A consideration: shorten the sch40 air pipe back to the dumby riser to provide space on top of the fire box to add a small flat "hot" plate. You could keep a pot of coffee warm or toast up your tacos 🌮 🌮 🌮
@@Bob_Adkins pizza ovens that run that hot don't cook pies for 7 to 8 minutes.... they cook for 70 to 80 seconds then rotate 180° & back in for another 80 seconds... anymore than 3 or 4 minutes and it's burnt
@@RichardCranium321 I know. I bake mine at only 500F and it only takes 8 minutes! Some pizza ovens run at 800F! My point was, that's a large stove and should put out a massive amount of heat! Unless his home is very large, it will only take small fires to heat it.
Nice job! I made one of these about 30 years ago for my fathers off grid cabin, same design with 20”x1/2”wall pipe, only thing I did different was to add a stainless steel water tank off the back end, it generated steam for humidity and hot water for washing stuff, it would heat his 750sq ft cabin, so hot you had to open a few windows.
I may add a piece of flat stock to the side of the burn chamber to put a pan of water on, we will see, smaller things like that can always be added/removed down the road
I like the symmetry of the stove and I would maybe change a few things. I would add a plate that would slide on the tubes to scrape off soot or ash the make it more efficient and I would shorten the heat exchanger to about half the size. That would make it more enjoyable to load wood into. The large pipe at the middle is ok, but I think it's gonna be too restrictive. I would incorporate a 1/2 inch plate on the top of the burn chamber in the front to cook on.
I love the idea. Cool video. I do feel like there should be a follow up video on this one with feedback on how effective the stove is working and any possible changes or improvements that you would like to do.
I am amazed at the thickness of the metal. This is what has to be done for longevity of the stove. Most people just use steel barrel drum which lasts a few seasons and you start over again with a build. One more thing fella. You should of added a secondary air burn feature. This would reduce the amount of wood needed by at least a half. The amount of ashes left from the combustion process would be just the bear minimum. You would be amazed as the how well that works. The third thing I can say is to make the stove using stainless steel metal. The look of stainless is just second to NONE !! Job well done Kyle, PERIOD.
Kyle, i realize i'm a little late to the party and this thing is already in service. overall i have to say you did a really good job of putting this thing together, selected some good materials for the project, however, if and when you ever have to go back and redo parts of this, keep some of the following points in mind: you didn't give your heat exchanger pipes a means of expansion. in a steam boiler, the fire facing ends are welded to the face plate which you did correctly, however on the exhaust end they get rolled in. there is a device that swages the pipes out to tighten up against the holes in the rear face plate. this way they can still expand in length and girth without putting strain on the welds of the faceplates but still remain airtight. you could try using an automotive exhaust pipe expander unless there is a boiler shop near you... unless i miss my guess, you will back in there rewelding the lower registers of pipes as they take the brunt of the heat rising up and the heating/cooling cycles will cause your welds to crack and allow carbon monoxide to seep out and enter the shop air. if you have no other choice but to weld the exhaust ends of your heat exchanger pipes, i would suggest using a 3/16ths 6013 rod that is used in boiler and steam applications. it does a better job of expanding and contracting at the same rate as the parent material. i didn't catch what grade of wire you were running in the MIG welder which is why i am suggesting it. another advantage to using rod is that you can bend it to get into those nooks and crannies that you were having a hard time getting into with the MIG torch something else that to take into consideration is the size of your draft. since this is a naturally aspirated and not a forced draft, the fresh air intake should have a slightly larger cross section (5 to 10 %) than the smoke riser going into the heat exchanger with the obstruction of the primary heat exchange pipe. by undersizing the fresh air intake you are starving the fire for oxygen, making the fire smolder. this in turn generates a lot of creosote, nitrous oxides and carbon monoxide which will foul the heat exchanger requiring frequent maintenance. now, by putting a damper in the chimney outlet you create a dam effect that gives you a more complete burn thus increasing the amount of heat gleaned from your fuel as the gasses are slowed way down in the heat exchanger. by partially opening the intake damper and closing the chimney damper a lot of the soot elements carried up off the fire will be combusted as it exits the burn chamber. it also great reduces the amount of CO the stove will generate by giving you a more complete combustion. while stove roaring with a draft open