LEG IX HSPA newer CLIBANUS photos

[Hibernicus]

For some years now we've been building bread ovens at events. At Ft Mac we've built a number of small ovens on the ground. At SCA events and more recently at The Muzeo in Anaheim we've built ovens of stacked brick.

This year we built a barrel vault oven.. a CLIBANUS... and it has proven to be superior to all the prior ovens.

Since the elements of the oven have to be transported there and back we built a metal tray slightly larger than the diameter of the oven in order to create a lip for the mudding to rest upon. This year we stood it on cinderblock but have since acquired a stack of light weight concrete stone blocks to replace the cinder blocks

The bricks are standard pavers. The door is arched with half bricks

We built a wood form for the body of the oven, and used a metal frame for the door. A wood form for the door has since been built to replace the metal frame. We laid up one arch at a time, slid the form back and built the next arch.... Note that the form has a handhole!

Each arch received just enough mudding, a mix of clay rich soil and straw, to keep it up until all arches were up. We then added additional bricking to close up the back.

Once the bricks were in place a skim coat of mudding was applied. A small smokey fire was built and kept hot with additional charcoal and an ocasional handful of leaves until all mudding was complete and no more smoke escaped through minor cracks.

A finish coat was applied with a handmade replica Roman trowel.

Here are a few photos



http://rlqm.com/ftmac2008/ftmac2008.oven.02.jpg
http://rlqm.com/ftmac2008/ftmac2008.oven.03.jpg
http://rlqm.com/ftmac2008/ftmac2008.oven.04.jpg
http://rlqm.com/ftmac2008/ftmac2008.oven.05.jpg