The Oven is ON!

Thursday night Scott placed a one-inch ceramic pad on top of the slab and started placing the firebrick. The firebrick will be the base of the oven - where we cook the pizzas. Once again, we had to do some research about the placement. Nothing is simple with this project. Do we stagger them? Do we set them on their side, or flat? Do we mortar them in place? After reading through my blogs and sending messages to my experts (thanks - again - to all of them), we decided to lay them flat (only 2 1/2" high) and not stagger them. This would minimize the cuts we had to make in the brick.

I forgot to take a picture of the final brick placement.
Here is a view from the oven front.

Scott and I have been talking about moving the 800# oven out of the truck and on to the base. I called my 'friends' at Victoria Repair & Mfg. and asked them if they would drive their forklift over. They said, "Sure!" So today they drove their forklift the 1.7 miles through the big town of Victoria to our house. Within minutes Tim and Chad had that thing off the truck and on the base. Piece of cake! All for $50 .. a steal.

We had to make some adjustments, but it moved easily.

Thanks to my photographer, Ryan Hill.

And there you have it .. the oven is ON!

As I write this, Scott is at Home Depot getting the materials to build the box that will go on top of the oven. We are hoping to fire the thing up July 4th. We'll see ...