2013 MHA Annual Meeting
Wildacres, North Carolina --- April 15 - 21, 2013

48" Adobe Pizza Oven
with Pat Manley and Marty Pearson

Back to Wildacres 2013 Photo Report

Marty Pearson prepares a level sand bed for the hearth course

Firebrick hearth

Laying out a 48" diameter circle.

Starting the sand plug for the adobe outer shell.

Sand is dampened to make it hold its shape

Brick throat and door assembly is built.

Styrofoam form for the door arch is in place.

Misting the sand.

Detail of door transition.

Sand is trowelled smooth.

Door arch complete.

Building the throat transition to the chimney.

Starting to pack down adobe clumps.

Adobe is sand and clay. In this case about 1 part Redart clay to 4 parts sand.

Darla Rousseau, from Prince Edward Island

Throwing prepared balls of adobe to the installers.

Mixing.

Tristan Lebreton from Quebec

Installing the chimney connector

Arch form was removed as soon as the brickwork was completed. Some people held their breath.

Cleaning out the throat.

Lighting a fire right away at the front, to start the drying process.
It was Wednesday afternoon, and the oven had to be fast cured to get it ready in time for the pizza party on Friday afternoon.

Plastering the front.

After supper, part of the sand was carved away, and the fire put deeper into the oven.

Hendrik Lepel form Ireland scoops out the sand late Wednesday night. He has built a number of similar ovens, and judged that it
was self supporting at this stage.

Curing fire in the fresh, cold oven cavity.
Note the two distinct layers delineated by the smoke.
The bottom layer is combustion air going towards the fire. The top layer is smoke heading in the opposite direction, towards the throat.
A demonstration of the Bernoulli effect (buoyancy or the Bell principle) in action.

The next day, Pat Manley preps the oven for another curing fire.
Note the patch at the top left of the firebox, where the plaster is dry.

Adjusting the air.
The idea is to dry the oven out slowly to avoid internal steam explosions.

Note the dry patch has gotten larger.

Pat Manley explains the oven to some visitors.

Carsten Homstead inserts the probe from his Testo 330-2 combustion analyzer into the stack.
This is the first time I know of that anyone has actually measured combustion performance on a wood fired bake oven.
Data to follow shortly.

Ready to party

2013 MHA Annual Meeting Wildacres, North Carolina --- April 15 - 21, 2013

2013 MHA Annual Meeting
Wildacres, North Carolina --- April 15 - 21, 2013