Pre cutting and reinstalling in another location?

[Vee]

Hello,

I'm planning on building a 36" Pompeii oven at our cottage this spring but would like to get started planning, measuring and cutting at home during our long Canadian winters. I can only be at our cottage on the weekends in the spring so my build time is limited. I would rather be boating than building come summer. I've looked at oven kits but it seems that transport to Canada would make them cost-prohibitive.

Has anybody attempted or have advice on pre-building (dry stack) the block stand with a temporary plywood top and then pre-cutting as much of the pizza floor bricks, tray forms, rebar, arch bricks, dome brick as possible. I would like to build it in my garage at home and then reassemble it at the cottage. Would it be possible to dry-stack the oven dome bricks over a styrofoam form using shims and hot glue where needed and then reassemble the dome using an IT tool? I figure I could just peel the glue off the bricks before installation.

I've searched but haven't been able to find threads of anyone attempting this.

Crazy talk?

Any advice would be much appreciated.

John

[Kvanbael]

Great question! A lot can be prepped upfront in my opinion, but dry-building an entire brick dome seems unrealistic.

floorbricks and arches can be completely precut as long as you properly account for joint widths.

Dome bricks can be tapered upfront based on calculations. But some extra last minute cutting will be needed to avoid aligned vertical joints and to close each coarse.

that’s my 2 cents.

[SableSprings]

Welcome John! As noted by Kvanbeal the support base foundation is often a dry stack with a hearth slab poured on top. Forno Bravo actually does offer a DIY brick oven kit but I totally get the cost issue. What you want to do would be much easier casting your oven dome in 3 pieces. Another issue you need to think about is protection from moisture getting into your oven over the winter. You'd need to securely tarp it when you left each season or weekend (or build it in a shelter/enclosure. Have you considered something like the Roccbox or Oonie? They are very portable and could be put away or taken home in the winter. There are also some excellent pizza oven add-ons for gas BBQs.

Hope that isn't too discouraging, I think you could do a pre-assemble but hot glue would not be very useful & you'd be spending all your summer time working on the oven instead of enjoying the cottage (just my opinion of course...)

[UtahBeehiver]

FYI, I do believe the FB has stopped offering a DIY brick oven kit but still offers the free DIY brick plans.

[Vee]

Thanks All!

Sounds good. From reading a lot of posts here I see that much of the lower components can be preplanned and some cut ahead of time. I'll have a look at what Forno Bravo has available in my area.

Would a casted dome be as good as a brick one and last? Are there any good build threads here?

Yes I've done a lot of research on Roccbox and Ooni and they look like great products. An Ooni Pro costs $900 Cdn plus accessories and I would still be longing for a real wood oven. $1k would buy me about a 1/3 of the brick oven materials I think. Long term I'll probably end up with a Roccbox or Ooni for my home I figure.

John

[NCMan]

I plan on doing something like this for a one week workshop this spring. W/only a week to build the oven, I plan on precutting all the bricks (or as many as I can) and using shims and perhaps some lime mortar to temporarily hold them in place until the dome is basically done, number them, then transport them to the site. Not sure if it'll work, but I plan on giving it a try. I may have to improvise as I go, especially w/the last few chains, but I plan on doing it.

[lorenzo73]

I cut and placed all the bricks for the floor of my oven in the garage, then moved everything to the back yard. Before moving it, I took a picture, applied an edge finding filter, and numbered every one like a puzzle (see linked photo). Then I printed out the puzzle, cut it into pieces for each brick, and taped each numbered piece onto its corresponding brick. Its really easy to get mixed up, so this helped us keep everything sorted. For the dome, I cut all the bricks in half in the garage, then transported them to the yard for assembly, and made any necessary adjustment cuts out there on site.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/cbonsi...7708754175843/

[NCMan]

I cut and placed all the bricks for the floor of my oven in the garage, then moved everything to the back yard. Before moving it, I took a picture, applied an edge finding filter, and numbered every one like a puzzle (see linked photo). Then I printed out the puzzle, cut it into pieces for each brick, and taped each numbered piece onto its corresponding brick. Its really easy to get mixed up, so this helped us keep everything sorted. For the dome, I cut all the bricks in half in the garage, then transported them to the yard for assembly, and made any necessary adjustment cuts out there on site.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/cbonsi...7708754175843/

Thanks for sharing. It's pretty much what I plan to do.

[Vee]

I cut and placed all the bricks for the floor of my oven in the garage, then moved everything to the back yard. Before moving it, I took a picture, applied an edge finding filter, and numbered every one like a puzzle (see linked photo). Then I printed out the puzzle, cut it into pieces for each brick, and taped each numbered piece onto its corresponding brick. Its really easy to get mixed up, so this helped us keep everything sorted. For the dome, I cut all the bricks in half in the garage, then transported them to the yard for assembly, and made any necessary adjustment cuts out there on site.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/cbonsi...7708754175843/

Thanks for sharing. I'm looking forward to seeing how that goes.

John