My Heater

[ekips]

I have just found this site, and I'm pleased to find that I'm not on my own wanting to burn waste oil.

I built a heater five years ago just to prove a point after a discussion with some friends on the viability of just such a project. I might add that I was howled down when I suggested that it should be possible, so, being a "pig headed" old coot proceeded to prove my point.

My heater works on the dripper principle with a two stage burn, to evaporate the oil at a low temperature, the idea being to trap as many of the volatile heavy metals as possible in the ash, then burn the resulting rich gas mix in a secondary airflow.

To cut a lomg story short, it worked pretty well right from the first burn but required a little fine tuning to adjust the secondary airflow.

There is a photo of the prototype on my web pages at: http://members.ozemail.com.au/~ekips/

Yeah,... I know, Why haven't I got a recent photo? The truth is that I've been too lazy to update my web pages for some time, but if enough interest is shown I will post a more recent picture.

Because of our relatively mild winters here in South Australia I have adjusted it to produce about 150,000 btu Max. When I first installed it in the house to test it, it nearly drove us outside on a cold wintry night and was only bought under control by cutting off the oil and lifting the manhole into the ceiling space to get rid of the heat as it continued to burn for about twenty minutes after the oil was cut off. (It did melt the TV aerial cable which was about 4 feet away though).

I have a 500 gallon tank in an old horse stable about 40 yards from the house and the oil is piped to the heater through a buried 3/4" polypropylene pipe, with the exception of the section inside of the house which is 1/2" copper with all brazed joints to avoid the possibility of leakage.

Shirl, my long suffering wife was horrified when I suggested bringing it into the living room, but I pacified her with the story that it was only for a test run and that the slow combustion heater would be going back. One thing led to another and 5 years later it is still in place, gradually Shirl has learnt that there are better things to do with your spare time than cut and carry wood and clean up sawdust, chips and ash from the living room carpet. I think that the final barrier came down when the local Mayor called in it have a look and was so impressed that he went home and built one for his workshop.

It also helps to be on good terms with your local trucking company, as many of the parts can be salvaged out of his junk heap. The body of my heater is made from two worn out truck brake drums.

Don't give up, it can be done, and it's not that expensive if you have a reasonable workshop and a few tools.

[redeyecow]

    Well I live in central Alberta Can.  and the topic of heat is always

  right up there with the weather.  I vaguely remember my father using a

  drip setup to keep the water trough from freezing. Seems to me that it smoked

  and stunk like crazy and also coated the "burner" with carbon fairly quickly.

      I'd be interested in seeing a few details.

[ekips]

Yes, I can believe that it did stink, but it doesn't have to. The smell would have been unburnt oil vapour, a by-product of incomplete combustion caused by one of a number of things. Generally the fault relates to either incorrect fuel-air ratio or poor mixing of the fuel and air. Both problems are fairly easy to fix.

Remember, you can burn any carbonaceous fuel cleanly if you have enough air, and you mix it well with the fuel.

Too little air or poor mixing is characterized by black smoke and heavy soot deposits (unburnt carbon). The two main causes of this are (1) Low draft, usually remedied by a larger or higher chimney, or (2) poor design of the secondary air inlet. If you look closely at the photo on my webpage you will be able to see the flame through a perforated section in the secondary flame tube where the hot gasses are re-ignited by the admission of air through a large number of small holes. In my case I have about 220 x 3/16" holes drilled into a 6" diameter Mack truck cylinder liner. (These are heavy cast iron and will take a lot of heat without burning out).

The second problem is too much air, this cools the pre-heaed gas and results in poor burning, also the faster air flow can literally blow the unburnt cooled gas up the chimney before it is has a chance to reach ignition temperature. This will cause white or blueish smoke to be seen at the chimney.

It is very easy to tell when you have all of these things right, as the visible flame in the secondary burning area goes from red to almost white, certainly bright enough to leave spots before your eyes when you look away. As for smell, my neighbours who are only 20 feet away say that they have never been aware of any smell and when I've had reason to climb onto the roof I can sometimes smell a very slight sweetish smell a bit like fresh bitumen but it is virtually un-noticeable at 10-15 feet.

I got off my butt after I sent my first post last night and the photo is now updated, I don't know which one you saw, probably the latter. (Click on the image to expand it) As I said if anyone is interested in trying to build one of these I will put more detailed photos on my webpages but it will have to be only a few at a time as I only have 5Mb of space. Also I am a Merchant Seaman and spend a lot of time away so if I don't answer immediately don't be put off, I'll get back to you as soon as I get home. I will be going away for six weeks in a weeks time, after which I'll be on a 4 weeks on, 4 weeks off roster.

