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Use any bricks in your egg? Need advice

I have some basic acme red bricks in my garage and was curious if they would hold up in my egg for a cheap raised direct setup. Need to get my pizzas higher up in the dome and this seemed like a cheap solution. Do I need a certain type of brick? I'm completely ignorant in this area.
Franklin, Tn
LBGE - Cast Iron Grate - Flameboss 300 - BGEtisserie

Comments

  • Legume
    Legume Posts: 14,602
    Foil wrapped fine for low and slow, but if you're cooking pizza, that's a pretty hot fire, I would stick with firebricks only.  Too dangerous if they shatter/esplode
  • blind99
    blind99 Posts: 4,971
    edited August 2016
    I've been using the same 3 cheapo red bricks for a few years now. So far no issues. 
    Chicago, IL - Large and Small BGE - Weber Gasser and Kettle
  • blind99
    blind99 Posts: 4,971
    Legume said:
    Foil wrapped fine for low and slow, but if you're cooking pizza, that's a pretty hot fire, I would stick with firebricks only.  Too dangerous if they shatter/esplode
    I really hope mine don't explode. That sounds not good. 
    Chicago, IL - Large and Small BGE - Weber Gasser and Kettle
  • Carolina Q
    Carolina Q Posts: 14,831
    Bricks (fire or otherwise) are fired at much higher temps that you will find in your egg. Any will do. However, I've never been a fan of using bricks because of the possibility of  dropping one or knocking it over and cracking your firebox or other ceramic part. 

    I hate it when I go to the kitchen for food and all I find are ingredients!                                                                                                                                                                                                                           

    Michael 
    Central Connecticut 

  • Legume
    Legume Posts: 14,602
    http://www.nakedwhiz.com/firebricks.htm

    This is has more info than my "I've heard"
  • Skiddymarker
    Skiddymarker Posts: 8,522
    Legume said:
    http://www.nakedwhiz.com/firebricks.htm

    This is has more info than my "I've heard"
    Good info. I used fire brick cut offs from lining the wood stove. They are cheap, light and easy to cut with any tile saw/blade. 
    Delta B.C. - Whiskey and steak, because no good story ever started with someone having a salad!
  • lousubcap
    lousubcap Posts: 32,167
    If you have any glassblowing artisan operations in your area, they should have plenty of bricks.  Several years ago when I asked about acquiring them I was gifted a six-pack. You never know.  FWIW-
    Louisville; Rolling smoke in the neighbourhood. # 38 for the win.  Life is too short for light/lite beer!  Seems I'm livin in a transitional period.
  • Thanks everyone, good advice.
    Franklin, Tn
    LBGE - Cast Iron Grate - Flameboss 300 - BGEtisserie

  • Have never heard of any bricks 'exploding', FWIW. 

    you never really hit the temps required for firebricks
    [social media disclaimer: irony and sarcasm may be used in some or all of user's posts; emoticon usage is intended to indicate moderately jocular social interaction; the comments toward users, their usernames, and the real people (living or dead) that they refer to are not intended to be adversarial in nature; those replying to this user are entering into a tacit agreement that they are real-life or social-media acquaintances and/or have agreed to or tacitly agreed to perpetrate occasional good-natured ribbing between and among themselves and others]

  • td66snrf
    td66snrf Posts: 1,821
    I use regular red bricks all the time in my gasser to make it into an oven. Baked lasagna last Sunday. I have fire bricks but I reserve them for when I have the oxy\acetylene fired up which generates Temps in 3500 range. Red bricks will be fine. 
    XLBGE, LBGE, MBGE, SMALL, MINI, 2 Kubs, Fire Magic Gasser
  • JMCXL
    JMCXL Posts: 1,524
    Legume said:
    http://www.nakedwhiz.com/firebricks.htm

    This is has more info than my "I've heard"
    Great link, as always tons of great information here
    Northern New Jersey
     XL - Woo2, AR      L (2) - Woo, PS Woo     MM (2) - Woo       MINI

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  • blasting
    blasting Posts: 6,262

    I use kiln posts for spacers now.  Bought the 1 1/2" size in a few lengths.   Definitely an upgrade from the bricks I'd been using, but still dirt cheap.  That said, red bricks are fine.  I used the same bricks for many years, hundreds of times, with no issue.

    Phoenix 
  • Toxarch
    Toxarch Posts: 1,900
    I'm no engineer but I did stay in a Holiday Inn Express before.

    Normal house bricks are made with some or no sand with clay and then fired to 1800-2000 degrees. Heating it higher will start to turn them to glass.

    There are various levels of fire brick, depending on the application. Fire brick is made from alumina and/or crystallized silica and is fired to a higher temperature than clay bricks.

    All the bricks will expand with heat. The difference in the above types is that the alumina and crystallized silica conduct heat really well to evenly spread the heat throughout the brick. The clay brick does not distribute the heat so you can end up with one side of the brick hotter than the other side. This can lead to thermal fracturing inside the brick. The brick will not explode but the hotter side expanding can break off from the colder side.

    In the egg, it probably won't be an issue since the air circulates around the brick and we also don't get close to 1800 degrees. In something like a wood burning oven or a fire place where the bricks are cemented in and have a definite hot side, it could end up a problem over time. The fractures will likely seem more like the bricks are disintegrating over time.
    Aledo, Texas
    Large BGE
    KJ Jr.

    Exodus 12:9 KJV
    Eat not of it raw, nor sodden at all with water, but roast with fire; his head with his legs, and with the purtenance thereof.

  • DieselkW
    DieselkW Posts: 894
    Speaking of bricks, I have a story to tell:

    Racing fans might know that once upon a time, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway was paved with bricks in 1909, 3.5 million of them. They took them all out and paved with asphalt in stages beginning in 1936. By 1938 the entire 2.5 mile track was asphalt. This house I bought was built in 1941, about 15 miles from the Speedway. There must have been a secondary market for those bricks because a few dozen (probably more) of those 3.5 million bricks, somehow ended up in my back yard about 9" under the surface. Probably an old fire pit - too few and too concentrated in one place for it to be an old patio.

    We found them when I excavated the backyard to install a patio in 2014.


    Anyway, these bricks are longer than standard, stamped by the brick maker "Culver Block" and dated various early 1900's.

    They're being sold on eBay some of them for over $100. Which is pretty cool, but I'm keeping mine.


    Here's the same angle taken earlier this summer, two years later, from about the same spot:


    I won't use them in the egg, there were other bricks excavated that are much more recent that I use - light cream color that I assume are fire bricks and have held up just fine at 700º .

    Exploding bricks, I hope, are a rarity.

    Indianapolis, IN

    BBQ is a celebration of culture in America. It is the closest thing we have to the wines and cheeses of Europe. 

    Drive a few hundred miles in any direction, and the experience changes dramatically.