Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Thank Leigh - looking forward to the bricks!

It looks like I'll be doing homebrew.
I called the local Heatstop distributor: $120 / 50 pounds - ouch, and that's if I pick it up.

Still have to go back and check on the Alsey Flueset. I don't remember it being that expensive.

Home brew is certainly cost-effective
Fireclay: $15-22/50 pounds depending on supplier
The lime and sand are certainly cheaper too and I still have 140+ pounds of portland cement
With oh sooo many people happy with the homebrew I'll probably become a convert.

Now I need to talk with my neighbor who said I can borrow his brick saw.

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

I picked about 1/3 of my firebricks today and 50# of fireclay. It turns out the 50# of fireclay is not much, only about 1/2 cu ft. I joked with the guy at Boral Brick in Greenville asking where the rest of the bag is. It's a bag as big as 94# of portland cement, but only half full.
Still looking for hydrated lime. Will pick the white sand tomorrow at Home Depot.

Moving forward...slowly.

[Aegis]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

I picked about 1/3 of my firebricks today and 50# of fireclay. It turns out the 50# of fireclay is not much, only about 1/2 cu ft. I joked with the guy at Boral Brick in Greenville asking where the rest of the bag is. It's a bag as big as 94# of portland cement, but only half full.
Still looking for hydrated lime. Will pick the white sand tomorrow at Home Depot.

Moving forward...slowly.

As you cut your firebricks you will get PLENTY of fireclay from the wet saw tray. I was amazed at the amount I wound up with after cutting the last brick. I think it was over a 5 gal bucket full!
Good Luck on your build!
John

[rodeair]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Jeff - I built my 42 inch with the one 50# bag of fireclay. You'll use a half bag of portland as well. The big volume is the "fine sand", that'll be 150 - 200#. Save the fireclay, as John suggests, from the wet saw for use in cladding the dome. If you get one of those big bags of lime, you will have more than a half bag left over. I used 5 gallon buckets with sealed lids for the ingredients to make it easier. A bucket full of fireclay, portland, and lime is all I used for building the dome and entry along with 3 bucketfulls of sand. As I say, this does not include any leveling or dome cladding materials. Make sure to use only "fine sand" and not playground sand. You will find as I did the homebrew is great stuff. Good luck!
Leigh

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Time for stupid questions:
LIME:
Can I use quicklime or does it need to be hydrated lime? (Did you know there was a lime website National Lime Association) It just confused me further. Neither Lowe's or HD had hydrated lime.
SAND:
Is quickcrete all-purpose sand 'fine'? I saw it at lowes and HD, butI didn't figure it was. Is the fineness the primary consideration.
I bought premium play sand (Short Mountain Silica - Mooresburg, TN) because is looked finer than the quikcrete sand. It's been washed and screened (but the bag doesn't say the screen size).
@RODEAIR - thanks for help. The five gallon buckets sound like a great idea too!

[rodeair]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Jeff, I was able to get the hydrated lime from the local nursery. I originally bought the sand you got before finding it's not what's best. I was able to find "fine sand" at both a good hardware and a brick/stone supplier. The bag will have the words fine sand on it. I ended up using the play sand for the half inch dome cladding homebrew I mixed after the dome was done. Hope this helps, there are other threads on here about sand and such.
Leigh

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

thanks leigh!
I'll keep looking for finer sand as I still have time. I had hoped to lay out the floor tonight, but family needed me more. So I'll be up early tomorrow working on it.
Leigh - do the bags actually say "hydrated lime" on them? Quick bing images show the answer is yes.

From www.lime.org...needless to say I won't be processing it - lol. So it's not the same.
"Quicklime can be processed into hydrated lime by crushing the quicklime, adding water to the crushed lime (water accounts for approximately 1% of raw hydrate), and then classifying the hydrated lime to ensure it meets customer specifications before it is transported. "

There are even International Building Lime Symposiums each year.

All this time I thought limes were for gin&tonics, margaritas and key lime pies - LOL.

Seriously - I'll go looking for hydrated lime.

Jeff

[jatsrt]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Jeff,
OK, finally caught up on your thread and build.

I'm surprised the Heat Stop 50 is so expensive for you, I found it locally for $50 a bag, pretty decent deal to not have to make a home brew. Too bad you are so far away, I have 1 3/4 50# bags of fire clay left. At $13 a bag I way over bought.

As far as your sand, Lowes does not carry "fine mesh" near me, though I did find it at Home Depot right down the street. It was right next to the general purpose(with other masonry mixes) and cost the same, looking at it, it is a cleaner sand with less foreign particles.

I'll try to keep on top of your thread from now on :-)

[jatsrt]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Also, looking at your perlite layer I wish I had gone with perline and not vermiculite, looks like it was much easier to work with and less compaction. I also found my layer to not be overly crumbly. Though I did mix it on the wet side and floated it. So, I have a fine particle very sturdy layer on top and it gets larger and more "airy" as you go down. I can break into it and cut it very easily, but it is still structurally very strong.

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

So the post I just wrote disappeared into the ether - so I'll have to recreate it.

Good week - I called around and found hydrated lime at a Southern States store. I'll pick up a couple bags this week.

I bought 125 bricks a few weeks back. They were wire cut which means they don't have a nice smooth finish. They are also 4x8 and $1 each.
I decided I didn't like them as much I thought I would so I found another brick dealer with the 'normal' finish 4x9 and $1.16 each. Bought 100 of them. I'll be going back for more of these.

I got the floor installed on the perlcrete. The premium playground sand is very fine and mixed it 1:1 with fireclay and water. Each batch I added more water to. By the time I was done I was happy with the 'cake frosting' consistency.
Oh yeah - the original perlcrete layer was too narrow so I had to add about 1.5-2" for 180 degrees (back half of the floor). Between switching to 9" bricks and laying the floor slightly off (since I started at the entrance) the original perlcrete layer was too narrow.

My neighbor loaned me his 10" brick saw (and blades ). It makes cutting bricks so easy. I'm putting the sailors on the floor. I cut some bricks and set them in place just to get the feeling of progress. Once I get more bricks and cut them, I'll start mortaring them (and the perlcrete should be dry.

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

@Leigh I found fine sand this week at Home Depot when I went to get the mortar bag. I bought a bag to see if it improves my homebrew.
Of course I'd already bought 2 bags of Heatstop50 last month.
I did get 4 courses done today with the help of a friend. Used 1 bag of Heatstop50.

It's starting to look like a dome now. I'll post some pics tomorrow.

I'll try the fine sand in some home brew after I finish the second bag of Heatstop. Like you were going to do, I'll use the play sand for the cladding.

It feels good to be making some progress again!

Jeff

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Picture as promised - third course as it's starting to get dark. Put on the 4th and called it a day. Definitely went faster with some help!



Rained today and it's going to rain a lot this week

Jeff

[VJ Dickens]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Small world, I live in Easley. Jeff where did you get your fire brick? By the way, looks great.

[PizzaIdiot]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

VJ - it's been a challenge getting supplies.
The bricks I'm using I got at Cason Building Supply. The ones I got at Boral were wire cut and not the look I wanted.

Are you planning on building something?

[VJ Dickens]

Re: Jeff's 42" Pompeii in Easley, SC (near Greenville,SC)

Yes. We started out to build an oven with clay(plenty of that here as you know)But once we found this site and forum my wife and I both got bit with the bug. We had planned for 32" which I know is small, but I think we will enjoy it. I found fire brick in Anderson for 1.00 each. 8 x 4 x 2.5. Do you know about these? Is there a way post directly to you?