears (ok, no blood) my teenage daughter and I finished our Pompeii oven in our backyard in Indianapolis and enjoyed it for a year. Now life is happening. My daughter has gone off to college to be an engineer,of course. My wife and I are divorcing (not because of the oven construction) and we are both moving. Although the realtor says the oven is a selling point for the house, my daughter and I feel way too attached to it leave it for the new owners. We would like to move it about 10 miles to another relatives home, at least for a few years until my daughter finishes college.
We did a "back of the envelope calculation" and determined that the weight is in the neighborhood of 11,500 lb.
Being amateurs my daughter and I overbuilt the oven. It is on a 8 inch pad of reinforced concrete and we ran the rebar up into the block wall which were dry stacked and then filled with cement. In turn, the rebar was continued up base of the table of the oven. We used about 4 in of vermiculite concrete to insulate the oven from the rest of the structure. I think the biggest weakness when it comes to moving the oven is that that there is little mechanical attachment between bricks for the floor of the pizza oven and the vermiculite concrete.
I would prefer to not move the oven in pieces due to laziness, mostly, but could consider it. I especially would like to avoid repouring the pad or replacing the decorative stone.
I did talk to a fellow on the phone with a crane mounted on a flatbed and he thought he could do it, but seemed concerned about the weight. I know things much more massive than this are move in the construction and manufacturing worlds, so I figure this should be doable.
Has anyone moved an oven of this size without damaging it? I would appreciate any thoughts or observations from the community.

[david s]

Ovens don't like being transported being heavy and brittle. It sounds like you would have to lift the oven and the stand from your description of how the supporting slab is integrated with the stand. Probably way better to build a new oven at your new house.

[Indysailor58]

I appreciate the thought about ovens being brittle, but people mount them on trailers, etc for mobile cooking-don't they?

[david s]

Yes they do, but they're invariably cast ovens. There are plenty of stories about brick trailer ovens rattling to bits. I'm with Gulf, you'd be better off building another. Your second oven will be easier to build and you'll do a better job of it.

[UtahBeehiver]

Here is a link where they moved an oven in the UK, but like David said, it is a cast oven and i believe the original oven base was only temporary but it gives you a concept of what was involved.

https://community.fornobravo.com/for...d-thread/page2

[JRPizza]

A friend of mine successfully moved an oven, but it was from his front yard to his back yard. He used a fork lift and when the guy questioned why he only wanted to rent for an hour he said something to the effect of that is all the time needed to either be move it or scatter it across the yard. He dug under the base slab and moved the entire thing in one piece. I hadn't built my oven at the time so didn't think to ask him if the move resulted in any damage.

[RandyJ]

I know there are all terrain forklifts that can lift that kind of weight but it might be hard to get it in to the back yard. I am getting close to thinking of moving possibly and if that happens in will have to build again. I think mine is in the 16,000# + range so no moving that. The main difference is the ones that are on trailers is they are built to be moved.

Randy

[Indysailor58]

I appreciate the advice about leaving the oven and just building a new one. The way I see it though, is that if I try to move the oven and fail, in the worst case I still have to build a new oven or have no oven in my life. In short, I have nothing to lose.
I think if I am going to move this oven it is going to be a case of "go big or go home". To that end I have had a fellow with flat bed mounted crane come to look at the oven and he thought he could lift it onto the flatbed, "if i can get real close to it". He wants about $500 to move it, so that is not a show stopper.
If I can get the oven onto the flatbed are there any ideas about how I can reduce the vibration so that the oven does not shake itself to bits?

[david s]

When freighting out one of my oven kits I always place an old motorcycle tyre onto a pallet then load all the components on top. Haven't had anything damaged yet. You may need to use a few.

[gastagg]

Not that this matters now, but when building, I thought that I might eventually have to move it, or even want to move it. So, I keyed the oven slab into the stand and didn't connect the stand to the oven slab at all. I figured with it keyed in, what force in my backyard in Minneapolis is going to move 3000-4000lbs of concrete and brick? Then if I want to move it, I can jack the oven slab up a few inches with an automotive jack...enough to insert some metal beams of some sort under the slab to provide something that can be strapped onto. Granted, that doesn't do anything for the stand, but the stand and base were so easy to build compared to the oven that I wouldn't care about rebuilding those things. Anyway, thanks for the post. Hope it works out well!

RandyJ ...I need to get over and see your build if you decide to move! My wife and I were able to go to Mr. Chipsters earlier this summer....he's got a great setup.

[RandyJ]

You beat me over to Chips house. I have not made it there yet. I would love to have you stop by some time. We are not moving for sure but it is on the radar. I would also love to stop by and see yours as well.