is a cool thing to hear, the fire is subjected to high degree of turbulence. while it may seem you're getting a complete burn. most of your energy is going up the chimney. by closing the damper in the chimney and opening the draft you get a pyrolysis effect that re-combusts the VOCs released by the fire very efficiently. the smoke at 9:36 in part 3 of this series is about 30% of the thermal energy of your fuel going poof! next, a baffle plate of sorts can be put into the burn chamber to keep the flames from directly entering the heat exchanger during initial daily firing up. that causes the flames to take a more indirect route into the exhaust and re-combusts another large portion of the VOCs and soot released by the flames that will otherwise accumulate in the cooler parts of the system. the end plates on the burn chamber should have been bowled a slight bit as the expansion of the steel goes out in all directions. at some point in time you will see cracks forming along the weld seams and the endplates will also start to buckle and warp. by them being cupped slightly, it gives the material a place to go when it gets hot and not deform in doing so. grates are not the best thing to put into a wood burner but if you must then i would recommend cast iron grates. steel webbing will burn up in a few weeks and steel grates will last only marginally longer. you can get inconel grates that will outlast cast iron but those are insanely expensive and unless you get exactly the size you need, they are almost impossible to machine with conventional tooling on a milling machine now people are probably think i'm totally nuts, but here's a crazy tip for day to day operations: every 2 or 3 days throw a handful of rock salt in the coals of the fire or a few beer cans. there is a product on the market called "Red Devil" (it's kinda spendy) that you do the same thing with. this keeps your chimney pipe clean. it really eats the gunk in the chimney up. i'm not sure what chemical reaction is going on there, maybe somebody who has a better grasp of it can comment. many snows ago when i built my little cabin in Elk City ID, i would do that and never had to clean the chimney pipe...ever just for reference: i used to help run a 5MW wood fired, forced draft boiler and was tasked with rebuilding the refractory walls of the burn chamber and access hatch, did a lot of the welding of the additions to the low pressure steam distribution system, as well as a majority of the welding of the ductwork for the exhaust gas filtration system of that boiler. so the points i brought up in this comment are based on those experiences and observations good work, good show and good series, thanks for posting!! cheers! mike
Awesome build . I would think it will work good . One suggestion on the tubes . Instead of cutting can you stick weld them ? We build tube bundles for the oilfield and we have to stick weld the tight areas . Keep the videos coming !
@@noidontthinksolol yep, stick over mig, any on application like this. But chicken scratch welds will pull smoke around welds, the temperature difference also will make it draft out at those points also. Just saying, no disrespect to you.
Yeah, I was going to ask why he didnt stick weld also. Maybe he isnt comfortable with stick. Unless he lays the thing down they would be vertical stick welds and they can be tricky if you dont have experience
I enjoyed watching your video. It looks to me like you did excellent job and I hope it works out very good for you and I will be watching for you videos. God bless.
One thing that might help you recover more of the energy is to burn the wood gas that's collecting in the upper chamber. You just need controlled air inlet to let fresh air into that chamber and you might find the thing generates significantly more heat as well as reducing the "smoke" and other nasties. Cheers!
Problem is that steel surfaces inside have already sucked the heat away from the combustion and there is no more required heat to ignite that secondary fire even if putting additional air in... Fire wood should never be burnt inside steel casing since those surfaces quench the flame leaving a lot of unburnt gases.
Not true, if it is sucking air properly combustion will continue through the exhaust making a complete and smokeless burn which is essentially how "rocket stoves" work. If anything to be more efficient he should have the upper chamber split in two so it has to enter, go the length of the heat exchanger, then go back along the top portion before exhausting out the top that way more heat is effectively transferred. As it is this is a common design flaw I see with this same style.. Most of the heat is barely being used and going right out the exhaust specially with the double opening to the heat exchanger the back part won't be getting as much oxygen and thus burning more incompletely.
Nice setup 👍😁One of the best setups I've seen ..... you put a lot of thought into that. Double barrel stove ... They get super hot 🔥 so be super safe with it.
Nice fab job Kyle. Rick will be proud of you. Now we are going to need firewood videos. That should keep your shop warm and then you will be back to making RD-4 videos.
