Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

[Mexman]

I finished my 40 inch FB WFO a year ago and have really enjoyed making Pizza's in it. I've found that my favorite use of the oven is having my Monthly Pizza party. I invite about 25 people over Sunday afternoon about 4 o'clock and usually end up baking around 20 pies. Everyone seems to love the parties.
I've feed pizzas to over 100 people in the last 6 Months.
My problem is, I made two mistakes in building the oven. I downloaded the 64 page PDFS file from the FB site and read it from cover to cover. My wife and I live in centeral Mexico and I cannot just run down to Home Depot and buy the materials. I spent a lot of time rounding up fire bricks, vermiculite.
I had a locale contractor build the oven for me. It came out beautiful. Great insulation, floating floor.etc.
First problem, in building the dome, the contractor did not cut the 8 inch fire bricks in half. So, my dome is 8 inches thick. This is a lot of Mass to heat up.
Second problem, I wanted a solid stone oven floor. Here in Mexico, there thousands of bread ovens and most of them use Lava rock as floors. My oven floor is only 36 inches now with the 8 inch walls, so I ordered a 36 inch 2 inch thick Lava rock floor from a locale stone Company. After about a 3-4 week lead time, the floor arrived, but was 4 inches thick, instead of the 2 inches I ordered.
After some reasearch and a call to FB, I decided to go ahead and install it.
After a year of use, I decided that I will only use the WFO for pizzas. My wife and I love entertaining and want to continue having pizza parties. We would like to have as few as 8 guest over for pizzas
With that use in mind, I don't need an oven with a large amount of mass. Takes hours to heat up. I don't need to retain heat until the next day, I never intend to bake a dozen loves of bread. I need an oven that heats up fast to 800 degrees, bakes 15-20 pizzas., then shuts down.
I talked to my contractor and he said he could tear the dome off, cut the bricks in half and rebuild the dome for under $500. But, of course, I cant use the oven for about a Month. Don't know the cost of recutting the stone floor.
I'm wondering if it's worth rebuilding the oven.
Has anyone had experience in cooking in WFO with a lot of Mass, versus low mass oven?

[Gulf]

Re: Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

..........I talked to my contractor and he said he could tear the dome off, cut the bricks in half and rebuild the dome for under $500. But, of course, I cant use the oven for about a Month. Don't know the cost of recutting the stone floor. I'm wondering if it's worth rebuilding the oven.
Has anyone had experience in cooking in WFO with a lot of Mass, versus low mass oven?

I haven't had the experience of being able to compare ovens of different masses. But, I want another one. I don't want to part with the one I have. I just want another oven,............. nearby. It would be great to be able to have foods cooked at different temperatures being served hot and fresh from the oven at the very same time. I'm doing this now, somewhat, with the use of grills and smokers. But, it would be great! to be able to do that with two WFO's.

Is there anyway you can incorporate another oven into your site? If you could, you would be able to take your time on sourcing materials, it would only take about half as many firebrick, and you would not be without the use of an oven for a month.............or more .

I just hate to see a working oven torn down .

[dakzaag]

Re: Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

You should be able to cook pizza without having the oven saturated. Just keep the flame licking across the top of the dome and cook away. I think the oven looks great and maybe you can find a neighbor or partner to utilize the residual heat?
I vote to keep the oven and build another if necessary.

[Cubslover]

Re: Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

Tough call, the oven looks great. It'd be a shame to risk it.

[stonecutter]

Re: Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

.......I don't need an oven with a large amount of mass. Takes hours to heat up. I don't need to retain heat until the next day, I never intend to bake a dozen loves of bread. I need an oven that heats up fast to 800 degrees, bakes 15-20 pizzas., then shuts down.

Then this isn't the right oven for you.

I talked to my contractor and he said he could tear the dome off, cut the bricks in half and rebuild the dome for under $500. But, of course, I cant use the oven for about a Month. Don't know the cost of recutting the stone floor.
I'm wondering if it's worth rebuilding the oven.

$500 is a bargain for a rebuild. It's not like this is a hasty decision being that you actively used it for a year. You have identified your specific needs, and as mentioned, it's not the right oven for you. It's totally worth rebuilding. Why build another? Then is oven will be a yard ornament once you have one that functions the way you want. And ibuilding a second oven will cost more money in the long run.

Has anyone had experience in cooking in WFO with a lot of Mass, versus low mass oven?

Now you do. What other people with high mass ovens think is irrelevant....your needs are not theirs.

[Mexman]

Re: Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

Stonecutter
Do you think the 4 in thick Stone floor is worth cutting down to 2 inches.
This will be the hardest part of the rebuild because we will have to remove it and send it back to the state be Company. Very few places have a saw big enough to cut. 36 in slab in half.

[stonecutter]

Re: Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

Yes, it's worth the effort,otherwise the oven won't balance out. Well, it will, but then you're back to longer fire up times.

In other words, your reduced dome mass will be to temp while the floor is trying to catch up. What about relief cutting the bottom and chiseling off the waste to reduce the stone thickness?

[DavidApp]

Re: Should I tear the Dome of my FB WFO off.

Hello Mexman

Would it be less expensive to order a new 2" piece of stone?

You would only have shipping one way and the cutting would be the same.

David