Leslie L Wilson

Cristobal Cristo wrote:Good heater should be efficient and it's efficient when it has mass to store exhaust heat. Without that it' just a less or more complicated bonfire. There are various methods of efficient combustion - a long fi 300 pipe lined with clay will be an excellent firebox. I would suggest to focus the design on the exhaust energy storage that can be quickly built with what is available. Usually the most ubiquitous material is dirt and some plant fiber.
You could just prefabricate the L-shaped core. It would not be too heavy, so it could be shipped together with a top plate.
Then the client would need to line it (or not - for ultimate simplicity at the price of shorter lifespan) with clay and build a dirt bell around it with top plate on top that would:
-make a ceiling - the most complicated part in any masonry structure
-quickly radiate heat at the beginning of combustion
-could be used for cooking

I can not imagine anything simpler having thermal mass and built with limited material availibility.
If the client has an access to some tank/barrel then it could be also used as a substrate for clay but would require metal cutting.

The "client" is likely to be an 80 year old grandmother who knows how to fireup her ancient masonry heater, but no help in construction of a crazy new-fangled RMH.
We must do the rest of the build ourselves on location in one day if possible.

Spot on with constructing the core in our workshop. Today I'll try to source materials
However,
I need to know several of the best designs currently, then select the one where I can best match the materials.
Please send links pictures materials list for your nominations so we can assess feasibility.

Fox James wrote:The wooden box full of stones will not be a very effective method at all, certainly not compared to solid mass but I guess it might work for you as a compromise.
A far more up to date and effective method is a bell or enclosure built around the stove, in theory this might be an option for you.
So a basic description would be replacing the more traditional barrel with a solid mass around the stove.
An even simpler method might be a steel box ( barrel alternative) with stacked bricks around three sides.
Basically a piped mass system ( where a pipe is covered in clay) is well out of date as bell systems have proven to be more effective and easier to operate..

Wow! What happened to the bench slowly radiating heat to the body (especially one with a bad back that lives for work I can do in a reclining postion?)

Pictures! I need pictures!

Ill start sending some myself

Roelof Groenenboom wrote:Hi Leslie,

Maybe this will help? https://roquetinho.eu
It's a detailed industrial design, intended for both DIY and factory production.

Thanks Roelof
I looked briefly at the site. More time later. Anyone familiar with this design?

thomas rubino wrote:Yes, Paul's pebble heater has a wooden box that contains the barrel edges.
However, this is a semi-permanent build in his home; here we are discussing a bomb shelter.

Unfortunately,  the Ukrainian people are forced to spend more time in them than they want to.
You can use anything available to hold and seal those long edges. All you need is to keep them in place. Mud, bricks, and rocks come to mind.
Fox brings up a valid point: the risers need (should) to be insulated; it's very accurate, and without it, performance will suffer.
But does this really matter?

I come back to this.
It is for a temporary Bomb Shelter.
The whole idea is to remain as warm as possible with as little wood as possible.
You don't want or need longevity, efficiency, or looks; you just want people to stay alive until they can stop huddling in bomb shelters and return to their homes if they are still standing.

Edit)
I just read your latest post.
I did not understand your needs, especially regarding the need for an engineer to sign off on the project.

No bomb shelters!
Semi permanent to permanent solutions only!
The air raid alerts and even explosions are a daily fact of life. We live lives as normal as possible. Only children are sent to shelters for the most part. They've built truly innovative schools deep in Kharkiv Metro stations. Even so, throughout the country even many parents and families refuse to let the madman in moscow terrorize and disrupt their lives.

High quality permanent heating systems for homes and workshops using as much war debris as possible

Barrels - we will eventually be able to source them eventually. But it is an ongoing struggle.

Engineers & Code - this comes with the cities where I've had to work so far. Even Kharkiv. I'm living near one of several engineering schools in Kharkiv alone. But I just moved out here where I can work on the edges of the most active war zones. Red tape dissolves in frequent explosions.

Fox James wrote:

The basic priceable of how a rocket stove works is based on a very high heat situation inside the stove and that needs to be insulated. Perlite, Vermiculite, rock wool or ceramic fibre?

Rock wool common here. Hardware cloth to encased. Vermiculite available too. Yep. I follow the Wisner standards. Pulled a lot from their video as well as book.

Fox James wrote:The J tube is the only, easy to build, reliable rocket stove, but you still need to address some facts like the internal riser really needs to be insulated with some form of high temperature insulation.
The whole J tube can be made from fire bricks or even clay bricks, in an ideal world lightweight insulating bricks would be perfect as the stove could just be built and taken apart very easily.
I doubt in anybody outside of the environment can really understand the situation or imagine exactly what is available?
The basic priceable of how a rocket stove works is based on a very high heat situation inside the stove and that needs to be insulated. Perlite, Vermiculite, rock wool or ceramic fibre?