Great idea, using boiler technology in reverse. In a boiler, the smoke goes through the tubes heating the surrounding water. You have the fire surrounding the tubes instead. Of course, here in Southern California, it wouldn't be needed. Thanks for the video. Jon
It's not technically in reverse, there are both water tube and fire tube boilers. This would be like a water tube boiler with the fire on the outside of the tubes, and instead of water I'm using air. Thanks for watching Jon
@@kylechrist Aren't water tube boilers a pain in the a** to clean? With sut inside tubes you can send a brush through them; with sut around tubes how do you proceed? And while I'm already smartassing: Aren't the media in heat exchangers usually moving in opposing directions? (Most cooled smoke gets coolest air and most heated air gets hottest smoke) Greetings and stay safe
One thing you can add to the tubes to help with the heat transfer is a plate 3" spiral flat plate in the tubes. This will cause the air to rotate outward against the sides of the heat ex-changer tubes.
Very nicely done. The only thing that I'd add would be an intake for outside air. A firebox that big will suck up a LOT of air for combustion and, unless you draw that air from outside, it will suck a lot of your already heated air out of the room and up the chimney. Also, a damper (and/or a low speed inline fan) on the intake makes controlling the combustion rate a whole bunch easier than just a chimney damper. If you want to get fancy, you can thermostatically control the intake fan to increase the burn rate in response to room temperature.
@@jasongrinnell1986 most furnaces will have a exhaust and a fresh air/ combustion intake. Its common and called a sealed combustion furnace. With a fire this large (much larger than what occurs in standard furnace) it will require much more combustion air. He's recommending a combustion air intake basically. All new gas and propane furnaces have this, most are ran up through what's called a concentric vent kit.
@@jasongrinnell1986 wrong , the stove consumes AIR that's what going out the chimmey . many stove have a duct to bring in air from out side to feed in to the intake. rather than using the warm house air that get replaced via air leaks and cracks to the out side. its called make up air , same thing with big vent hoods over stoves
@@jasongrinnell1986 A typical furnace doesn't draw that much air compared to this. While I don't think this will be an issue with his shop, modern houses (Built within the last 20 years) often are so well sealed, a wood burning fireplace can't get enough oxygen and will cause draft issues. Many new houses have a 2" pipe that goes outside to bring air in for the fireplace.
I very much enjoyed watching this build. Years ago we had a similar heat exchanger on our wood boiler made by Magic Heat. They still make them. It would throw so much heat you couldn't stand in front of it. It had a rod in the center with a handle and an internal scraper that would clean the creosote off of the exchanger tubes. It worked very well. You would simply slide the handle back and forth and it would clean the exchanger tubes. It does seem like a lot of work the way you described cleaning yours but it's important that it gets done.
Very good build. I always see people making these wood stove heat exchangers with the fire on the outside of the tubes. Typically with heat exchangers, the fluid more prone to fouling will be inside the tubes since they are easier to clean.
I love this build. Thoughts: -Gussets on the legs tying the legs into the body is cheap insurance. -I wonder if you could extract more heat out of the unit by placing a shop fan at a right angle to the heater and circulate air over the heater as it’s burning. It would draw heat off the external surface of the whole unit while it moves air around your shop. -It would be interesting to see what the exhaust gas temp is at the top of the heat exchanger. That would tell you how well the heat exchanger is doing its job. When I saw the size of this unit the first thing I thought was to put a secondary exchanger to pull more heat before the gas enters the flue. This could be thin wall, like 14 gauge steel. Just some ideas! Too quality build.
I built one almost like that about 35 years ago to heat a shop in Montana. Made it long enough to burn old ceader fence posts. We were putting in new fence, so we had a ton of old posts. I didn't have any fancy tools for making it, just a cutting torch & stick welder. Brought it up to the Ag Show also with some custom gates & cattle guards. Most of the steel was old oil field pipe. It would make some terrible smoke welding it, im surprised I'm still alive.
Kyle , My hat goes off to you !! Great fab/build !! I built a wood burner somewhat like this in high school. Your's is a lot more efficient than mine. Mine was a rectangular cube with 4" pipes running side to side. We had a sheet metal guy build a sheet metal boot around it. Mounted it next to the furnace and attached it to cold air ducts. So all we used on the furnace was the blower. Needless to say, we burned up blower motor in furnace quickly. Too hot ! Once we mounted the motor outside the furnace? It worked like a charm for over 20-25 years. My dad was very happy !
We built a waste oil fired shop heater from a 500 gal tank. The tank is stood up on end with 48 used 2 1/4" boiler tubes. Our steam locomotives are fired on waste oil so the technology is familiar. It will easily turn red if not monitored.
My big concern is the dummy pipe between the upper and lower chamber is a sealed pressure vessel. If you don't already have a vent hole, please add one.