[nanotech]

If you need image space, I have 100Mb available.

darrin.moore@gmail.com

Anytime you need it, just e-mail me a pic, I'll upload it and send you back the link.

[ekips]

Thank you Darrin,

Your generosity is greatly appreciated.

I'll certainly be in touch if there is a need.

Thanks again,

Spike Jones.

Jamestown.

Sth. Australia.

[Ziggy]

This sounds very interesting and I too would be very interested in seeing more details about how to build this stove. The truck parts would be no problem for me as I have a friend who could supply my needs there. I look forward to hearing more.

[wildbill hickup]

I to would be interested to know more on the opperation. For instance, the picture is not clear enough to see what the gauge is. Is it a thermometer? Is the bottom section open or is that a glass panel, hwat makes up the burner in the bottom section and so on. I have several old 20lb propaine tank (you know the barbique) grill kind that are now obsolite (new laws) two of the are almost brand new but it costs as much to upgrade them to a new type valve as it does to buy a new tank. I wonder if modified they could serve the same perpoious as the rims.

So many questions!!!!!

Wildbill

[robotmaker]

I can't quite tell from your picture how you are running your setup, but I have had a few years experience in developing and building a variation of waste oil burner that pleases me and works fairly well.  I have done a story with pictures which can be found at http://www.eqg.biz/wob   Hope it helps someone.   I've also posted a few things on this board too, which can be found in the archives... Would like to see more of what you have done tho, maybe try to incorporate a few of your ideas into what I have.  When are the other pictures going to be posted?

rj

[ekips]

Wildbill,

The gauge is an old pyrometer (Thermometer) out of an old WWII vintage V16 GM engine in a tug boat. (I'm a Merchant Seaman) The tug boat was sold and the company had no further use for the spares, so I "rescued" them before they went to the dump. They are ideal, as they go up to 1200 deg Farenheit, the fluegas temp for the heater is generally 400 - 600 degrees meaning that the pyro is working right in its midrange. This plays a big part in being able to regulate the temperature with a minimum of fuss allowing you to tell when the heater is burning at a steady rate. It also allows you to see if the temp is rising or falling so that you can make adjustments early and avoid too many wild ups and downs. A high temperature thermometer is not necessary to do this though as you can use a lower range thermometer placed further away from the heat, just so long as it is not affected by drafts and is fixed firmly in the one place. The actual temperature is not important, so long as you have something to gauge whether the temperature is rising or falling.

The "open section" in the bottom is an old pyrex glass out of the door of an old scrapped oven given to me by my local electrician. The bottom section is enclosed by a double walled enclosure with galvanized iron on the outside and expanded metal mesh on the inside with glass wool insulation between. This stops the outside from getting too hot and also muffles the noise of the air inlet. It's not loud, but it is annoying when it's only 5 feet from the TV. (I'm half deaf as a result of working in engine rooms for forty years, so I need all the help I can get)

I'm about to post the first of a couple of explanations tonight and will explain how the actual burner works next.

Your propane cylinders should work OK, but will not last as long as brake drums as they are only about 1/8" thick. One of the important principals of the burner is that the flame is "suspended" and should not actually touch the body of the heater as this results in carbon deposits and dirty burning. The inside of the brake drums are 17" in diameter and the two of them give a vertical height of 18", so if your cylinders are about this size you shouldn't have much trouble.

[ekips]

Robotmaker,

I'll start getting the photos tomorrow and will email them to Darrin who has very generously allowed me the use of some of his web space.

Basically it is a two stage burn dripper system, there are no new engineering principals involved Just a novel way of putting them together I guess. The oil is dripped into a cast iron pan where it is burned in a reducing atmosphere (Oxygen deficient), this initially heats the oil until it starts to evaporate but because of the oxygen deficiency it cannot burn completely. As the partially burnt super hot gas rises up the tube it passes through an area where holes have been drilled allowing more air into the mixture, at the same time the resulting turbulence mixes the hot gas/air and it re-ignites giving a second stage burn. Controlling this secondary air inlet is vital to getting an efficient and clean burn.

[ekips]

I'll do this in several posts, as I'm only a two finger typist and I'll start from the beginning of the whole process, meaning that tonights post will relate mainly to the fuel supply system. This is the most expensive part of the whole system as it involves several tanks and a pump.

I'll try not to get too far off the track and hope that it all starts to make sense once I post some photos.

