Lincoln Impinger finger placement

One last question for the day. We have issues with soft crusts. Our finger placement is as follows:

Top: 4 hole, 4 hole, 4 hole, 4 hole
Bottom: blocked, 4 hole, 4 hole, blocked

I just started reading about finger placement today, so excuse the ignorance. But this doesnt make sense to me. Shouldn’t the bottoms be getting more airflow? Would swapping the 1st finger from the top to the bottom be beneficial? And adjusting temps and times from there?

Thanks again comrades!
Jason

Which model oven are you running? What are cook times and temp? I am no expert, but I believe our configuration is pretty standard for pizza. All four bottom fingers are full flow, top we have first and last open, middle two closed off.

Would swapping the 1st finger from the top to the bottom be beneficial? And adjusting temps and times from there?

Yes you are not getting enough bottom heat.

George Mills

Lincoln Impinger 1600. Gas. Cook times are 7:15, and temps are 445 and 435. I will try the setup like Rick G’s and see what happens. I knew this setup was not right. Rick G, what oven do you use, and what are your cook times and temps?

My oven is an Edge60 top is open,closed,closed,open and bottom is open all four.

All I can say is WOW! Thanks for all the input guys! Why I didn’t catch this earlier, I don’t know. Pizzas are coming out with much higher quality crusts. Temps and times are 7:00, 465 Left and 440 Right.

We have Lincoln 1450’s. I am glad you got it worked out, the crust takes a bit more energy to cook through than the top of pizza needs so the center two on top are blanked off.

We have Lincoln 1450’s. I am glad you got it worked out, the crust takes a bit more energy to cook through than the top of pizza needs so the center two on top are blanked off.

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Yeah I figured it was something like that. Our other oven is an old dual belt vulcan. It needs a new speed control board, but they dont make them anymore. To get that one belt operational, our local shop quoted us $2500 for an adapter and new board, and then labor on top of that. So I need to get that one sorted out next.

Anyways, thanks again for the help!

Jason;
When you say “4-hole” are you looking at the outer cover, or are you pulling the outer cover out and removing the inner sleeve which is actually the “finger” that controls the airflow.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

Oh I must just be referring to the outer cover. Like I said, I’m still learning a lot about how these ovens operate. But no, i was just referring to the outer cover, and to correct an earlier mistake, they are not “4 holes” across. It is more like sets of 6 holes at a diagonal angle. I do know what you are referring to though. Is there something I should look into tomorrow morning before I fire the oven?

Jason

Jason;
You will need to open each finger position to find out what you actually have. Be sure to keep track of what position each finger was in so you can put it back together again as it was. A typical finger pattern might look like this: Top open, partial, partial, radiant panel. Bottom full open across all fingers. The top finger configuration is typically modified depending upon the pizza being baked. For example, if all of your pizzas are heavily topped with vegetables you might want a top profile with more airflow to the top to give you a drier pizza. If your pizzas more like a New York presentation you will need to restrict a lot of the airflow to the top of the pizza and use more radiant panels with the last top finger adjusted just to give you the finished color you are looking for.
With most of the oven manufacturers those inner panels or baffles as they are some times called, will have a number stamped on the end for identification purposes. Since finger configuration is typically specific to the oven model, it is difficult to say exactly what the profile should be, but armed with your oven model number, serial number and finger panel numbers a call to the oven manufacturer should get you their standard finger set up profile for baking pizzas, if it is the best profile for your specific pizza is another question.
One other thing, remember, to pull the bottom fingers you will need to remove the conveyor assembly, a good thing to get used to doing because the number one problem that I encounter with air impingement ovens is that they are never cleaned which dramatically alters the airflow to the bottom of the pizza. One more thing, top and bottom fingers may not be interchangeable between top and bottom positions but they can be changed laterally.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

I will have to pull it apart to see what I have. With this particular oven, I don’t have to remove the belt assembly to remove the bottom finger assembly. I just need to it up a few inches, and they slide out. And in the oven, the top and bottom fingers can be interchanged. I think that was my initial problem, the old managers reassembled the oven incorrectly. But anyways, thanks for the info! I reeally do appreciate it, and ill post back up here when I get more info on the fingers themselves.

Jason;
One of the things that I see done in a lot of pizzerias using air impingement ovens is to place a “finger map” showing the correct placement of top and bottom fingers on the side of the oven to prevent that very thing from happening.
Keep us posted.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

Hi everyone, I have a Lincoln impinger model 1040 and have the following 8 fingers. I have 1 1501, 4 1508’s, 1 1511’s, 1 1530 and 1 1531. Help please. Thank you in advance. 4 for the top and 4 from the bottom.

Chris Pro;
I don’t have my Lincoln finger chart right now which identifies their fingers by the reference numbers, but if you contact Lincoln Food Service Company at 800-374-3004 they should be able to tell you which fingers go in what position for baking pizza in your specific oven. Be sure to have your oven information at hand when you contact them.
including serial number and date of manufacture as it might have an influence on the finger positions for your particular oven. Not knowing anything about your oven, if you don’t buy an air impingement oven “new” but instead as a “used” oven you can’t be sure that it is even profiled for baking pizzas so if you find that to be the case that is the time to discuss which fingers you will need to purchase and what positions they will need to be placed in. Typically, the bottom profile will be full open so all the fingers across the bottom should have the same reference number.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

We have our impinger oven at the following:
Top: Blocked, Finish, Blocked, 1/2
Bottom: all open.

470 degrees for 5:30.

If you have those fingers, give it a shot

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Steve;
What is a “finish” finger? I’ve not heard of it before.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

Steve;
What is a “finish” finger? I’ve not heard of it before.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

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This is what Mike French referred to it as from MF&B. I call it a partial because it’s more of a sporadic finger with the openings. No rhyme or reason to which parts of the mesh are open.

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I can see where it is a partial finger sleeve but “sporadic” has me confused as the holes need to be of a uniform pattern across the entire width of the insert/finger. The only exception to this is where we have special fingers to provide a different airflow the each side of the oven, this is usually used only in a dedicated oven with a split conveyor where we want each conveyor to provide a different bake. The other exception is a fairly new one where we have panels designed to address lateral heat problems across the width of the conveyor. This did not seem to be a problem with earlier ovens but with the new ovens with higher airflow velocity it is sometimes an issue which must be addressed. There is a standard panel with staggered holes across the length of the panel, possibly this is what you have?
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor

Steve;
If you Google (what do the fingers in a Lincoln air impingement oven look like?) there will be a page showing a number of the finger inserts (but they literally have enough different configurations to fill a pick up bed…I know this for a fact as we had them all for our research at AIB, and you can probably make a safe bet on the fact that they’ve added a few more since my retirement.
Tom Lehmann/The Dough Doctor