Neat project. I'm wondering about the lower tube - it seems like it would be blowing HOT air right in your face when tending the fire. Personally, I would consider cutting it back and putting a Y made out of a couple 90*s that would direct air to both sides.
Great looking stove well built but it is a good thing you own heavy equipment to move it. No worries about burn through It will be around long after we are both gone. 👍😎
You don't move this by hand, that's for sure. The 20" sch 40 pipe that makes up the two "drums" is 123.11lbs per ft, each piece is 4ft long, so 8ft total. That puts the weight of just those two pieces at 984.88lbs. I'm guessing total weight will be around 1500lbs
Awesome build and it seems like a great design, please post a followup video, with maybe a pro and con. This thing is amaazing, it reminds me of the heat exchangers in the DAC boiler room when I was a kid.
On my shop stove I built a flat above the door to cook on and lined the bottom half way up the the sides with fire brick and use a shovel to clean out the stove ashes. It would be nice to see your door,latch,hinges,and draft control. You did a nice job.
Kyle, I would tap into your blower chamber and use it to run some air into the pipe between the firebox and the heat exchanger. That would give you a secondary burn when you are calling for heat. I would come up with some sort of check valve. Most of the secondary air systems preheat the air before introducing it. I guess you could restrict the opening of your mid-heat exchanger pipe and run it back from near the exit where it is warmer and use that air for a secondary burn.
Secondary chambers are amazing when they work correctly. There was almost no smoke from the stove at my old house when it was warmed up and full of wood.
I was thinking the same thing. It would really improve on efficiency and reduce the soot buildup on the heat exchanger tubes. A fellow could just drill an 1/8" hope of 2 completely through the 6" riser and schedule 40 pipe. Then weld the outer holes closed.
I'm not opposed to something like this, my only concern with this is pressurizing the burn chamber enough that I hurt or even take away the draft. The last thing I want is smoke coming back out of the door or air damper and into my shop
Being a combination pipe welder for 42 years this is extremely doable and I thank you for showing your craftsmanship and professionalism. GREAT IDEA now I need some isos...!!?
For control of the flame you can probably run a bypass tube with a simple valve from the circulation fan and feed it into the burning chamber. It should allow you to control the oxygen going into the burn chamber increasing and decreasing the burn rate of the wood for when you first fire it up you can run a lot of air in, and when the shop is up to temp you can lower the air flow rate.
Wow that is huge I hope it's more than a garage you are heating. Also building a unit that heavy duty pretty much demands you make it into a hot water heat exchanger which would allow you to distribute heat anywhere and anyway you want with a variety of methods. It would still be easy to add a water heat exchanger coil to the end of those big tubes.
I already have a wood boiler that heats my house, I wanted something different and more on demand for my shop as I only work out there a couple nights a week. It's a 40x50 area I'll be heating
Just noticed yer last name.... When yer last name is Christ yer just blessed frum the start I see with the abilities ta do it all and have it all.lucky feller. I'm just funnin, I understand you worked long and hard fer whut you have and can do.wish everyone had an uncle Kyle.
Thanks for the bonus fire lol. You know as men, we are naturally drawn to fire. Just sitting and staring at it for hours, thinking about absolutely nothing 😅
Definitely need a cold air intake going into the top section for a secondary burn in your heat exchanger. Any smoke will get burned and it will also cut down on the creosote buildup.
That was a excellent build you must work in a fab shop having access to all the materials I also worked in a fab shop and the cost of pipe and tube is outrageous plus everyone don't have access to a 20 tube plasma table but that works out in your favor that thing is overkill but will last a very long time great job would like a follow up on how it performs thanks for sharing
My grandfather made a waist oil drip for the wood stove in the shop. I can email you pics if you want. It almost doubles the BTU of the stove. I think he got the idea from farm show magazine. It's pretty simple. a steel bucket with a pipe welded to it going to a petcock, copper tube for 6" then a redundant ball valve, back to copper tube, then a transition to a 4"piece of ¼ or ⅜ pipe going into the top of the stove. It's really simple and a good way to turn old oil into a massive heat increase. It keeps our 75x50 shop warm. Only the bottom half of the walls and the ceiling are insulated. If i keep it stoked I've been in a t shirt borderline sweating with snow on the ground outside.
Looks sharp. I had the same type of heat exchanger setup. Plugged tight with hard creasoat from the moisture caking in it. Probably from burning it to slow with poorly dried wood. Couldn't burn it got enough in the basement but in a shop I think you'll have a better chance to keep it roaring n a little cleaner. 7018 n a buzz box on those long tubes would make light work of it but then you'll loose the nice look of consistent weld pattern.
