Chimney height

[SableSprings]

Great job Sandieego! Pretty sweet feeling when the dome gets closed & cleaned up. Try a solution of 50/50 vinegar/water on the mortar haze...but it will never be an issue because you only focus on what's coming out of the oven or what's smelling delicious while baking. Remember, use a mask & eye protection when working with the insulation batting and go slow on the curing fires. We had a little "first fire" wine & beer party for our friends to watch the tiny paper fire get lit with a little offering of good scotch to the pizza gods.

Looking forward to your continuing journey!

[Sandieego]

Thanks for the positive words. Had a break in the action and was back at it this weekend. Funny how much you can accomplish in a day! One day I did the second arch, the next I did the chimney. I am not a brick layer, nor do I think I can become one. I am sure there is some technique to making straight walls and arches. I followed what I learned from here and feel I am pretty close with my skill set.
I did not take as many pictures this weekend. Had only about a 3-4 hour window each day, was focused more on getting done. Here are the arch build along with the vent draw. I basically placed a support beam brick between the two arches, then attached a brick at an angle to slant the vent draw up. I also used the same arch form as the inner arch. I kept the same height as I figured I did not want to allow the smoke an opportunity to exact out the front. I figured with my door I have an inch gap at the sides and I could put it in at an angle to get a good seal when baking. Plus I figured making the same height was going to make the chimney building easier.

[Sandieego]

So I then built the chimney, dang is it hard to make bricks level and straight!!!
I was making my chimney with the duravent collar in mind. So made the opening 8 by 8 inches square which is drawing from the vent which was a 5 by 11 rectangular opening.

[Sandieego]

This is where it was really dicey. putting on the vent collar is complicated when the bricks are not perfectly level and moving in cement. Probably not the way to do it.
I had 1/4" by 1.25" aluminum screws on hand. I went ahead and drilled the bricks which was oddly very easy to me. The screws drilled in rather hard, but successfully took. I am thinking of getting 2 inch screws or longer. before I go and redo it, I am very curious from people who have done it. will this stay in place? My vent tube in 3 feet plus the duravent chimney cap. The collar is currently level so I suspect the tube will go up looking straight.
Any other advice to ensure the cap and tube does not fall over? Does the community think I can continue on, or should I grab longer screws?

[JRPizza]

I don't know if you were planning on this, but you could consider another layer of brick to "crown" your adapter, which would give the chimney assembly a more firm base. That is what I had copied from UtahBeehiver

[Sandieego]

So I decided to pull out my Aluminum screws, go for the longer 2 and 1/4" fastnet screws and redo my last row of chimney brick (mainly because as I pulled the collar for the chimney the first row of bricks came with it as it was so tightly put in place. I redid and feel it has an even better grip. Better yet, it remained level at the collar (probably first thing I have made that is level).
The next day, I got down to laying my ceramic blanket. One thing I learned is that I am a very bad estimator. I got 6 rolls of 25 by 2 feet by 1 inch ceramic blanket as I thought that would be enough for my dome. It was TOO much. I have two and half rolls left over!!
The three and a half rolls I used covered my dome with four inches of insulation on the sides and 6 at the top. I figure more insulation, the better???
Now, I've got that and one 2 inch by 2 and 3 feet ceramic platform to sell...

[Sandieego]

I forgot to mention that it was SNOWING in San Diego this weekend. Snowing Ceramic blanket material that is. In post readings (I am the kind of person that only looks at pictures and pays no attention at all to what I read) of the blogs here, I saw people masked up and covering their whole bodies with COVID suits making me think it was crazy. I then re-reviewed the post on safety and they do discuss this a bit. I am not an ogre and I was gentle, but cutting this material with a straight edge, pulling it to fit over the dome, etc, causes a proverbial ceramic dust storm!!! Helps that I was doing this in the afternoon when the winds kick up to 10-15 knots! I was wearing full length clothing, N95, hat, glasses and gloves, so that helped. My skin got a little irritated on the wrists of direct exposure, but otherwise handled it well. The material had a spread of over 20 feet from where I am putting it!

