More thermal blanket needed?

[WoodywWun]

Having got the homebrew on, I let my dome/gallery cure/dry for several weeks. I was relieved to see no cracks appearing. The thermal blanket has gone on now, with some doubling/trebling up on the layers over the top area of the dome. Some lower parts of the dome only have a single layer of blanket. I elected to use chicken wire over the blanket. This was very easy to put on and shape. It was cheap as chips to buy and it holds the blanket down well and I hope will give a good key for the next (Vermicrete) insulation layer.

Going on advice, I decided to start my curing fires (after t weeks of air dry/cure) with just the thermal blanket on. I've achieved six of the seven fires so far and got the upper dome up to a temperature of about 550C (1,000F). The temperature of the middle dome got up to about 300C (570F) and the lower dome/floor up to about 250C (480F). I've set the fires without the availability of a door so I suspect I'm getting quite a cooling effect from the door area. I've had no cracking of the homebrew dome or gallery. My clay tile chimney has held up well, with no cracks. About 75% of the fire's smoke ends up going up the chimney with about 25% coming out of the door.

The door is under construction now and is to be a stainless steel double skinned affaire with a piece of the thermal blanket as the internal insulator.

I've attached a photo to show how the thermal blanket looks.. should I go the extra mile and make sure there is a full 25mm over the whole dome or can I rely on the Vermicrete insulation layer in the lower areas of the dome?

Any thoughts would be welcome. There's a link to my build thread below.


https://community.fornobravo.com/for...w-some-options

[RandyJ]

You could probably stand to put some more insulation on the top of the oven. I had a minimum of 3" at any point on my build. Not totally clear on what else you are asking here but it takes a while to fully cook all the water out of the oven and get more even temps. But more insulation will help keep it warm and reflect the heat back in.

Randy

[WoodywWun]

Thanks for your reply and advice Randy. I'll probably go for some more blanket insulation, particularly where I've only one layer at the moment.

What I was after was folks' thoughts and experience on oven temperatures in various parts of the dome and whether this was normal for them to be different or if it was linked, strongly to the thickness of the insulation. Noted about the time it takes to expel water. I'll keep the curing fires going.