Bought a gas deck oven

[pcampbell]

OK, after staring at auctions for a long time, decided to pick up an gas deck oven for testing.

It is going to be a pain to get it home and setup (thankfully it is 15 minutes from home, and I am good with gas lines!), but I thought I need to figure out if I can get what I want out of a gas deck oven.  My wife is thrilled 

It is roughly like a Baker's Pride GS805 - supposedly will do 4 x 18" pies.  The deck height is a little tall, 9" vs 8" on  Y-600, and 7" on GS/DS series.  Not sure how big of a deal that is, but if we swap out the 1.5" stones for bricks it will decrease the height I guess. 

Going to have to try to figure out how to adjust the thermostat to get get 700 or 750 out of it.

[JConk007]

Cool Patrick whered you grab that baby? The oven will be fired if you are around sunday!
John

[pcampbell]

It's in Bergenfield, but it's been up and down on ebay for months, they had it listed for a lot more, then finally did it auction style.

If you wanted to see what other junk the guy has (nothing too interesting I would say) http://cgi6.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewSellersOtherItems&userid=commoncommercial

Going to try to get it Monday but I probably will not get it hooked up for  a few more days.

Thanks for the invite but I am working at the Pizza Fusion. I have been working 7 days (real job + pizza job) a week for a while now trying to take it all in.  We'll catch up sometime though!!

[JConk007]

Wheres Pizza Fusion?

[pcampbell]

It is in Ridgewood, across from Whole Foods.  It's a small franchise  and their thing is organic pizza. 

[pcampbell]

I finally got this thing fired up.

Unfortunately, I waited 3 hours, and it was only up to about 600F, and the wife could wait no longer.  So I gave it a try.  Results were good, better than home oven, with a little char on the bottom.  I was not blown away by any means.  I am hoping that the extra 100F is going to be the difference that makes me go "WOW".    I can't believe how long it takes to warm up, and this is with the regular 1.5" stone.  We baked some cookies in it an hour after I shut it off    I do hate to run it for so long and only make a few pizzas.

I am using a 62% KA bread flour dough with 2% salt and 211 grams for 10" pizza (I don't have a big peel).

I am also wondering if the bottom is just going to burn and the top won't bake quickly enough for 700F bottom temperature.

[JConk007]

WOW 3 HRS? mY WFO IS AT 800 IN 3 HRS? WHERE DID THE MIXER GO?
JOHN

[pcampbell]

I think it is just weak, hopefully it's not an insulation issue (losing heat faster than it can heat up).  It's 60k BTU per hour, that is what, 1 big log? (8 pounds of good wood?) 

I am not sure I have the air:fuel ratio correct either.  Maybe I need to tinker with that.  I could easily change the jet to 90 or 100k BTU but I will probably hold off.  I just need to be patient and fire it up and let it run for 4-5 hours one day and see how it goes.  I guess this is why a lot of guys are running around 475F!!!

Maybe terry can give me some advice about how to get the top:bottom to cook evenly.    I have the slides all the way open.

We tried to move the mixer into the garage, and almost gave myself and my wife a heart attack, so we ended up giving it up to someone who was going to use it right away rather than have it collect dust    Next time I pay someone to move it!!!!!! 1000+ pounds top heavy = very scary!!!

I was surprised, the exhaust heat is only about 200F.  I guess it is keeping it in pretty well.

[pcampbell]

I messed with the air:fuel on the burner, this time in 3 hours, it'll be maxed out @ 700F I think.  Just waiting for it to get there.

[tdeane]

You could try moving the pizza onto a screen mid bake to let the top catch up to the bottom.

[pcampbell]

Is that what you are doing with the screen?

I don't know if I am impatient, not giving it enough time to heat up, or maybe it can't keep up with the temperature.. because the burner seems to never goes off (thermostat is fine, if I turn it down a little it goes into bypass mode or whatever, with the small flame).