Yes, if you look at the Hostomel home site in the most recent videos you'll see the full firebrick J tube I successfully built totally from the explosion debris of the home. I want to do these mainly but no one hear really believes in the system to allow it to be built in even a shed. You cannot imagine 3 years of frustration to build it when I have no land or home of my own anymore to just build the d"#@ thing.
For now, the portable version that I can build in this Canadian humanitarians workshop will have to serve as the poster child for RMH in Ukraine, so I want to build the most efficient, inexpensive, DIY that looks great and well built.

Believe it or not, I also need to get a Ukrainian engineer to sign off on it sooner rather than later. The opportunity to test builds for soldiers deployed was stopped by their engineer. Even after sharing Portlands code and many specs out of Ernie & Erica's book. Ernest was helping by email in those days. Shared the same repeated problem he had. At least I'm in good company but small consolation when I know how many will be suffering frostbite or worse again this winter.

Sorry. Gotta get to bed. Tomorrow's my first full day back in Kharkiv and my coworker wants to start pricing the material.  Anyone know lumber specs for a basic wooden bench design?

thomas rubino wrote:Yes, you can use sheet metal.
When using barrels, they are split lengthwise and the end caps are cut off except for 2" or so at the arch to retain a half-barrel shape.
When using sheet metal without support, I would hesitate to use it as a bench or a bed.  
It might support the weight, and it might not.
You could weld tabs on the inside and use nuts and bolts to place a "stiffener" across the arch when setting it up, and unbolt one side to lay it flat for transport.

I think we're talking about different design. The half barrels are not the actual bench. There is a design near the end of Paul's video with the wooden box bench. Instead of  those lightweight ducting tubes ( we don't have those anywhere that I've seen. The main Lowes-like chain managers apparently never saw a crimper before!) the video shows the half barrels INSIDEthe wooden box bench with agregragate nestled all around them. I couldn't tell if smaller rocks are put ob top before the top seating of the bench would be in place. It's one of those Qs without As when I watched the video.

Leslie L Wilson wrote:

thomas rubino wrote:Hi
The half-barrel stratification chamber is extremely easy to throw together and quickly packed up if you need to vacate.

Incredibly difficult to lay hands on used barrels. All kinds of Metal Ukrainians fiercely hold on to and recycle.
Can our welder fashion stratification chamber from sheet metal? It looks like flat side goes down, curved part up top, correct?

More questions than answers when I watch And rematch Paul's video. Has there been any tested followup to the Qs posed by the video?

thomas rubino wrote:Hi Leslie
I am assuming that you know the different size J-Tube dimensions.
If not, we can easily give them to you.
You may find that a K-Tube design works better for you.

As these are temporary stoves to save lives, there is no reason not to quickly weld them up from metal.
The half-barrel stratification chamber is extremely easy to throw together and quickly packed up if you need to vacate.
Mud of any type can be used as well as any large stones, metal items, bricks, or anything else that remains in the area.

I've already built standard JTube RMH (YouTube.com  @ResilientVillageUkraine  combustion chamber and Cob bench ( separately, lacking a good building site) out of mainly war debris. Cost well under $100.

These are NOT temporary solutions we need. They're for both civilians (many elderly refusing to leave partially destroyed homes) and soldiers ( many living&working in abandoned homes). We also need a high quality prototype to knock the socks off our  contacts in media, military, government and humanitarian groups so we can really get the word out.

Beyond the prototype, It's dangerous for us to stay long in the areas of greatest need. We must have a quick assembly, easy to use system for the home owners/borrowers. They'll have all sizes of aggregate (a mix of large and small i believe provides best thermal properties).

But there usually won't be the time and manpower for traditional RMH. Later, yes. But I am under tremendous time constraints for the next few weeks to prove RMH is viable option for Ukraine.

Leslie that link is to commercial sellers. We need to build our own... Ideally from war debris. These babies need to be cheap and mass produce able, ideally.

And no one ships to Ukraine in the middle of a war, not something like this.

pDF plans i could pay for if they fit our needs. But these systems are so in need of tweaking to fit unique situations and often different materials that I need expert advice. We don't have time and resources to tinker if someone already knows best solution.

The end of Paul's shippable core video talked about some next-gen ideas. I need to know how those sent and where the experts stand now on best approach to portable/movable systems.