Installing a damper

[diulin]

I'm sorry if this has already been discussed at length, but I'm new here (part of the way through my first half-barrel style pizza oven) and couldn't find any good discussion on the subject. The question is how useful would it be to have a damper in the chimney? I'd love to hear from anyone who has one about how it works for them and for what purposes. Thanks.

[Btwenzel05]

I have a damper on my DIY steel WFO it seems to help retain heat for sure.

[w650gb500]

I fitted a damper and I use it both when I first fire up the oven and as soon as the last item is removed at the end of the evening. It certainly helps with heat retention.

[Sixto]

It depends if your flue opening is located outside the arch (like in a flue gallery) or not. If you have a gallery, then you could just plug the arch with an insulated door, and the flue would be outside of the heated space. If your flue is directly connected to the oven, then you would benefit from a damper, but you also may be losing too much heat out the flue when the fire is burning (which is the benefit of having an arch height that is 60% of the dome height, some of the heat stays at the top of the dome, and only the heat layer below a the top of the arch goes out the arch and into the flue)

[pacificfurn]

I used a Duravent 8" flue I got from Offerup. Then I cut the bottom out of a stainless steel dog bowl that was just the right size. U-bolts and an all-thread rod ran through the sides of the Duravent to the outside of the chimney where I bolted on a cast iron arrow to indicate the direction of the damper.

I agree that the heat retention is much greater with the damper.