Black Oven

[DevilsBrew]

Ages ago, a poster on a metal stove youtube video brought up the idea of a valve. The creator of the video was attempting to build a stovetop. Would it be possible to use a valve to at least divert some of the heat directly into a chamber? Let me clarify by saying, not a valve at the top of the riser but after that point.

[mannytheseacow]

Funny you bring this up because I"ve been thinking about how to utilize my RMH for cooking. At least with my 6" system, I don't think there is enough heat in the horizontals for cooking. But I've been thinking of taking the barrel off and replacing it with a rectangular box, using the top as a cooktop. I think what will seal the deal is if I can find a used commercial flattop griddle. If I had one of these I could just use that for the top and then just weld up some sides to the cook top.

[pa_friendly_guy]

I wonder why you can't just use the top of the Barrel as a cook top? It has always seemed to me that it would work idealy for cooking. Maybe the only problem would be the smoke and grease laden vapors in your living room. I think what he is talking about though is more of a Black oven with the smoke into the oven for flavor. Matts design has done that. He has a vent right were it hits the top of the barrel. He uses it for smoking as well as regulating the amount of heat for cooking or BBQing. From what he said he Loves how it is working. He also made a cobb oven on the top of the barrel on an out side Rocket Stove. I don't recall if he had a vent value in the oven to let in the heat and smoke or not. With a Rocket Stove you will find that there is very little smoke anyway.

[mannytheseacow]

Oh, right, I get it! Yes, I think Matt's outdoor cook system is a perfect example. I was thinking "cooktop" as opposed to "oven".

I got a great book as a gift years ago:

I've always wanted to make one of these but never convinced myself yet that I'm going to stay in one place long enough to expend the effort. I learned a lot about baking bread and masonry just from reading it. I literally scoured the pages for couple of years!

As far as cooking on top of the barrel, yes I think it works. I was thinking like a stainless steel cafe flat-top where I could fry some eggs and hashbrowns or grill some fish. With the stainless I think it could be cleaned easily after use and keep the smoking to a minimum. As for smells.... that could be good or bad!

[matt walker]

To answer 'Brew's question directly, yes. Simple and can be done easily. I installed a stove yesterday in a home and we made a mass bypass using two Ts and a chimney damper. That is a simple valve and routing system that anyone can put together from the hardware store. My outdoor systems also do exactly that. The adjustable opening on top of the barrel is in practice a valve that adjusts how much heat is allowed up into the oven or cooker, and how much goes to the mass.

[DevilsBrew]

I was up at 4 am, couldn't think, and started drifting. It is so difficult to write down what is in my head. I've seen Matt's lever and it is a good idea. My experience has been with masonry so my thought process turns to rocket stoves that aren't exposed. Therefore, there would need to be some sort of value included to control the amount or direction of the heat. The European masonry stoves are self-contained. The cooktop and oven are in one build. A valve would allow control over which apparatus gets the heat or all could be heated at once. Another concept I have along these lines is using a value as a train switch. You can choose which bench to heat in a house, room to room, upstairs or downstairs, or in a greenhouse.

As far as smoking food, I'm wondering if you could backpedal and slow down the rocket to allow for some smoke.

[matt walker]

Sure, your first paragraph there, all that's possible. Just need to build it! Actually, none of that would be too difficult, and you are right, it's pretty much all been done before in various masonry, and even steel box, heaters.

As for the slower fire for a smoker, well, you are pretty much describing a modern offset smoker. At this point they have well insulated fireboxes and basically work like a less clean burning rocket stove. A small fire down low burning pretty hot and fairly cleanly, then the exhaust gasses routed up through the cooking chamber.

[DevilsBrew]

As far as floor to floor, with the vertical flues now being used is seems as though it would be easy to manage the heat to another floor.