Building outdoors on ground in tropics

[Johnnycantplaytoday]

Thanks Dave,

Not to much room to make a separate decorative arch and I sort of like the way it looks at the moment. Was hoping not to get any cracks but at that location and the way it is, I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. I will keep an eye on it though to see if it spreads or gets bigger.

Was wondering if it was worth poking around with a hacksaw blade or similar between the vermicrete and the casting to create a 1-2mm airspace at the front of the oven where there is no blanket. Or is this just wishful thinking. Could even cut a bit of vermicrete out of the inside of the flue gallery and get a blade in there also down the side of the flue gallery casting to create a small gap as well. That way when the inner casting dome expands, it will have a couple mm to expand into thereby reducing any stress on the outer vermicrete layer.

Could it also be worth trying to pour some kind of bonding/glue agent in between the crack while its hot, something like Bondcrete or high temp glue maybe to fill the gap and dry when it cools

Just a thought!

Regards

JB

[UtahBeehiver]

That crack is just a wisdom line, I agree with David, all ovens have cracks somewhere.

[Johnnycantplaytoday]

Hi Guys,

Been a couple weeks so I thought I'd give an update. Well last weekend it rained most of the weekend finished off with 80-100km Gale force winds and rain coming sideways. So the tarp I put on the oven blew away and basically the oven got saturated and water went down the flue wetting inside. So I did a couple smaller fires a couple days ago to slowly dry the inside out and to help dry the outer insulation layer as well.

I finished my Internal Insulated door, but havn't had a chance to test it's effectiveness due to wanting to dry it out slowly. So I think I'm good to go with the internal door and a larger fire however this weekends looking like the same story as last week, so maybe not.

Anyway, I've attached a couple photos of the inner door and will get back with it's effectiveness when I get a chance to fire the oven up again.

Thanks again for all your help and advice.

I've also now put on over 2 kg's in the last few weeks from eating pizza every Friday, Saturday and Sunday & I personally hold each & every person on this site responsible for my increasing waistline!! Just Kidding! No really!

Cheers

JB