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cob ovens on trailers

May 6, 2008

“I was wondering if you might have any info or resources for cob oven on trailers?”

Here’s my thoughts and experience, over and above what’s already in Build Your Own Earth Oven:

I wouldn’t try to put a cob or earthen oven on a trailer myself. I do know of one guy who did but he had to do repairs on the oven before the year was out but I haven’t heard from him since, so don’t know the whole story of his oven. Maybe it’s doing just fine. It’s hard to imagine that unfired earth would be able to withstand prolonged exposure to road vibration without serious cracking and ultimate failures.

The only trailer oven I’ve made was lightweight, hi-temp cement, as described in the book. I’ll refer you to that and Dan Wing’s article about trailers for ovens, which is here.

I haven’t yet heard from anyone who has successfully done what I’ve only seen in Mexico, a site-built temporary, wood-fired, masonry oven mortared with mud so that it could be quickly and easily disassembled and moved to another town for another festival.

There are myriad other ways a person might build a quick oven, including pre-cast, fitted pieces of fired clay (or hi-temp refractory cement) that could be constructed into a shell over a brick hearth — or even a metal dome over a fire-brick floor, which I suspect would work fine for pizza. I would think that just about any one of these options would be much cheaper than building a road-worthy (and safe) trailer.

I’d love to hear from folks who’ve got experience they’d like to share on this one, especially anyone with photos of Mexican festival ovens.

2 Comments · oventek

Comments

  1. Joshua says

    November 13, 2013 at 10:37 am

    I have a commercial wfo on a trailer.

    The first thing people need to know is that the local Health Department division of Food Safety will generally dictate what type of oven to begin with.
    Meaning for example that, in my part of the world, each county has it’s own rules and licensing – and pretty much all of them require all food equipment to be NSF certified. So a cobb oven won’t fly. Regardless of the technical issues.

    But assuming the HD allows it, I would say a brick oven or a cob oven is probably less road-worthy than a modular cast masonry oven. Why? Because there are fewer pieces to vibrate apart, and once in place, are self-supporting. Even the floors are just a few large firebrick pieces.

    That being said, I believe just about any oven on a trailer is going to need more maint and repair than a fixed-in-place.

    Reply
  2. Jim Alber says

    February 27, 2012 at 9:05 pm

    Hello, I am planning to build a portable brick oven. I was hoping to find some clear answers on how to build a portable brick oven. My plan is to build a brick structure with a channel iron frame surrounding the oven structure. Unless I discover a reason to do otherwise, I will build buck stays with short independent frame segments to handle the issue of expansion of the steel frame. Overlaying the mass, I plan to use commercial ceramic wool insulation and then clad the oven as is done on any large industrial boiler. Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated. Best regards, Jim

    Reply

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Hand Print Press began in the early 90s, when I self-published Build Your Own Earth Oven. I was thinking of myself as a capital A  Artist. However, as I learned from the garden and other teachers, art just means “to fit together” — it’s how the world works — flora, fauna, humans — all must fit themselves together, with each other, with the landscape, with wind and weather. In addition to the bookstore (which now includes a few other authors), the site contains stories and updates on ovens, heat, baking, beauty, agriculture, fire, community, culture, (spoon) carving, etc. It’s all art! Thanks for visiting. You can contact me at handprint at cmug dot com, or thru instagram.
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