Breaking rock in the hot sun......

We have a fire pit on the patio.  It was there when we moved in years ago, and it's been used mightily since then.  As one friend put it.... "The smoking rift into the fires of hell".

Works, it does.  Pretty, it ain't.   'Tis time to repair that situation.

The cinder blocks circling the fire pit have seen the application of a BFH, and now reside out in the woods, where perhaps they will confuse the hell out of an archeologist some millennium.

Surprisingly, I found the pit lined with brick, and there *might* have been a fire clay lining at some point.  Now, there were only slightly stiffer layers to the years worth of ash and debris shoveled from the pit.  Two wheel barrel loads!

 

 

Now about 25% done, we can see the new fire pit forming up. To the right, a heavy 1 3/4" galvanized pipe has been driven into the stone rumble under the patio, and now is set in concrete and rock.  There's a lot more rock to go, at least six more inches concreted over the whole shebang, and another six inches out from the base as well. Rocks are being hit with said BFH, and chunks cemented into the nook and crannies.

The pipe is there as a mounting point for a dohicky I'll be building.  A six foot tall black iron 'T', that slides down into the pipe.   One arm of the 'T' will have several eyelets bolted in, as chain mounts for a hanging grill.  The other arm of the 'T' is the handle by which the grill is rotated over the fire as desired.

Several air holes have been built into the laid rock, allowing for a hotter and less smoky fire.  The fire pit itself, I'm thinking I will line with fire clay if the cost is not prohibitive.

The last time I worked any kind of stone, I was fifteen, and my dad near killed me building a stone loading dock behind the barn.  "Look boy, every rock has to touch as many other rocks as possible.  Mortar is GLUE, not a structural element!"

Hopefully, when this is done, it'll be something that would have made him smile.