Seeking Shelter From the Storm

As normal for late fall in southern Oregon, the serious rain was literally on the horizon. I figured I’d better get started on building some sort of sturdier, short term shelter for the oven as soon as possible. It was fairly obvious that the blue tarp, rope, bucket, and bags were really not the ticket for long term protection from the weather. Once again, my inexperience and lack of spatial concepts made for an interesting construction process of the temporary cover.

During the next break in the weather, I took the tarp off and started to build a frame for my temporary enclosure. Looking back on it now, I probably should have had a plan or at least asked somebody with some building experience for help...

I figured if I just put up four corner 2x4's and tied them together with sheet metal roofing on a top frame, and threw on some fiberglass insulation I had laying around, it would be “good enough”...apparently not...

After adding more side supports braced with angle brackets tacked into the hearth and plywood siding to stop the sway, it looked like my oven would be dry for the winter...again...apparently not...even half sheet trays diverting rain away from the gaps around the chimney brick and roofing.

It turned out that water would condense on the underside of the metal roofing at night and early morning. In fact it wasn't “just a few drops” it was almost like it rained underneath the roof onto the fiberglass insulation which just greedily soaked up the water. In less than a week, the fiberglass was literally dripping wet when I removed it to create temporary roof structure 2.0

Off came the roofing sheets and down went some plywood as a roof base. I covered the plywood top with Tyvek, and added flashing around the edges. I realized that I’d want something to keep water from dripping down the side of the chimney, so I incorporated flashing into the chimney as I built it up further. I also stepped the chimney bricks in to allow me to firmly set my chimney cap in place (instead of keeping it in place with the BBQ grill and nylon line...ouch!).

Next, I reattached the metal sheets and set them so the flashing embedded in the chimney would drip out onto the sheets and not down into the landing area. That system stopped the very successful internal drip system I had unintentionally created with version 1.0 and made for a reasonable oven shelter that lasted through the wet winter months.






So, here's my Hillbilly shelter for the oven going into the winter of 2009-2010. The empty cart bays in the oven's support base turned out to be a pretty good place to keep some of my stuff dry through the winter as well.