Installation Available in All 50 States

Installation Available in All 50 States

DIY Wood Fired Pizza Oven: The Step-By-Step Guide

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If you really like food, a wood-fired pizza oven should be a must in your home’s garden.

Building one is not a hard task, but it does require some patience, specific materials, hard work and a custom-designed pizza oven door.

At The Fireplace Door Guy, we want to help you fulfill your foodie wishes. Check out our step-by-step guide and start building yours:

1.Decide location: This is the first and most important part of the process as you have to keep in mind that once the oven is built you won’t be able to move it around. Make sure the area is well ventilated and with enough space around it.

2.Get the materials: These materials and quantities are an approximation as it will depend on how big you want your oven to be, but supposing you want to build a 1.5 x 1.5 m pizza oven you should buy these materials in these quantities:

  • 30 bricks
  • 20 brick blocks
  • An electric drill with wood screws.
  • Big stones
  • 14 bags of builder’s sand
  • 180 kg of clay
  • 1 plant pot
  • Assorted glass bottles
  • 1 large bag of wood shaving
  • Wheelbarrow
  • Water
  • Old kitchen knife
  • Tarpaulin sheet
  • Plastic bucket
  • Newspaper

3.Mix the clay and sand in batches when you need it

4.Break the clay inside the plastic tarpaulin sheet in small pieces (no larger than a thumb) and wearing wellies with some water. Test the mix by throwing a small amount of the mix from shoulder height, if it holds together it’s ready, if it splats it has too much water, if it cracks, it needs more water.

5.Build the foundation of your oven: To build it use bricks and cement to keep them together. The box should be approximately 1m high x 1.20 m long on all sides.

6.Build the dome: Use 120 kg of damp sand and make a mound in the center of the plinth. The size depends on how big you want it to be, but usually it will work fine if it’s 50 cm high approximately. cover it with wet newspaper.

7.Build 10 cm thick rolls of puddled clay mix around the sand dome, starting from the base and continue until it’s completely covered and smooth the outside with a spatula or with your hands. Leave the structure to dry for 4 to 5 hours.

8.Use the kitchen knife to cut out the entrance to the oven. Make it big enough to fit a tray.

9.Scoop out the sand and let the dome dry until next morning.

10.Light up a small fire inside to help dry out the pizza oven.

11.Build the opening with the rest of the bricks, and cut a circular opening in the roof, near to the brick entrance arch and build clay rings around it to make the chimney.

12.Make a clay and water mix and stir in 6 kg of wood shavings. Stir and add water until the mix has the consistency of cream, repeat step 6 to build the final shell. Let dry and clean remaining debris.

13.Install a pizza oven door to keep the heat in and ensure the proper functionality of your new oven.
At The Fireplace Door Guy, we custom fabricate the most beautiful pizza oven doors in the United States. Give us a call to learn more about our oven and fireplace doors.

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