Pics of my budget oven build.

[BottleFed70]

Here's some pics of my progress so far.

Originally I wanted to build a 2x3x5 oven, but the cost of sheetmetal was too high.

What I ended up doing was buying an old metal filing cabinet from a recycler. It wasn't as large as I wanted, but with an internal size of 18" x 36" x 40" it should do most any parts I need.

$40 got me the cabinet from the recycler.

Here's a pic of the cabinet after I stripped everything out of it. 1 nice thing about using a filing cabinet is that it already has rails you can use for shelving and hanging parts:

[BottleFed70]

I used tin snips to cut the studs, and sheet metal screws to hold everythign together. I was suprised at how quickly the framing went, and how sturdy everything is.

I had an old oven in my garage, so I took the elements and window out of it to build my oven.

Here's a pic of the cabinet after being framed with steel studs, you can also see how the elements are mounted:

[BottleFed70]

The filing cabinet didn't have a 1 piece door, so I made my own using a piece of 18ga sheetmetal and more steel studs.

Here's a pic of the door:

[BottleFed70]

At that's as far as I have gotten so far. Right now I'm waiting for my high temp wire, temp controller, and SSR to come in before I can go any further.

The oven will be insulated with 4" of Rock wool insulation (Accoustical Fire Batt). The outer skin will be made of hardy backer (concrete) board. I would prefer to use sheetmetal for the outside for less weight, but the concrete board is much cheaper.

So far I'm into this oven for about $140

- Old filing cabinet $40
- Steel studs $50
- Cut to size Sheet metal for door $45
- sheet metal screws $5
- Elements and window from old oven $Free

[JTW37]

Nice job on restructuring the file cabinet. Who would ever have figured what we guys will come up with to do powder?

[fl70]

Nice work!
What size elements did you use?

[BottleFed70]

Originally Posted by fl70

Nice work!
What size elements did you use?

Thanks.
Do you mean wattage or physical size?

They were the elements from my old oven, I believe the bake element is 2500W and the Broil is 3000W. They are different sizes, the bake element is larger and around 18"x16" while the broil element is closer to 16"x16". These measurements count only the size of the element inside of the oven, part of each element goes through the oven inner wall to connect to the wiring.

[fl70]

Wattage.
What SSR did you order the 25 or the 40?
If you find the cost of the 4" rock wool prohibitive you could always use R13 (3-1/2") unfaced fiberglass insulation.

[BottleFed70]

Originally Posted by fl70

Wattage.
What SSR did you order the 25 or the 40?
If you find the cost of the 4" rock wool prohibitive you could always use R13 (3-1/2") unfaced fiberglass insulation.

I bought a 40A SSR just to be safe, was only an extra $3.

Actually, I found the rock wool to be not much more than the regular fiberglass insulation.

[chromo]

For cheap sheet metal look for junk washers and dryers, heck half the time they are tossed out while still working and looking like new also!

I bought a really nice looking and working gas dryer for $10 at a yard sale, like new, they moved here from a big city with a natural gas dryer then couldn't use it so bought a new propane dryer LOL

Anyway I haul them home from scrapyards and elsewhere for about $3 as scrap, then strip them for the motors and other parts, that sheet metal is great for many things! You might want to sand blast the paint off it though for an oven if on the hot side. If your looking at really old ones they may be rusty around the bottoms but I pick out the good ones that have no rust. I buy allot of junk from scrapyards, you haul it in and I haul it home