This project began when my husband Dan and I decided that we want to replace our living room woodstove with a batch box rocket stove. Since we have zero experience with rocket stoves, it seemed wise to approach the learning curve carefully. We decided to start by building a Walker masonry stove for an outdoor kitchen as a learning project.
It was challenging because even though Dan does brickwork around the homestead, we weren't familiar with batch boxes and cores. Even with the plans, the build wasn't intuitive. Modifications were made where things weren't clear, but we figured, heck, it's a learning project. We knew we'd get a lot of use out of the stove for outdoor cooking and canning, even if it didn't turn out perfect. Dan did the building and problem solving. My contribution was researching, documenting, and encouraging.
It's built now and had it's first test fire. I can honestly say, we learned a lot! Here are a few of the dozens and dozens of pictures I took.
We probably could have eliminated the concrete blocks for the base, but they were part of the plan.
Walker riserless core in progress.
Dan's welded stand for the oven rack.
View through the oven door opening.
Oven side finished.
I'm also pleased to mention that the oven and firebox doors were handcrafted by Permies' Thomas Rubino of Dragon Tech! They look really good with this stove.
Finished oven
Stovetop(s)
The plans call for two glass electric stove cooktops. I could only find one on craiglist, but we found a piece of granite for the oven side that works well. Dan cut and welded old bed rails to trim out the top.
Firebox door
Firebox side
Our first fire taught us that we need to perfect our batch box firestarting technique. :)
We don't have a way to measure the internal temp, but I was very curious about the chimney temperature with a fire going.
Magnetic stovetop thermometer to measure chimney temp.
With a pan of water simmering on the stove, the outside of the chimney was less than 100F.
I'm so glad we did this for a number of reasons. Firstly, because I've been wanting an outdoor kitchen for quite some time. Secondly, we now have some experience under our belts and feel more confident to take the next step and build our next one.
Awesome! I'm thinking about doing the same thing with a walker stove for an outdoor kitchen. I think my biggest concern at the moment is that the batch box doors seem to be really expensive to buy. I'm cruising craigslist to look for broken electric stoves with a glass cooktop.
Two things about the stove doors.
First, I think the door from a barrel stove kit might work.
I picked up a rusted out barrel stove with this idea in mind(its still in mind-not in action!).
I don't think they include a glass view port, but is that really necessary?
Maybe it is, or at least hugely desirable.
The second thing is the idea of a Plunge Door.
This is described by Paul as reminiscent of a casserole dish door but less likely to break.
I would describe it as a pizza oven door.
I have tried to cast such a door from refractory, but my process was sloppy.
Yeah that plunge door looks interesting. I need to get myself a little stick welder I think so I can build something.
I agree the glass view port isn't necessary. I'm fine eliminating it. My goals for this are baking bread (450F ish) and canning/simmering fruit. I bake bread weekly but only can in batches when fruit is available. I haven't really figured out how to modify the rocket stove design to handle canning + baking. It seems like the walker style stove is more geared towards that. The walker stove seems pretty inexpensive if I can salvage a door and the cooktops. Roughly in the $600ish range. I think a rocket stove could be cheaper if I could figure out how to change the design to canning + baking
How does your glass cooktop fair? I ask because I have read that if you are canning on a glass cooktop stove, it can create too much weight or heat and crack the cooktop. I assume from the pictures it has direct contact with fire, so that also makes me wonder how they're holding up. It does look like a very nice oven.
I love how you did your rocket stove door. The great thing about this thread is seeing how people are doing things their way. This is a different rocket oven door tutorial i just saw: https://permies.com/s/oven-door
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