Pizza oven building - questions

[jack123]

Hi!

Ive put a few pictures on of my current build, but I've hit quite a big problem seemingly! Whilst I've done a lot of research on the size, design etc., all I know is that I wanted 'fire bricks'. Whilst I got a few of high density bricks for the floor of the oven (laid in herringbone), I got a great price on light weight refractory bricks and have used them on the dome with a vermiculite coating and will be using an insulating blanket.

My previous oven was with clays, which worked but not too well. Given that the heat for a pizza is predominantly the floor heat and then heat of oven / flames will this work for pizzas? I understand the heat storage in the leightweitht bricks
mean it won't re-radiate heat for too long which may make other cooking (requiring longer cooking times) difficult!

Any advice would be appreciated before I progress any further!!

thanks!! 

[jack123]

[downunderdave]

May 21, 2017 22:38:30 GMT jack123 said:

Hi!

Ive put a few pictures on of my current build, but I've hit quite a big problem seemingly! Whilst I've done a lot of research on the size, design etc., all I know is that I wanted 'fire bricks'. Whilst I got a few of high density bricks for the floor of the oven (laid in herringbone), I got a great price on light weight refractory bricks and have used them on the dome with a vermiculite coating and will be using an insulating blanket.

My previous oven was with clays, which worked but not too well. Given that the heat for a pizza is predominantly the floor heat and then heat of oven / flames will this work for pizzas? I understand the heat storage in the leightweitht bricks
mean it won't re-radiate heat for too long which may make other cooking (requiring longer cooking times) difficult!

Any advice would be appreciated before I progress any further!!

thanks!! 

Short of tearing it down and rebuilding in dense brick, your other option would be to fire it and see how it goes. I'd expect you'll be able to get it up to pizza temp, but as soon as you let the big fire die down, push aside the coals, prepare the floor and maintain the small fire on the side, your dome temp is likely to drop substantially and cooking the top of the pizza will be difficult. Happy to be proved wrong so give it a shot. Put some blanket over it first though.