Everyone should move to Tennessee. It’s almost, always perfect here.
carson
Just from here in South Africa, we have been experiencing the hottest spring in our recorded history on the farm 32 years, we have got to 47 C 116 F and it’s not even summer yet, we have had several hail storms.
Now try operate a gasifier in a shed when the corrugated iron roof is the same temp as the head exchanger.
By the end of the day I feel like a piece of biltong ( jerky ).
Enjoy the bad weather, it makes one appreciate the good weather even more!
Patrick
Well sure glad I’m neither especially cold or hot n’ dry like many of you folk. Once our always too short of “dry” summer broke on Aug 27 we’ve only had 10 day it has not rained in the last 81 days. Only had 5 actual glorious sunny days one by one skitter, scattered in there ( when I take the show off mountains and canoeing pictures). By end of a 150 year historic wet Sept after the 4th longest no rain period of 62 days my outside wood is now again 60% sinker wet saoked through and through. Be able to really dry out again maybe beginning mid next July and be dry by mid August to begin it all over again.
Ha! But my Doug FIr trees love this and do grow some year around! More tonnage per acre growing than in the Brazil rain forest.
Nice stove ArvidO. Be real easy to glass front that door. Tell me how big or small and I could see about shipping you up piece.
S.U.
Here’s 200.000 BTU worth of fast heat. This is a double inner barrel damper setup for door loading without much smoke puffing. One inch rebar protects the bottom barrel for at least a decade.
http://jamclasses.drbanjo.com/static/dimages/Barrels.JPG
HA! That’s what Im building Doug! Except out of old LP tanks… and I spent an excessive amount of time making my own door and hinges…
Whats the inside look like?
Doug, Do you actually feed secondary air into the upper barrel and from which end. A lot of folks don’t know that the gasses from the lower barrel are supposed to be burned in the upper one … This requires a small secondary air inlet and it is also fun to put a site glass in the middle of the upper barrel so you can watch that blue flame in it … Most folks just think of that upper barrel as a heat exchanger and miss the whole idea. Mike L
Torch cut and bent one inch rebar with four inch high legs for the middle section. The right hand and left hand grates rest on each side of the middle grate on their legs. They got four inch high legs on one side with two inch high on the side going up the barrel side. Each section width is 10 inch wide. I had one work like a charm on my last Vogelzang stove. This one is better yet as $110 gives you an ash door. Don’t buy the cheaper Vogelzang door as the extra $40 means that I never have to remove the grate to clean the ashes.
http://jamclasses.drbanjo.com/static/dimages/Grate_0.JPG
Hey Mike, fellow frost dweller, my last double barrel had two pipes welded long wise for forced air blowing in the upper, but with no internal interaction. But I didn’t need it as I can effortlessly get 90 degrees with my uninsulated two stall garage. I often get advice of proper insulating and draft control, but I’ve never paid for the heat and don’t want spontaneous combustion of my wooden cupboards!
Thanks Steve, primary air will come in under the grate, secondary air will come in through the side at the bottom. I have ceramic blanket insulation that I will wrap the insides with and then have a piece of thin stainless to keep it in place… we’ll see how it works. I’ll post some pics as it comes together… I may use a round Pyrex pie plate as a door… thanks for the offer for glass though… it’s more than a little appreciated.
Hello guys; I find myself in need of a wood stove for my shop. Kind of thinking of a two 55gal barrel set-up. I had one before but it burned out so I will take the cast iron hardware off from that. Mike LaRossa, you said that we should get secondary burn in the top drum. First off, don’t we have to pull the gases/smoke down through the flame/char to get burnable gases?? If they just go up to the second barrel, it is just smoke and tar. If I put a false floor in the first drum with about a 6 inch hole in the floor so the gases are pulled down through the char and directed by the 6 inch tube up to the second barrel, with secondary air in the tube just before the second barrel- what is going to ignite the secondary air? I’m thinking of putting a smaller barrel in the bottom barrel with the top side up against the larger barrel which will leave a space between the two barrels at the bottom. Put a 6" hole in the bottom side of the small barrel. Then like I said put secondary air coming in where the top and bottom big barrels come together. When it comes to wood burning stoves I know nothing. Can’t ever understand how a “rocket” stove works, but I do have an understanding of wood gasification. Please help me out on this one.