Firstly this whole thing is designed on the KISS principle (Keep It Simple Stupid). That means no external inputs other than Fuel and Air, and I suppose a few minutes of electric power once a day to pump up the oil header tank from the main storage tank. This takes about two minutes per day and is on a digital timer, I could bypass this and pump up the 20 - 25 litres (5 - 6 Gallons) by hand once a day, but I'm basically lazy, after all, I did design this monster to hopefully lessen my workload. The pump is a small gear pump rescued from a wreckers yard for $5 and attached to a 1/3 HP electric motor out of an old washing machine found at the local dump. The inline digital time switch cost A$25 at the local hardware store.

The down side of this simplicity is that it also means that there are no safety cutouts should something go wrong. So be aware!

Having run this unit for five winters now I have a good idea of its performance and reliability and have on many occasions let it run unattended overnight. This is probably not a good idea, but I figure that the worst thing that can happen is for something to block the metering valve and for it to go out. To minimize the chances of this, the raw oil that I receive from my local garage is first put through a settling tank to allow any solids or water to settle out and then strained to remove grass seeds and other gunk that always seems to find its way into waste oil drums. This is done by passing it  through a metal flyscreen strainer before it is put into the storage tank. It is then filtered again on leaving the header tank by passing it through one of those filters fitted to garden watering systems. These will remove anything larger than about 15 - 20/1000ths of an inch. Because of the primary strainer and the fact that the oil gets a chance to settle whilst in the storage tank I have only had to clean this filter once in over 1200 gallons of oil.

As an added precaution to all of the above, I have also put a second water separation tank in the delivery line to the house to remove any last traces of free water as I was afraid that condensation may form inside the storage tank. As you are aware, it is very dangerous to add water to a burning oil fire, the water boils when it hits the hot oil in the evaporation pan and spatters burning oil droplets in all directions which vastly increases the surface area of the oil resulting in a mini explosion. This is to be avoided at all costs, its effects can range from minor annoyance from the increased noise to a potentially dangerous "boilover". I have had several small sputtering attacks in the past, but none since fitting the second settling tank.

Tomorrow I will take photos of all this stuff and with Darrins help get up a link so that they can be viewed. I will also post an explanation of what we're looking at in each photo.

Coming Soon..... The Cast Iron Monster.

[ekips]

To see a picture of the Burner assembly go to

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~ekips/images/burner.jpg

This is an old photo as you will realize from the fact that at this stage the lower cladding has not been put around the burner area. I used this photo as it is one of the few that I have that clearly shows the secondary air inlet holes in the flame tube.

The next photo at

http://members.ozemail.com.au/~ekips/images/clean.JPG

shows the whiteness of the flame when it is burning correctly. Sorry about the quality of the photo but it's scanned off a slide.

Since these photos were taken the dripper assembly has been simplified and the fuel line has been moved away from the burner to keep it cooler, because the metering valve used to get so hot you needed gloves just to touch it.

[wildbill hickup]

Thanks for filling in the blanks. Can't wait to see you posts. I have access to WVO and while I use most for Bio-D and such I have some that is not clean enough. I have to take it all good and bad.I've just been burning the waste on top of wood in my stove, and I think this might be perfect for the left over oil.

Thanks again

Wildbill

[Experimental]

     Good Job, on that heater -- I have been experimenting with one, quite similar in construction, but just have not had the time to carry on with it -- and of all the ones I have seen, it,s the best of all !!

    I retired, about two years ago, and have been so busy -- I keep wondering how I ever had time for a job !!

    I,ve been building a cabin, in a very remote area, powered by a solar panel, and wind generator -- when finished, I would like to build one of those stoves !!

    I,m hopeing you will publish some drawings, and details, and thank you for shareing your creation with the rest of us !!

   Good day, and nice work, Bill H......

[ekips]

Thanks Bill,

I have got a few drawings (AutoSketch) and odd photos, but it will have to wait until I return from work in about 6 weeks. I've been as busy as a "one armed irish fiddler" the last few days, trying to get everything sorted out before I go back.

I lit up the heater for the first time this year two nights ago, as the nights are starting to get colder and every time I light it I remember the weeks of time I used to spend cutting wood. Ahhh... Pure Bliss.

I'm sure that more than a few people have thought that I am rather odd having the "Cast iron Monster" in my living room, but their opinions change as soon as the weather gets cold. It would never win any prizes for it's good looks, but no-one can fault the way it works.

Spike.

[mikey ny]

hello,

    I have access to a lot of WVO and I thought i would run it through my old oil burner. I know the drip method works pretty well but if i could get that stuff to work in a modified oil burner gun to my boiler it would be controlled automatically by my present system. Anyone ever tried this? It seems to easy to be true. I may experiment with this in a couple of weeks.