However some refractory wood fired oven manufacturer’s have stated that using brick as a building building is not recommended in a wood fired oven.  Its interesting that only until recent, brick ovens were the norm and have been used for thousands of years. Many ovens in Europe that are still used today are hundreds of years old and have had no renovation work made on the structure at all. If anything, brick is the prefered building material for a wood fired oven as it allows the heat to soak into the oven’s mass unlike refractory materials. It is the soaked heat within the oven that allows the absorbed heat to “bake” the food without requiring a heat source to be present in the chamber. Refractory materials on the other hand are used mainly for furnaces that require extremely high temperatures and are designed to prevent heat being lost into adjacent material, with refractory material focusing the heat within the chamber. Thus, limited “soaking” has occurred.  A refractory material oven is not as efficient or effective than that of a traditional solid brick oven as its not designed to “soak” heat. It’s the soaked heat that allows and extends the baking process.

The only advantage of refractory material is that they can be cast into large shapes that make cast refractory ovens quick to make, easier to transport and easier and quicker to assemble.

A fire brick, firebrick, or refractory brick is a block of refractory ceramic material used in lining furnaces, kilns, fireboxes, and fireplaces. A refractory brick is built primarily to withstand high heat, but should also usually have a low thermal conductivity…

NOTE: Stardard bricks are generally used in fireplaces and chimneys in any normal situation. Lime mortar (with no cement) should be used in building fireplaces, chimney’s and woodfired ovens at a ratio of 4 sand:1 lime. This is the traditional mortar for areas involving high temperatures. Regular cement mortar is not be to be used in high heat areas.