Candle Heater

Hi all,

We're Jon and Sue and we're new to the forum...we've been having lots of fun reading the archives...WOW...lots of wonderful information! 

A friend of mine sent us this link a few months ago.  It sure sounds interesting...and a neat little way to heat up just an individual room.

http://www.greenoptimistic.com/2008/11/06/candle-room-heater/

This guy is selling a completed one...but it looks simple enough to make.  I'm sure the quality of the candle, wax and wick will make a difference.

We'd love to hear what others think of this idea...or if anyone has tried something like this before.

Thanks for your thoughts,
Sue and Jon

P.S.  I just found a direct link to the actual site that's selling them:
http://heatstick.com/_KanHeet01.htm

i like it!  i have 2 tiny bedrooms and  have been looking for a way to heat them without electricity.  might give this a shot,  i wonder how hard it is to drill through the pots?

I think the pots already have holes in them...you know...for water drainage. 

I really started looking through and reading the site more closely...looks like they've also tried it using an electric bulb in place of the candle.  Though it uses electricity...it also gave off lots more heat and only cost about .50 per week.  They were using it as a night light...and also a heat source.  Apparently an electric bulb only uses 10% of it's energy to produce the light...the rest of the electricity goes to heat.  (or so their site says)  I guess by using the light bulb...they're way more effecient and create lots more radiant heat.

Here's a link...scroll to the bottom of the page, and he shows you how to make one yourself.

http://heatstick.com/_KandleHeeterNews.htm

We'll definitely be trying this out...and will post how it goes.  Sure seems to make sense, though.

s:-)

ah,  duh,  the pots already have holes.  this project looks super easy!

Jon-Sue wrote:
Hi all,

We're Jon and Sue and we're new to the forum...we've been having lots of fun reading the archives...WOW...lots of wonderful information! 

A friend of mine sent us this link a few months ago.  It sure sounds interesting...and a neat little way to heat up just an individual room.

http://www.greenoptimistic.com/2008/11/06/candle-room-heater/

This guy is selling a completed one...but it looks simple enough to make.  I'm sure the quality of the candle, wax and wick will make a difference.

We'd love to hear what others think of this idea...or if anyone has tried something like this before.

Thanks for your thoughts,
Sue and Jon

P.S.  I just found a direct link to the actual site that's selling them:
http://heatstick.com/_KanHeet01.htm

Speaking as someone with some experience in cold houses, as well as some physics training:

It's true that an incandescent bulb or candle can make an appreciable difference in a small space's temperature. 

You're not getting any more heat by putting pots over the candle, than you would by just burning the candle.  Only a tiny amount of light is converted to heat in the pots; that light would otherwise be converted to heat when it hits your eyes, your curtains, your bookshelves...

But if it makes you more comfortable to have the heat concentrated in an upside-down flowerpot, rather than floating around the room on air currents, then go for it.

The heated pots should stay warm a little while after the candle goes out, a nice comfort while you're drifting off to sleep.

If you don't want to mess with the bolts, etc, try one of your old aromatherapy pots with a stones or ball-bearings in the dish instead of scents.  Hematite and soapstone are both pretty and dense, and will hold a lot of heat.

It does seem like you could heat a room with one or more of these.

The key would be that it is on 24x7 - constantly putting out a small amount of heat.  And that heat can be focused closer to people (as Erica pointed out) and, thus, more efficient. 

It does seem that there is something about the physics:  the amount of heat put into the room has to be exactly the same, with or without the clay pots.  I think it is important that we fully embrace that. 

So then I can imagine a candle radiating more heat (with the contraption) from the burn point, for longer, before the heat eventually wandered to the ceiling - thus filling the room with warm air from the ceiling downward. 

So the contraption might help to hold the heat nearer a person before it eventually found its way to the rest of the room.

Throw in factors about how cold it is outside, how much insulation there is and how much air exchange there is in the room ...  and you probably can come up with a combination where a single candle with this contraption can make a person feel plenty warm whereas with just a candle and no contraption they would feel slightly chilled.

At least ...  that is what all of the gobbledygook in my head says. 

I would really like to hear from some folks that are trying it!

I did this last winter as my main source of heat. I was living in a drafty attic, and I mostly enclosed my bed and nightstand with space blankets (open at the top and bottom, nothing too close to the candle heater). I started with beeswax candles and then moved on to an olive oil lamp in a jar (easy enough to make, but because I didn't have experience with the height of the wick for olive oil, I bought one cheap from Lehman's). The olive oil lamp put out a LOT of heat! It burned surprisingly clean most of the time, with none of that caustic olive oil smoke that you get from burning olive oil in a pan on the stove. But if there was a strong draft or the wick got too short or too long, it would smoke. It still felt stuffy to have something burning that close to my bed. I was getting more chest congestion and respiratory problems. Even when the flame looked free of smoke, I could tell by how fast the soot built up on the inside of the flower pots that it was not a clean flame. The beeswax candles were slightly less sooty on average than the olive oil lamp, but they also weren't quite as warm. So far this year I'm using electric heat on the few occasions it's been cold enough to warrant it, and my lungs are grateful.

I do think the flowerpots help. Otherwise, a small spot on the ceiling would get quite hot and nothing else much would feel warm. And there was no real insulation in that attic, so heating a spot of ceiling was about as efficient as heating a small spot of sky. Also when I extinguished the flame--I would usually risk dozing off for awhile with it burning, and then wake up and put it out sometime around midnight--the warmth would still be emitted for awhile. Long enough for me to get back to sleep, anyway.

I think the thing I liked best about it was just the excuse to have a reassuring flame glowing in my room on a long dark night, and because of how stable and weighty the base was and that it was covered, I felt okay going to sleep for a little while next to it.

Hi Kerrick,

Neat that you've used one.  Was it the same one found at "heatstick.com"?  (With the bolt inside and three nestled pots?) 

How warm did it heat the room? 

You can see on the website that you can also use an electric lightbulb instead of a candle...suppose to be much warmer...then you also won't have the soot or the fear of the flame being so close as you fall asleep.

Sue and Jon

Well, in my space blanket curtained bed nest, it was warm enough that I sometimes needed almost no covers while it was on. I never measured the temperature change, but it was substantial. And I thought about the lightbulb, but for me the whole point was to see if I could get through a winter with no electricity or gas for heating (should be possible in the Bay Area, even though I'm a lover of warmth!). I thought if I were going to run a lightbulb to heat with, I might as well get an efficient-as-possible electric heater.

Oh, and yes, I bought it from the heatstick people. I knew about them because my roommate the previous year had bought one to heat with while studying.

I too found the Heat Stick website, and started making my own versions.  My smallest candle version uses votive candles and a stand I bought at Joanne's craft store for less than $5.  That one uses a 4" pot for the largest.  My medium one uses an Orchid pot for a base, and a 6" pot for the largest one.  I generally use a mason jar with scrap wax from the smaller version mixed with vegetable oil.  Using vegetable oil works fine, but I have to use a wire spiral to hold the wick up, as the vegetable oil can't hold the wick up by itself, after it heats up.  V3 uses an orchid pot and 6" pot like the medium candle one, but I made this one into the electrical version.  I had to take the base apart, and I glued it to a ceramic base.  Works great.  That one I leave in my bathroom with a 50W halogen bulb.  V4 uses a larger orchid pot for the base, and about an 8" pot for the outer one.  I put a Lamplight parrafin lamp (the one without the handle loop) I bought at Walmart in it.  It  works really well, and it burned all weekend without needing to be refilled.

Keep the flames down or they soot up A LOT.  They do create an nice glow, and do add noticeable heat in my smaller house.  Very nice