Nice design, I built one 40 years ago. 28inches on burner box 24inches on exchanger. Used 2 inch boiler tubes. Basically the same blower setup. My leg set up the same, but found out after it is to top heavy, safety factors. Splayed out the new base about 1 ft off the sides. After about 30 yrs of burning hot fire ( burns 3 half length rail ties) the exchanger tubes started cracking out, cut me out and replaced. Arc gouge and 7018 rod. Probably get another 30 yrs service before maintenance again.
Nice job, and some nice toys to assist with that! Thanks for sharing. For ideas you might entertain (after the build is done, of course, and maybe you've addressed these, but having the fire exhaust pass around the tubes in the exchanger makes for a lot of surface area for creosote to accumulate. Creosote fouling reduces exchanger efficiency and requires frequent cleaning. Way back in my younger years, my dad added an eight inch stack heater to our wood stove flue which is pretty much your basic exchanger design, just a bit smaller. It had a free-running tube plate attached to a pull-rod that could be pulled out and in at any time which would scrape off the creosote debris. Another idea might be to pass the flue gasses through the inside of the tubing, and blow air around the outsides - reverse of your design, but that could be a bit more challenging and disruptive to cleaning since each tube would need brushed out individually by removing an access plate, much like I did on my oil boiler. Just some food for thought. Have a Happy New Year!
Wow this is blowing me away a wood burning stove on steroids great job. The bad part is the steel and labor cost would be like Six grand or more..and on the good side in two winters it will pay for itself on fuel costs and last longer than a cast iron stove. And anybody that comes over is going to want you to build them one haha
nice build that plasma cutter makes easy work then the torch lol, i have made one smaller from scrap pieces laying around few years ago and used 1 id pipe for the blower fan in the back so the air would stay constantly hotter was pushing 140 to 160 degree air out warms the shed up fast and no wasted heat
Love it looks amazing and I think it will work a treat! My only complaint and it’s my idiosyncratic brain was the out of level bonus fire footage had to zoom in to ignore🤣 Beautiful work
I don't know if you can do this, but if you have the fan suck instead of blow you will probably get more efficiency out of your heat exchanger. If the air moves through the pipes in the opposite direction to the smoke then the hottest end of the air pipes will also be at the hottest end of the smoke, so more heat can be extracted.
That's a nice stove. I like the heat exchanger and the heavy weight of it. I would have added a flat surface on the top of the burn chamber right in front for a cast iron water pot for steam in the shop. Maybe for cooking a pot of beans.
Hope you'll update when you get it 'finished' and installed. I need to build something bigger for my 40x40 shop ... tired of being cold trying to get things done haha
This is by far the best looking burn barrel heating unit that I have ever seen in TH-cam
Thanks Joe!
A consideration: shorten the sch40 air pipe back to the dumby riser to provide space on top of the fire box to add a small flat "hot" plate. You could keep a pot of coffee warm or toast up your tacos 🌮 🌮 🌮
If he encloses it he could turn that hot plate into a pizza oven
@@RichardCranium321 In the 7-8 minutes it takes to bake a pizza at 500F would dump enough heat in his house to heat a large barn!
@@Bob_Adkins pizza ovens that run that hot don't cook pies for 7 to 8 minutes.... they cook for 70 to 80 seconds then rotate 180° & back in for another 80 seconds... anymore than 3 or 4 minutes and it's burnt
@@RichardCranium321 I know. I bake mine at only 500F and it only takes 8 minutes! Some pizza ovens run at 800F! My point was, that's a large stove and should put out a massive amount of heat! Unless his home is very large, it will only take small fires to heat it.
@@Bob_Adkins pretty sure that's a stove for his workshop, but yeah I know what you mean.
Nice job! I made one of these about 30 years ago for my fathers off grid cabin, same design with 20”x1/2”wall pipe, only thing I did different was to add a stainless steel water tank off the back end, it generated steam for humidity and hot water for washing stuff, it would heat his 750sq ft cabin, so hot you had to open a few windows.