[JRPizza]

You can always use some of the left over insulation for a door. I even saved some scraps for if/when my door needs to be replaced!

[Sandieego]

I got the urge to do a show and tell. This is how to remove the standing cone of your ceramic blanket as it is bent around these curved edges.
Image 1: the ceramic blanket is in place and a large cone is formed from the excessive material bundling up.
Image 2: Cut along one side of the cone, not the middle. Cut it down to just past the base of the cone
Image 3: Pull the cut edge over the blanket. effectively flattening the cone.
Image 4: eyeball down the excessive piece and cut it.
Image 5: push them together to put your blanket together.
FINALLY: SAVE your blanket pieces. There will be so much left behind and you use it for your oven door! DO NOT throw it away!!!! Save it in the box it came in or a garbage can so it does not blow all over the place on you.

[Sandieego]

once I was done with my last layer of blanket I decided to wrap it. I saw some people doing a wire first then chicken wire. I forgot where my wire went, so I did the next best thing which was copper mesh I had laying around!
I also thought I needed a mechanism for water repellent to the pizza oven base. The one thing I have paid attention to is the whole keep the thing dry argument so you do not get these osmotic explosion cracks. That sounds upsetting. My neighbor has one from allowing the son-in-law fire up the oven. It was a LARGE fire I am told. Also, I got hosed on a deck rebuild by some guy who did not know what he was doing and had to have things completely redone after water started to come into my house.
That said, I saw an aluminum sheathing put in place to allow the stucco to sit on with the MFBC guys videos (those are pretty nice explanatory videos), so I fashioned a ring around my dome before the copper was in place. i will trim this closer to the counter and seal it with high temp sealant before laying the stucco. not sure if it is a good idea, but I am sticking to it for now.

[Sandieego]

SO by the grace of God, I got the chicken wire up with 6 tie points along the base of my oven. I pulled it to the edges of the brick. I placed my exhaust nipple at the top of the dome for the breather valve so felt pretty good.
I was pretty excited at this point. I made this a stopping point to start fires as per the forum. Although you can't help but think about the continuing build process. One thing I noticed is that my dome shape with these malleable materials is more hill like than a ball. It is a rolling hill.
Therefore, I am not sure what to do from here. Do I drill holes in the brick for more tie points and secure it in? So I am wondering what people do here. can you brown coat stucco the gaps? This means I could end up with 2 inches of brown coat in places considering my skills and the sponginess, it could very well be 4. Do I add some insulating layer cement like vermiculite and portland? I could also incorporate more tie points and lash it down tighter, this may make the gaps less apparent.

[Sandieego]

Even with this burning dilemma, it is a marvel to behold what you can build! It is gargantuous!!! The photos I have seen do not really make you appreciate how large these things are. I am not sure if this one gives anyone a good idea. I went with a 3 foot chimney with the stainless cap from FB (thank you, FB). The overall height is this likely 11 feet on this puppy!
By the way, I will definitely get rid of the aluminum flashing around the arch entry area, it is not flat at all there. Will likely remove it everywhere else, too.

[Sandieego]

Fire....Fire!!!!
Paper fire!!!

[Sandieego]

after that initial burn and about 10 hours later, did the get to 300 burn. was really cool seeing the smoke cloud and the trail going up the chimney. Boy there was alot of smoke. Not sure if it was the wood I bought or not.

[Sandieego]

Got the dome blackened a little tonight!!! Mission accomplished. Will keep burning it this week. Hoping I can fire up some pizza next weekend by Sunday.
I appreciate anyone following this build giving me their insight on the stucco to floor transition. I have a ceramic board and perlite underneath it and I am deathly afraid of water soaking in there from my prior deck experience and don't want to screw it up. I am thinking of pulling off my aluminum strip and just doing the stucco. Then, doing a stucco waterproof coat at the end with something a silane/siloxane based sealer, like Siloxa-Tek 8500
Thank you!