Rocket stove on a second story?

Howdy all!
I live in a two story house. The bottom floor is a daylight basement. The floor to the second story is oak wood floor over OSB and 2x6 beams at 16" spacing.
My question is, can a rocket mass heater work on a second story safely or does it have to be built on slab foundation?

You are not giving enough info for calculation. Lengh of the joists, age of the joists. Material of the joists. But thoses joists and floor are following a standard, which must be given in pounds per square foot i would think uniformly repartited load. You can go a smidge over that value if you're next to a supporting wall for the joists.

As with any additional load you have to reinforce a floor just with any load you must add addition support You can calculated the additional load and add reinforcement to bare the load. You can find the load capabilities of any materials on the web ie a 4x4 post will hold x amount of weight. This is hard to calculate as fasteners and cross beams are a factor, you can find the info but an engineer is going to make it legal fast. You can over build it but no way of knowing if an inspector will approve it. If that is a concern. Hope that helps. I had to put more support under my shed to deal with the near 1500 lbs of cob and brick which are the RMH.
Mikael69

Justin Claassen : A Late welcome to Permies.com, our Sister site richsoil.com, and a Big Welcome to the Rocket and Wood Stoves forum threads!
You should be able to come here 24 / 7 and find someone who wants to talk about what you want to talk about !

We are also going to need the sq.ft. that you are hoping to heat, and anything like cathedral Ceilings, A general location ! And Elevation above sea level and Your
Climate Zone # if known ! This will help size your future rocket ! Basically we are talking about the weight of a water bed, and should be w/in Your design Specs.

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This allows you a common language to come here and talk about questions and observations, and assures that You and your Fellow Members with be using the
same words to describe the Parts/Sections, their size, shape, and orientation to other Parts/sections.

You will also be shown the steps to determine The Constant Cross Sectional Areas C.C.S.As of the right size System for you, and the Ratio of Depth of Feed Tube,
Length of Burn Tunnel and Height of Your Heat Riser ! Consider this a major investment in saving you Time Trouble and Moneys not spent on unwanted Parts !

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see Groupings of Short Videos, as the 1st one starts to play you will see that the top Row is labeled Rocket Mass Heater Scenes just to the right of that is
the PLAY Button. Click on that !

What you will see as the videos then load in correct order for viewing Is ~ 3/8ths ~ of a Well made Commercial video showing a great upscale build very similar to
what you will need to plan for in your 2nd floor location ! This is a very generous Teaser for the DVD that is for sale at Village Video, enjoy watching the Videos.

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Hey all. Thanks for the welcome and good info!

Here is what I have. We are in zone 8 pacific nw. I am looking at heating about 1200 sq ft. The main rooms are important. If it does not make it to the back bedrooms, no worries.

I will get an engineer out to determine if we can take the load once I know what I am talking about for weight. Also, I am not worried about code/permit at this time.

I guess I am also concerned about building this on wood. Would it get to hot? Or is the main concern the load? Do you have to insulate between the floor and the rmh?

I want to build it along the wall with the wood stove somewhere. The stove in the photo is shot, doesn't put off heat and I should not be burning in it. I need a better option before next winter.

Thanks for all the info!

Justin Claassen : Check out the Village video.org Site, Also you may be lucky depending what is behind your existing wall for Hidden timbers and other flammable
exposures ! A Fellow Member was very successful (finally) with using much of his old Hearth stones and especially the Fireplaces Ash pit/ clean out to craft a very
effective Rocket Mass Heater RMH!

From the list of most recent Rocket Stove Forum Threads, clickon> '' Rocket mass heater project in suburban home '', even though this is built over a
Concrete slab, there is potentially much in common with Brett Andrzejewski's build and yours ! For the Craft ! Big AL !

can a rocket mass heater work on a second story safely or does it have to be built on slab foundation?

Yes, it can be safe on a 2nd story, but you need to insulate the wood from the burn tunnel. You should incorporate a thermocouple between your insulation layers and the wood sub-floor, just to make sure the wood is not getting too hot. Probably the most effective insulative layer is a some inches of air. In other words, mount the burn tunnel up so that air can get underneath it.

See the blogs in my signature.

Justin Claassen wrote:Hey all. Thanks for the welcome and good info!

Here is what I have. We are in zone 8 pacific nw. I am looking at heating about 1200 sq ft. The main rooms are important. If it does not make it to the back bedrooms, no worries.

I will get an engineer out to determine if we can take the load once I know what I am talking about for weight. Also, I am not worried about code/permit at this time.

I guess I am also concerned about building this on wood. Would it get to hot? Or is the main concern the load? Do you have to insulate between the floor and the rmh?

I want to build it along the wall with the wood stove somewhere. The stove in the photo is shot, doesn't put off heat and I should not be burning in it. I need a better option before next winter.

Thanks for all the info!

Justion, with this, go for batch box and bell. It wuld be apropver easier i think. And it would be easier and weight less! I'll take care of you later, as i'm off to work in a few minutes.

In the book by ianto evans it covers building a RMH on a wood floor and has lots of great info an air gap between the floor and the burn chamber is the best method of insulating the wood.

Justin, check from this post and downwards. There's two sketchup files which should give you the idea of what i'm babling about.

https://permies.com/forums/posts/list/40/31382#246585

The fireplace you have nearly has all the mass you need and already suported. Why mess with a pile of cob, when you can have a batch rocket and a bell.