I HAVE DONE MY FIRST SMITHING TODAY! \o/ it isn’t true “blacksmithing” because I’m just using a propane hand torch but still. The hammer handle I made today out of a plum branch.
The 20 lb I-beam has a nice ring to it. I still need to “gusset” it (weld in braces) and get access to an oxy-acetylene torch to bend the nose into a rounded horn before I can use it for serious work.
I just made “splines” (small wedges of steel) to wedge into the hammer handle to stabilize it. I used a 3/4" wide strip of 1/8" plate steel that I’d cut off of something.
Yes, I used a tomato sauce can full of cold water to “quench” the metal.
You don’t necessarily have to pull the gasses back through char. Tar and smoke are very combustible, just not clean enough to combust in an internal combustion engine (for very long). Remember tar is essentially a hydrocarbon, and smoke is just visable carbon particles. Both of which will burn just fine outright. What causes the secondary burn is the sheer heat of the product gas. The product gas(smoke/ tar) is very very very hot. Hot enough to combust if you just combine it with the right amount of oxygen. That’s why we get the cutting torch effect with air leaks in the gasifier system where HOT product gas and fresh (oxygen containing) air mix.
That’s an interesting Idea you’ve got though. Basically that should work. I think the hotter you can get the secondary air the more likely it will allow this secondary burn to take place. Still toying with where I will put my secondary air inlet on my 2 drum style wood stove.
I have a perforated grate under which primary combustion air is introduced. After the burn is going good and hot (lots of wood off gassing) Then open the secondary air located farther up (exactly where to be determined) and get the secondary burn going.
Wayne Keith has talked somewhere about how on a badly designed (or improperly dampened) wood stove you can almost light off the flue gases.
Here’s what’s kept me busy for a week or so… Oil pump repair on 1998 Honda Odyssey. The gaskets were leaking, so I did a full teardown, replaced timing belts, gaskets, cleaned everything etc.
I know you like videos, but it was a long project (not done yet either). So I did a time lapse yesterday.
3 minute video, covers about 4 hours of work.
Eric;
Thank you for the reply. I wish you had your stove up and running to prove the concept. Where did you get the design? My thought is, the chimney “draw” is going to pull air straight across the top of your combustion chamber and into the secondary chamber, not even feeding the fire. Some will come in the combustion opening and swirl down into the fire to feed it. You would get much more air feeding your fire if you used the pyrolysis intake only. If you give it enough air through the pyrolysis opening all of the burnable pyrolysis gases will burn. Then the air from the combustion opening will just be diluting the vacuum created by the chimney. I have been guilty of what Mr. Wayne is talking about. I built an outside boiler for my house. The opening for the air was too small and the chimney would pull as much are through it as it could. But, that was not enough to burn all of the pyrolysis gases. When I would open the door to load it, the air coming in would feed those gases and they would instantly burn, giving me a kind of “back fire”. I believe that I could have ignited those gases at the top of the chimney while the door was closed.
I just did some reading and thinking and figured I would try it. worst comes to worst I would do what your suggesting and just get rid of the combustion air inlet.
This morning on my way back from town in my WOOD POWED TRUCK I stop on the road side to chat with a friend hoping to sale some wood. He cuts, splits, stacks to dry it in the summer months and in winter on cold days hauls it into town and hope to sale. He sits for hours or all day and most of the time has to haul it back home unload and wait for another cold day, load it back on and repeat. When he gets a customer he follows them home unloads and stacks the wood . With the money earned he drives into town and spends it to fill his truck with gasoline so he can repeat the process.
IF ONLY THERE WAS A BETTER WAY!!
SWEM
Wise words Sir Wayne, for those with ears to hear.
Woodgas is the fastest payback in alt energy, makes use of “stranded energy”, local energy.
The sure and quick cure for rural poverty with an opportunity for many to make an honest living which is all they seek.
Certainly appreciate your efforts toward enlightenment.
On a day to be thankful, I thank you and the many Drive on Wood contributors.
We will make it happen.
Yes Doug,
If one has equipment so equipped he can put his wood directly into powering his truck without having to go through all the middle men , extra time and effort to convert the wood into money and then to gasoline for power…
Happy Thanksgiving to all.
Wayne and family