Jason E Smith

I wish I had been on this forum 4 months ago. I would have gone in for 1 or 2.

I thought of an idea to use the barrel to heat water while potentially not affecting the temperature in the combustion chamber.
I will sketch up some plans once I get home, I am currently out of town and do not have access to any of my tools and equipment.

Satamax Antone wrote:

Jason E Smith wrote:

Troy Rhodes wrote:
I don't know exactly what your immediate/short term solution to the heat problem is. But I do know that the long term solution is more insulation. 3 1/2" of cellulose blown into the walls will cut your heating needs at least in half. You can do that yourself fairly inexpensively. I have a lot of experience in that regard. Ask if you need details.

With the current levels of insulation, it is highly unlikely that a rmh in the basement will keep the house adequately warm.

I have a friend who delivers newspapers. He always has a lot of them left over every week.
Would it be feasible to use newspaper to insulate my home?

Yes, but over here, they use a fire retardant mixed with the powdered newpaper.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cellulose_insulation

Well time to look into it. Its pretty cheap for a small thing of it at Home Depot. But I will need to buy it over time and figure out how to put it into the out walls.
Thank you for that information.

Troy Rhodes wrote:
I don't know exactly what your immediate/short term solution to the heat problem is. But I do know that the long term solution is more insulation. 3 1/2" of cellulose blown into the walls will cut your heating needs at least in half. You can do that yourself fairly inexpensively. I have a lot of experience in that regard. Ask if you need details.

With the current levels of insulation, it is highly unlikely that a rmh in the basement will keep the house adequately warm.

I have a friend who delivers newspapers. He always has a lot of them left over every week.
Would it be feasible to use newspaper to insulate my home?

Well I decided that if I am still living here long enough to build an RMH, I will likely instead of making a multi-exhaust system I will knock out the wall in the middle of the house and build the mass there.
It would be much easier to accomplish that rather than the trail, error, (which might lead to a fire) and time involved in designing and implementing the multi-exhaust RHM.

Along with my radical plans for a multi room RMH, I have been trying to come up with a way to use the heat from either a Rocket stove or a RMH to generate electricity.

So far the only idea I have come up with is to heat water and have the steam spin a turbine that is attached to a generator.

I figure the only way to make this work would be to have two separate tanks. One of boiling the water and one that would be used as a cooling tank.
If done correctly I figure it would work. Problem is I have no idea how to make the set up correctly without an explosion from the Flash heated water.

Any suggestions?

Ralf,

I know that no matter what forced air system was in place it would require frequent inspections, cleanings, and maintenance. It look likely need to be checked daily to make sure it doesn't break down unexpectedly. And in the case of a power outage I have multiple back up systems in my home to provide myself at the very least about 4 hours of DC 12v. Which I also have an invert to supply myself with 120v if needed.


Allen,

I understand that my theory makes the RMH much more complicated and increases the chance for failure.
But as I continue to think of problems I think of ways to makes sure the problems don't happen.

Right about now I want to build it so I figure out a way to make it work.
Time to pull out the sketch pad and draw some designs.

Ralf Siepmann wrote:Hi,

as I read this split-run-challenge I spontaneously began to do some math:
One 6" duct and four 3" ducts do have the same CSA, however the wall length (circumference) of four 3" ducts is double to that of a 6" duct, hence I assume double the drag per run length.
If you subtract a boundary layer of say 0.2 inches the ratio between the circumferences gets somewhat better, but the "flow-open" CSA of the 4 ducts becomes smaller than that of the 6" duct.

At this point I would say "try, but with a fan", but it gets worse:

Suppose you have no forced air supply double drag means half the recommended maximum run length through the mass, for a 6" system that translates to 22 1/2 feet instead of 45 feet straight run, no bends.
Divided by your four runs you have 5 1/2 feet per run, straight, without any bends. But if you want to heat four rooms and channel these short runs into a room and back to a combined chimney you will have to subtract substantially more length from each run for the required bends

At this point I would say: IMHO not possible.
But please correct me if my logic or math is wrong.



Ralf

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So according to your math, as long as there is a forced air system in place, it could theoretically work?

Satamax Antone wrote:Well, this question comes back regularly, that why you got a laconic reply

I have a few builds behind me, and I would not try a multi channel heater.


I don't know how is your neighbourhood. But as far as cheap and easy insulation goes. Pile up small size strawbales against your walls. cover the prevailing wind side with a tarp during the winter. Can't remember in US r values, but it's around R40 or so. Once roten, after may be ten years, change it. And you're good for ten more years. Hold with wire. I had calculated here, in france, it would cost me about 1100 euros to cover 250m² of wall. And that would be repaid in few months for you, with your electric bills!

Sadly I live in an Urban area, I could probably get the straw bails, but after setting them up I would have Code Enforcement breathing down my neck telling me to remove them or they would fine me.

My neighbors house is roughly 10 feet or 3 meters from mine.

Satamax Antone wrote:Jason, just to explain my point of view on the subject, immagine, that you've managed to make four perfectly equal channels, that draw the same. With the same incline. With the same amount of elbows, all oriented the same, to reach a single chimney.

But you have around one of thoses, you have left few stones in the cob, more than in another one. Closer to the pipe, that what you want. But even to that level of detail, it counts. These accumulate more heat, and they keep it longer. And, then, you have your stronger pulling leg.

I would rather play with one or two bells, and conduction through the walls.

But since you said, your house is from 66, it's most certainly not a massonry wall one. I don't know how you guys can stand baloon or stick framing, in the US. Worse bit, it's my job, partly, to make such structures. But i like thick stone walls!

Well, rant off.

My house is 66 years old it was built in 1950. And the walls are drywall with little to no insulation on the outer walls.

Now when you start giving examples of why it would be hard to do, THAT satisfies my curiosity better than just saying " it would be difficult so I wouldn't try it."

The major part of figuring things like this out is contemplating what could go wrong and figuring out ways to fix it before it happens.

The main thing my brain came up with was when the 4 smaller exhaust joined back into the bigger one. I figure that it would hit that junction and if it didn't have initial assistance it would bottle neck or try to go backwards down one of the smaller exhaust.