AJ,
I'm not sure what you are asking here- "Is there differences though in the tolerances for flow and exhaust?"
Are you refering to our design, or traditional designs compared to ours? We've tried so many scenarios, and everytime we change something we get a different result. It's important to define what the stove is going to be used for, then you can build it with its' intentions in mind. For instance, if you are primarily going to be cooking on the stove, you'll want the top plate to heat up fast and hot. A thinner gauge, top-plate should be used and the distance of the plate adjusted a little lower above the heat riser. etc.. We balanced all these tests out and made 'clear exhaust' our priority. And that's what you get with ours. Really clear exhaust even at startup.
We've found that the stove cruises at about 500 degrees at the top plate. It seems to be the optimum temp for maximizing our refill time to heating power. The inside temps are close to 900 degrees at this speed.
As for thermal masses.... we are still in the process of testing different materials and lengths. More to come...
The larger unit... That's funny to me because the biggest concern we face is that people usually want a smaller unit. You're the first person to ask if we can make a bigger one. The answer is yes we can however, this unit puts out the heat. How big is the space that you are trying to heat?
