Firebricks Question

[PizzaHog]

Hi Norma
According to Forno Bravo it sounds like you have the right kind, especially if the color is yellow I guess.
http://www.fornobravo.com/pompeii_oven/brick_primer.html

[norma427]

Hi Norma
According to Forno Bravo it sounds like you have the right kind, especially if the color is yellow I guess.
http://www.fornobravo.com/pompeii_oven/brick_primer.html

Hog,

Thanks for supplying the link.  Does look like I found the right kind.  Now makes me wonder if I should have gotten the thicker ones.    Wouldn't be hard to go back there tomorrow and also get some thicker ones.  Maybe I could also talk to someone there and find out what most people use.  It made me wonder when the lady said they had the firebricks in yellow and red.  I see on the Forno Bravo link you provided it does say to use yellow.

Thanks for your help,

Norma

[carbon]

Norma,

If they weigh that much, then I'm sure they're the type you want.  It's just that I've never seen them in white.

As a comparison, my full bricks (white 2.5 x 4.5 x 9) which are insulating weigh only a couple of pounds each.

[norma427]

Norma,

If they weigh that much, then I'm sure they're the type you want.  It's just that I've never seen them in white.

As a comparison, my full bricks (white 2.5 x 4.5 x 9) which are insulating weigh only a couple of pounds each.

carbon,

They also look almost white to me, also, but the lady said when I called today they were yellow.  Doesn't make any sense.    I don't know how much weight the thicker firebricks weigh. 

Thanks for letting me know how much your bricks weigh.  This forum is a great place for information.

Thanks for your help,

Norma

[Jackie Tran]

I have the tan/yellowish ones that are 4.5 x 9 x 1.25".  Each firebrick is 3 lbs 11.25 oz.

[norma427]

I have the tan/yellowish ones that are 4.5 x 9 x 1.25".  Each firebrick is 3 lbs 11.25 oz.

Tranman,

Yours sound almost exactly like me.  Wonder why yours is 1 1/4" thick and mine is 1 1/2" thick.    They must make them different thicknesses in different parts of country.

I will have to try different experiments with my BBQ grill and oven to see what happens.

Norma

[Ronzo]

Matt,

That is interesting to know that their are different grades of firebricks.  I just picked some up today.  Here is a picture of some of them. Are these the right kind?  If they aren't, I can take them back tomorrow.

Thanks,

Norma

They look exactly like the ones I have, and they don't insulate anything (someone mentioned they look like insulating bricks). They take the heat and radiate it very well.

[norma427]

They look exactly like the ones I have, and they don't insulate anything (someone mentioned they look like insulating bricks). They take the heat and radiate it very well.

Ronzo,

Thanks for letting me know they look like the ones you have and radiate heat very well.  This has been an interesting day, learning about firebricks.

Thanks for your info, 

Norma

[carbon]

I attached a photo of some white insulating bricks I'm using to create a thermal break in my oven project.  These bricks weigh only about a quarter of what the standard tan colored bricks weigh that I used in the dome.  Not only are these very light, they're brittle as well.

[norma427]

I attached a photo of some white insulating bricks I'm using to create a thermal break in my oven project.  These bricks weigh only about a quarter of what the standard tan colored bricks weigh that I used in the dome.  Not only are these very light, they're brittle as well.

carbon,

Your oven project looks interesting.    Since I don't much about insulating bricks, are they the same thing as firebricks or what should I ask for if I want to purchase some?

Thanks for your help,

Norma

[norma427]

I was working on my BBQ grill oven today.  The firebricks are hard to cut.  In addition to the tools in this picture, I got many more tools out to try cutting the firebricks.  I did manage to get them all cut but one, and then it decided to have a shower.  If it stops raining, I will cut the last firebrick and test the oven tonight.  I did spit a few firebricks as can be seen in the pictures.

Norma

[Jackie Tran]

Oven looks great.  Do you have a rotisserie burner to play with?  I gather not.  Without a rotisserie burner in the back or side & back air space for the heat to travel up, you may not get enough heat to brown the top.   I hope your bake goes well tonight.  Looking forward to your results. 


Norma, it looks like if you extend the side and back walls you can build the fire right inside and then push the coals to the side.  LOL.

I'm still tinkering with my MBE setup.  This pizza making is tricky business.

Tran

[norma427]

Tranman,

Thanks for saying the BBQ oven looks great.  I just finished cutting the last firebrick.  I don’t have a rotisserie burner to play around with.  There is a gap in the back and sides of the firebricks.  There is also some vents in the back of my BBQ grill.  I do have some cherry wood bark and could try that to burn on the one side, but  just think I am going to try this out the way it is and see what happens.  I was thinking about cutting some steel sheet metal that was in the shed, but cutting these bricks were enough for me today. 

I agree that the pizza making business is tricky.  I will post the results, whether good or bad.  I am worried about loading the pie into the BBQ grill oven. 

Best of luck in your MBE setup, 

Norma

[scott123]

Wow Norma, cutting Firebricks with a hand saw?!?  Is the saw still intact? 

Anyway, the setup looks pretty good. How big is the steel pan? 10 x 15? With a ceiling that doesn't cover the entire hearth, I don't think you'll have a choice but to turn the pie.  You might want to think about centering the pan on the two side supports rather than having it touch the back wall. If the hearth is 13.5" deep and the ceiling is 10", that's only 1.75" on the back and front, rather than a whopping 3.5" on the front.

