luis proenca

John, despite my lack of experience in the area, i dare to make a suggestion: fire it up and let it burn for long hours, till it gets to the normal opperating temps. The smoke should disapear by then. Probably it will take a long while to get really warm enough due to the volume of mass, due to the lack of insulation and of course due to the canadian winter temperatures.
Adding what so ever to the interior of the tubes is in my opinion, pointless.
Keep on going

My stove is still in my worshop, right where it borned. So far i have made it work for periods of 4 to 8 hours non stop. The steel riser seems to be holding on despite it is half the thickness of yours. I believe that the mild temperatures of the portuguese winter are helping my stove to work properly. The mass i added warm up pretty fast. Air temperatures here are for sure much higher than in canada. Have you tryed a blow torch to give the stove that first push?
I took a look at your project and at first sight it looks much better planned and studied than mine.
Accordind to some opinions here, metal is not the best choice, i will not disagree with those opinions, logically ceramic will resist longer to high temps. But i think that we dont need extremely high temps, after all, the purpose of the stove is domestic use, not industrial.

Greets

Hi John,
My project has been buildt so far almost without any fixed plans, if you know what i mean. It is a free project guided by inspiration and by the available materials. All stuff that i bought so far, was bought trying to spend as less money as possible.
About the smoke, if i fire up my stove with matches and some straw or pine needles and small tree branches, the smoke will come up the feeding tunnel. If i use a blow torch for 30 seconds, to start the fire, an initial draft is established towards the riser and no smoke will come up the feed tunnel.
The exaust is (after 10 min of burning time) mostly steam. If for example it burns out of fire wood, when i add some more while the stove is still hot, it will smoke a little, but only till the burning gets going again.

Hi Styles,
It sure become heavy, i'd say it is over 100 kilos. Wheels are planned since the beggining. Its just that time has been short to acomplish all tasks on time.

Greetings.
Luis

Hello Tobias, John,
Since the last time i wrote here, there werent major progresses in my stove. Real life comes first, work, family obligations, health issues kind of absorbed almost all my time.
Despite that, few more details were added. The feed tunnel and air intake received a double skin. Its mostly to make it look better, but the ceramic and the clay/sand behind it, handle the heat pretty well.
Every time i have the chance, i fire it up. Its tricky to fire it by usual methods (lots of smoke out), but using a small blow torch for a few seconds helps to create the needed draft to get it going. It burns smooth without big issues, just need to make sure the firewood doesnt get stuck in the feeding chamber. I kept it burning for long hours, 6 to 8 hours with hardwood(oak and olivewood). So far so good
Next month, due to professinal reasons, will be spent out of the country, so, no progress will take place before february.

A happy new year for all is my sincere wish.
Greetings.

Insulation i shall use around the feed tunnel and air intake. As well as doors. It should make some difference. But i see mineral wool as to fragile maybe. It gets pretty hot around the feed tunnel due to the proximity of the burning chamber.
You're right when you say that clay is not that permanent. In fact all in this stove is easy to dismantle and rebuild properly. Even the heat riser and burning chamber can be removed easy.
For the rest of the week i havent possibilty to make more progress. But my head will still be busy with it.
Thanks for all replies.

Tobias, like i mentioned before, i will try keep the costs as low as possible on this project. That is the reason of using gravel, sand and clay instead of perlite.
It seems a bit out of logic to start doing things correctly now that i know that i started wrong since the first momment. Lets just say that this project was like a teaching to me.
Anyway, the thing seems to be working. I left it burning this afternoon for about two hours with a small log of olivewood split in two. It burned the wood till the end almost. The exaust fumes are mostly water steam. That is a good sign of proper burning temperatures, i guess.
About that green pain, for sure it must be removed, i plan burn it away with a blow torch and repaint with high-temperature paint that lays in my shop since few years. In fact the paint on top of the dome started to make bubbles few minutes after the stove was burning.
Shall consider the mineral wool to insulate the feed and air tunnel, but why not cover it with the same mix of clay and gravel? at least it would add some thermal mass.

This morning some progress was made. The pics speak for them selves. The exaust opening was cut, a temporary chimney was installed and i could perform the first burning tests with the dome in place.
I was actually surprised but the draft increased when i closed the whole thing with the dome. Now still must think of a door for the air intake as well as some insulation on the outside.
Unfortunatelly, weekends are too short, and monday real life starts again((

Today some progress was made on the stove.
First i must add that, once the durability of the stove is a bit short, i decided to keep the costs as low as possible using as far as possible only materials i had laying around my workshop. So, this morning i started by cutting off a section of both the feed tunnel and of the heat riser. The a metal sheet was added around the riser and (part of the) burning chamber. The gap between was filled with a mix of small gravel, sand and clay. Half of this mix was clay. Water was added too, in order to make it more compact.The dome (second gas cylinder is also ready. Tomorrow will be time to cut the exaust hole and add a section of pipe to connect the chimney tube. Here's some pics.

Tobias,
The stove was fired up few times already and it always had good draft except once. One time, the flames instead of going to the riser, they came up the feeding tunnel. I was told that the feed tunnel was too long and that was the reason of the back fire. I have shorten it and problem seems to be solved. Anyway i still have to shorten the riser (shall leave 4 cm between the top of the dome), so, probably will be forced to shorten the feeding tunnel again.
What creates some confusion in my head is the fact that the exaust hole will be opened just a few cm's above the level of the burning chamber... this means that exaust gases must come down from the top of the dome to find their way out through the exaust opening... Probably its just my head complicating simple things)) Shall work some hours on it tommorow and post the results at evening.
Thanks