I think I gave it 3 hours last time, and had deck temps of just under 700F.  Maybe I just need more time.

I'd actually be curious to see how it bakes at every temperature from 550 up to 700+ .

Dough is pretty "standard". Actually I am using KA Bread flour, 62-63% water.  I'm doing a 20 minute autolyse with 100% water and 60% of the flour.  2.6% salt.   .45% IDY.  10 minutes on KA dough hook.  I'm trying to move up to bigger 16" pizzas. .095 thickness factor. 

[pcampbell]

Got the deck up to 700+F, maybe 710-725 in places.  Bottom charred nicely but the top was not done.  It was not raw but just not done enough. 

It seems like the higher you go the bigger difference (and of course the difference is the wrong way...) in temp between the air or top heat, and the deck.


So how does this (Di Fara) come out of a deck oven? Much longer bake time?  Lower temp?

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/185/483356488_2fe3999601.jpg?v=0

[tdeane]

Got the deck up to 700+F, maybe 710-725 in places.  Bottom charred nicely but the top was not done.  It was not raw but just not done enough. 

It seems like the higher you go the bigger difference (and of course the difference is the wrong way...) in temp between the air or top heat, and the deck.


So how does this (Di Fara) come out of a deck oven? Much longer bake time?  Lower temp?

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/185/483356488_2fe3999601.jpg?v=0

Dom bakes his pies for a long time. I would guess his bake temp is between 600-700. I don't care what anyone says that pizza in the photo is just burned and I would have thrown it straight in the trash.

[pcampbell]

Half of it is definitely burned

[scott r]

terry is right, difara's is not a fast baked pie.   He is mixing in bromated flour and that helps him to achieve a long bake with lots of char, and still have it tender inside.  I think 650 is about right for his style.   

[pcampbell]

Same old thing.  I went down to 600 F on the deck temp, and bottom is done in 4 minutes, top is still very white.  It looks very much this: http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php/topic,5238.0.html

I took the water down to 60% to make stretching easier, left everything the same.  60% flour/100% water - 20 minute autolyse.  Mixed 10 minutes on KA Hook.  Finished dough temp was maybe 75-78F. 

Into the fridge (covered) for 24 hours.  Out on counter (covered) for 1.5-2 hours before baking.

Flour (100%): Water (60%): IDY (.47%): Salt (2.6%): Total (163.07%):

420.28 g  |  14.82 oz | 0.93 lbs 252.17 g  |  8.89 oz | 0.56 lbs 1.98 g | 0.07 oz | 0 lbs | 0.66 tsp | 0.22 tbsp 10.93 g | 0.39 oz | 0.02 lbs | 2.28 tsp | 0.76 tbsp 685.35 g | 24.17 oz | 1.51 lbs | TF = 0.095

Tom Lehmann suggsted it is purely an oven issue, and to try an oven that is brick lined on the ceiling.  Thinking of modifying this one to put brick splits on the top, full bricks on the floor, and change out the burner to 100,000 BTU (or maybe even 2 side-by-side burners for more even baking).  This would bring the deck height down to about 6" also.  For now I'll try throwing it on a screen after a few minutes.

[pcampbell]

I did a little experiment, and lifted half of the deck (1 stone) up 2" higher.  This brought the deck height down to 7" on one side.  I thought that this might work, but actually thought the reason it would work would be because the stone would be further away from the flame, and therefore would be cooler when the probe reached temperature.

It did end up working a LOT better, and had a great pizza with fairly even baking (4 minutes @ 600 F... ), but in the end, I believe the difference is less due to the further distance from the flame, than the decreased deck height.

So next step is to load up fire bricks on the deck (1.125" taller, so 1.125" shorter deck height), and fire brick splits (1.3125") on the ceiling (this part is a little tricky).  This will bring the deck height down to 6.57" with hopefully a lot of radiant heat on the ceiling, and fire it up to and see what happens.