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Outdoor Wood Oven

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MarkSteven
  2/4/2016 08:07 EST

I am planning on building an outdoor wood oven for cooking bread and pizza and I was wondering if you could purchase fire bricks anywhere in Managua.

Salsera
  2/4/2016 11:56 EST

Contact Finca Aleman or Volker Engmann on FACEBOOK, he built one.

iguanalover
  2/5/2016 09:13 EST

Nicaragua's forests are being destroyed for firewood and parts of the country are becoming covered with smoke. The government is encouraging the use of gas stoves. We greatly appreciate people who cook with gas.

atz111
  2/5/2016 09:24 EST

Not true at all. Just more nonsense. The forests have/are being destroyed mainly by illegal logging. The vast majority of the firewood is collected from down wood...not cutting big trees. Destroying a single tree in the forest in the RAAN (where there are virtually no people to use the wood as firewood) uses more wood than 1,000 families us in two months....but that wood is shipped to mills to use in your house. More made up stuff from the great unknowns who need to talk.

KeyWestPirate
  2/5/2016 12:11 EST

Makes sense in the cities, for sure.

In the campo there is plenty of wood, trimmings, more than be used generally. It's not necessary to cut trees for leña.

Generally, a fire is maintained all day in the stove. The stove is fed from one end, the long sticks are simply pushed in more or less,, depending on the heat needed.

Chimbos are not available generally in the campo,, would have to be brought in on the bus.

Gas would be healthier, no question, than the wood smoke, but houses are spread far enough apart that it's not an outside problem.

Wood stove provides some welcome heat in the chilly mornings, I see people gather around drinking their over-sweetened coffee, warming up a bit before heading out.

My farm is at 3800 ft, so it does get cold at night.

atz111
  2/5/2016 12:13 EST

What is the low temp range at 3,800 feet..must be close to 60F?

novato1953
  2/5/2016 12:40 EST

Interesting topic as it develops, but even from a pizza oven there's no free lunch. Gas has to be imported and paid for with USD, which reduces the foreign reserves available to sustain the controlled Cordoba exchange rate. Firewood demand nationally surely outstrips forest windfall on any sustainable basis, and consequently forest loss is inescapable, at least short-term. Since LPG sells in Nicaragua for nearly triple what it costs in the US, whoever collects the price difference will strongly resist change. But how about those Gigantes?

dturoff
  2/5/2016 13:06 EST

This is a less simple issue than it might appear. Gas is surely healthier, if for no other reason, than that the output of a gas stove has no particulates.

It is expensive though, for all aspects of it: the stove, the fuel itself, the storage and transport of the fuel, etc.

Also, from the "carbon footprint" perspective, the carbon in wood is going into the atmosphere pretty quickly no matter what, even if it rots and gets eaten by termites on the ground. The fossil fuel could potentially remain sequestered for millennia.

Salsera
  2/5/2016 13:36 EST

Another alternative solution are solar cookers. We have been cooking with solar cookers (parabolic SK14 and box cooker) and selling them for more than 10 years. Me and my 3 employees had a solar lunch every day.

http://www.elnuevodiario.com.ni/nacionales/359279-mujeres-nicaraguenses-cocinan-energia-solar-cuidar/

atz111
  2/5/2016 19:38 EST

Dollar....Very limited use...not practical at all...seems like an NGO dreamup Have to also have wood or gas. Morning or breakfast is no sun, evening for supper is no sun, clouds anytime is no sun. Many people who work in the campo have such away from home, so that is a cold one. So 90 percent of the time needed is useless.

letitsoak
  2/6/2016 12:51 EST

I would also like to know where to buy fire bricks but all you get from this group is BS opinions.

atz111
  2/6/2016 12:53 EST

It's mostly a group of philosophers. I know a guy who has a pizza oven (built here I think)....I will ask in the next few days and post where he got his.

elduendegrande
  2/9/2016 15:02 EST

PSIM, probably somewhere in Managua, Try the yellow pages.

Barbaro
  2/12/2016 11:20 EST

I think one of your first responders Salsera on
2/4/2016 11:56 EST had a solution. Best of luck

Contact Finca Aleman or Volker Engmann on FACEBOOK, he built one.

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