The last time we talked, you were considering preheating the ceiling on it's own and then adding the hearth. Is that still your plan? If, so, I would blast the ceiling with all three burners for a while, seeing how hot you can get it.  Make sure you take the temp of the top bricks- that's the temp that really counts. The bricks are your heat storage. As you bake the pizza, the pan will draw heat from the bricks. If the top of the bricks is nice and hot (hopefully higher than 600), then they should have absorbed a decent quantity of heat and should stay hot for a while.

[Jackie Tran]

Scott, if you preheat the ceiling first and then open the hood to build the hearth and walls, I would think once you close the hood again that the ceiling would start to lose heat to the other structures in the grill.  Wouldn't the heat strive to reach for equilibrium and readily give up it's heat to the non heated walls and floor.  How long do you think the ceiling would stay hotter than the floor heat?  What happens to pie #2 after a modest 5 min bake? Just wondering. 

Norma I'm getting hungry.  Where are those pies?

[norma427]

scott123,

The steel pan is 12 ½" by 17".  I only used two saws partially to see how they would fare.  I mostly used chisels, that I first scored the firebricks on both sides, kept using different chisels with a hammer, until the firebrick split to fit the hearth, sides and top steel pan.  My arms are aching now, from all that pounding. Even pounded my hand a couple of times. I didn’t realize how hard firebricks are to cut.  I did ask the man where I purchased my firebricks how much they charge to cut them and he said 1.00 a brick.  I thought I would give a go myself. I also thought it was funny, when I told the owner what I was going to do with the firebricks and he said two other people had come in yesterday and were going to do the same thing with their BBQ grills. I said to him, they must be also looking at pizzamaking.com. He said it was unusual that people purchase them for their BBQ grills. It took longer than I thought it would to cut the firebricks. I could have also rented a water cutter from my local hardware store, but I like to do things by hand.

I didn’t heat the top first today.  I just wanted to try this set-up to see what would happen.

Thanks for your advise.    I might be needing more as I try these different methods.

Norma

Tranman,

Here is the one and only pie I baked tonight.  It was getting dark and I had other things to do before I could get ready to bake this one and only pie. 

Norma


I got to try making pizza for the first time tonight in the BBQ grill with the new set-up.  I let the BBQ grill with the firebricks heat for about 45 minutes.  I took the temperature of the hearth and top.  The temperature of the hearth was 610 degrees F and the temperature of the above firebricks on the pan was 565 degrees F.  The pizza baked a lot faster in this set-up.  I even let the pizza thicker. The pizza baked in 3 1/2 minutes. When I saw the bottom of the crust was starting to get dark, I took the pizza inside and put it under the broiler.  I just turned on the broiler when I got inside.  At least my kitchen didn’t get hot. Even though the bottom crust looks dark, there was no burnt flavor. It just had a wonderful char flavor in my opinion. The pizza was 8 1/2"

Norma

[norma427]

more pictures

Norma

[norma427]

more pictures

Norma

[norma427]

last pictures

Thanks to everyone that helped me on this project and other posts on the forum about BBQ grill set-ups!     I never would have been able to do it without all your help, 

Norma

[scott123]

610 hearth 565 dome.... with a 45 minute preheat... interesting.

It's a little too much char for my tastes, but the puffiness/oven spring is impressive.

Do you have any charcoal?  I was thinking you might put a few coals on top of the firebrick ceiling. That might give you better ceiling heat with a quicker pre-heat. Charcoal should burn clean as well, as opposed to wood, which could gunk up the lid of the grill and eventually catch fire. Wood works in a WFO because it reaches hot enough temps to burn the tar away.

Btw, the next time you do this,  before the pizza goes in, could you take four temps?

Dome ext. (top of the firebricks)
Dome int. (middle of the steel pan)
Hearth int.
Hearth ext. (underneath the hearth, if possible)

I think that should give us a better picture of the thermodynamics.

Scott, if you preheat the ceiling first and then open the hood to build the hearth and walls, I would think once you close the hood again that the ceiling would start to lose heat to the other structures in the grill.  Wouldn't the heat strive to reach for equilibrium and readily give up it's heat to the non heated walls and floor.  How long do you think the ceiling would stay hotter than the floor heat?  What happens to pie #2 after a modest 5 min bake? Just wondering. 

Well, first of all, in my ceiling preheat scenario, the walls would already be place, so the hearth could be slide into place without having to handle hot bricks.

Secondly, firebrick's one slight flaw (low conductivity) is also one of it's strengths. It takes longer to heat up and doesn't transfer heat to the pizza as quickly (although, in this case, 610 firebrick transferred a surprisingly large amount of heat to Norma's pizza), BUT, it stays hot for a looooong time. If one were to heat firebrick to, say, 650, within a relatively closed system such as this, I would think it would stay pretty close to that for a while, especially with some heat (not a lot, but some) collecting in the head space with the lid closed. I couldn't guarantee that it would maintain that 650 indefinitely, but I think an hour or two (with the heat at full blast and the oven closed), would be no problem. Even if you turned off the gas completely but kept the lid closed, I would think the firebrick would cool very slowly. I'm totally guessing here, but I wouldn't be surprised if firebrick loses about 100 a degrees an hour in that scenario.

I heat my 1.25" soapstone to 550 and that's too hot to touch 3 hours later (with the door open) and soapstone is more conductive (loses heat quicker) than firebrick.