I may add a piece of flat stock to the side of the burn chamber to put a pan of water on, we will see, smaller things like that can always be added/removed down the road
I like the symmetry of the stove and I would maybe change a few things. I would add a plate that would slide on the tubes to scrape off soot or ash the make it more efficient and I would shorten the heat exchanger to about half the size. That would make it more enjoyable to load wood into. The large pipe at the middle is ok, but I think it's gonna be too restrictive. I would incorporate a 1/2 inch plate on the top of the burn chamber in the front to cook on.
Can't wait to see the final setup and find out how well it works, Thank you for the video!
There is a lot of interest so we will do an update video once I've had a chance to test it out in the shop
Looking forward to that
Can't wait for the update video.
I love the idea. Cool video. I do feel like there should be a follow up video on this one with feedback on how effective the stove is working and any possible changes or improvements that you would like to do.
Absolutely 👍
It’s like an industrial version of the Yule log Christmas fireplace channel at the end!! Nice build. I’m sure it will probably outlive you.
That would be ideal!
I am amazed at the thickness of the metal. This is what has to be done for longevity of the stove. Most people just use steel barrel drum which lasts a few seasons and you start over again with a build.
One more thing fella. You should of added a secondary air burn feature. This would reduce the amount of wood needed by at least a half. The amount of ashes left from the combustion process would be just the bear minimum. You would be amazed as the how well that works.
The third thing I can say is to make the stove using stainless steel metal. The look of stainless is just second to NONE !!
Job well done Kyle, PERIOD.
I seen one of these on the Military Channel.
The Heat Exchanger was mounted to the side of an Apache.
Kyle,
i realize i'm a little late to the party and this thing is already in service. overall i have to say you did a really good job of putting this thing together, selected some good materials for the project, however, if and when you ever have to go back and redo parts of this, keep some of the following points in mind:
you didn't give your heat exchanger pipes a means of expansion. in a steam boiler, the fire facing ends are welded to the face plate which you did correctly, however on the exhaust end they get rolled in. there is a device that swages the pipes out to tighten up against the holes in the rear face plate. this way they can still expand in length and girth without putting strain on the welds of the faceplates but still remain airtight. you could try using an automotive exhaust pipe expander unless there is a boiler shop near you... unless i miss my guess, you will back in there rewelding the lower registers of pipes as they take the brunt of the heat rising up and the heating/cooling cycles will cause your welds to crack and allow carbon monoxide to seep out and enter the shop air. if you have no other choice but to weld the exhaust ends of your heat exchanger pipes, i would suggest using a 3/16ths 6013 rod that is used in boiler and steam applications. it does a better job of expanding and contracting at the same rate as the parent material. i didn't catch what grade of wire you were running in the MIG welder which is why i am suggesting it. another advantage to using rod is that you can bend it to get into those nooks and crannies that you were having a hard time getting into with the MIG torch
something else that to take into consideration is the size of your draft. since this is a naturally aspirated and not a forced draft, the fresh air intake should have a slightly larger cross section (5 to 10 %) than the smoke riser going into the heat exchanger with the obstruction of the primary heat exchange pipe. by undersizing the fresh air intake you are starving the fire for oxygen, making the fire smolder. this in turn generates a lot of creosote, nitrous oxides and carbon monoxide which will foul the heat exchanger requiring frequent maintenance. now, by putting a damper in the chimney outlet you create a dam effect that gives you a more complete burn thus increasing the amount of heat gleaned from your fuel as the gasses are slowed way down in the heat exchanger. by partially opening the intake damper and closing the chimney damper a lot of the soot elements carried up off the fire will be combusted as it exits the burn chamber. it also great reduces the amount of CO the stove will generate by giving you a more complete combustion. while stove roaring with a draft open is a cool thing to hear, the fire is subjected to high degree of turbulence. while it may seem you're getting a complete burn. most of your energy is going up the chimney. by closing the damper in the chimney and opening the draft you get a pyrolysis effect that re-combusts the VOCs released by the fire very efficiently. the smoke at 9:36 in part 3 of this series is about 30% of the thermal energy of your fuel going poof!
next, a baffle plate of sorts can be put into the burn chamber to keep the flames from directly entering the heat exchanger during initial daily firing up. that causes the flames to take a more indirect route into the exhaust and re-combusts another large portion of the VOCs and soot released by the flames that will otherwise accumulate in the cooler parts of the system.
the end plates on the burn chamber should have been bowled a slight bit as the expansion of the steel goes out in all directions. at some point in time you will see cracks forming along the weld seams and the endplates will also start to buckle and warp. by them being cupped slightly, it gives the material a place to go when it gets hot and not deform in doing so.
