Bricks and more bricks...

[scott_vt]

Good Mornin Lloyd,
What a beautiful job, Im with Jinman on the lantern up top, that really makes it JMO !

One question though, what is that support made of over the firebox ? Almost looks like wood, which I guess would only work if the fire is set quite a ways back...

It looks very inviting especially with the proper beverage on a nice evening !

 

[Dutch445]

Very Nice project!
I have a question for you Lloyd, how much foundation is below the fireplace?
I just finished up a large paver patio, ( http://www.tractorbynet.com/forums/projects/281410-backyard-paver-patio.html ) and i have not put a fireplace there and I am
thinking I need one, so I wonder if the existing 12" of base I have under my patio
would be enough to build a fireplace on, but not one as large as this one.

 

[Lloyd_E]

Scott,

The mantle support is wood. With the Rumsford design the idea is to get as much fire against the back wall as possible - so it reflects out. Hard on the brick, that is why they started using cast fire back.

I was going to go with angle iron but I like the look and if I wasn't running out of time I would have put a few axe marks in it to look hand-hewn... which I may do.
I have a hand-hewn one in my 200+ year old house in the fireplace which also has a bake oven. Based on WETT info, in the house, I hung a steel plate down below the beam horizontally with 1.5" of airspace to prevent the wood from catching fire. It has worked great even with our Vermont Casting stove sitting below it. I will do the same with the outdoor fire place.

Dutch, there is about 12" of small field stone plus another 12" of class A gravel plus a 4"+ slab of concrete below the fireplace. Up here are ground rarely freezes anymore - not to say it won't ever. When I built the pizza oven I went down 3 feet and came up towards the lawn surface with progressively smaller rocks before laying gravel and then the 5" slab for the oven. The first layer of field stone below the bake oven were roughly 12"x12" or larger - not sure the weight but some tested my ability to move them in position once dropped in place from the tractor bucket.

Hope this helps.

Lloyd