grates are not the best thing to put into a wood burner but if you must then i would recommend cast iron grates. steel webbing will burn up in a few weeks and steel grates will last only marginally longer. you can get inconel grates that will outlast cast iron but those are insanely expensive and unless you get exactly the size you need, they are almost impossible to machine with conventional tooling on a milling machine
now people are probably think i'm totally nuts, but here's a crazy tip for day to day operations: every 2 or 3 days throw a handful of rock salt in the coals of the fire or a few beer cans. there is a product on the market called "Red Devil" (it's kinda spendy) that you do the same thing with. this keeps your chimney pipe clean. it really eats the gunk in the chimney up. i'm not sure what chemical reaction is going on there, maybe somebody who has a better grasp of it can comment. many snows ago when i built my little cabin in Elk City ID, i would do that and never had to clean the chimney pipe...ever
just for reference: i used to help run a 5MW wood fired, forced draft boiler and was tasked with rebuilding the refractory walls of the burn chamber and access hatch, did a lot of the welding of the additions to the low pressure steam distribution system, as well as a majority of the welding of the ductwork for the exhaust gas filtration system of that boiler. so the points i brought up in this comment are based on those experiences and observations
good work, good show and good series, thanks for posting!!
cheers! mike
Awesome build . I would think it will work good . One suggestion on the tubes . Instead of cutting can you stick weld them ? We build tube bundles for the oilfield and we have to stick weld the tight areas . Keep the videos coming !
Or switch to Flux Core for that small area and not run a nozzle.
@@noidontthinksolol yep, stick over mig, any on application like this. But chicken scratch welds will pull smoke around welds, the temperature difference also will make it draft out at those points also.
Just saying, no disrespect to you.
Yeah, I was going to ask why he didnt stick weld also. Maybe he isnt comfortable with stick. Unless he lays the thing down they would be vertical stick welds and they can be tricky if you dont have experience
Stick weld is my flavor!
I enjoyed watching your video. It looks to me like you did excellent job and I hope it works out very good for you and I will be watching for you videos. God bless.
One thing that might help you recover more of the energy is to burn the wood gas that's collecting in the upper chamber. You just need controlled air inlet to let fresh air into that chamber and you might find the thing generates significantly more heat as well as reducing the "smoke" and other nasties. Cheers!
Problem is that steel surfaces inside have already sucked the heat away from the combustion and there is no more required heat to ignite that secondary fire even if putting additional air in... Fire wood should never be burnt inside steel casing since those surfaces quench the flame leaving a lot of unburnt gases.
@@JuhaErkkila good point. so the interior would have needed to have a fire brick lining being considering that plan then.
Not true, if it is sucking air properly combustion will continue through the exhaust making a complete and smokeless burn which is essentially how "rocket stoves" work.
If anything to be more efficient he should have the upper chamber split in two so it has to enter, go the length of the heat exchanger, then go back along the top portion before exhausting out the top that way more heat is effectively transferred. As it is this is a common design flaw I see with this same style.. Most of the heat is barely being used and going right out the exhaust specially with the double opening to the heat exchanger the back part won't be getting as much oxygen and thus burning more incompletely.
@@SilvaDreams I think he only has 1 opening to the rear of the combustion chamber. The other was a dummy coming up near the front of the fire box
@@SilvaDreams There is only a single entry and exit to the heat exchanger, and they are at opposite ends.
Nice setup 👍😁One of the best setups I've seen ..... you put a lot of thought into that.
Double barrel stove ... They get super hot 🔥 so be super safe with it.
Thanks Dan, I looked into doing a simple double barrel setup but I wanted something that will last and that has a decent ash cleanout
Nice fab job Kyle. Rick will be proud of you. Now we are going to need firewood videos. That should keep your shop warm and then you will be back to making RD-4 videos.
That's the plan Chuck, a warm shop will be awesome!
Great idea, using boiler technology in reverse. In a boiler, the smoke goes through the tubes heating the surrounding water. You have the fire surrounding the tubes instead. Of course, here in Southern California, it wouldn't be needed. Thanks for the video. Jon
It's not technically in reverse, there are both water tube and fire tube boilers. This would be like a water tube boiler with the fire on the outside of the tubes, and instead of water I'm using air. Thanks for watching Jon
@@kylechrist Aren't water tube boilers a pain in the a** to clean? With sut inside tubes you can send a brush through them; with sut around tubes how do you proceed?
And while I'm already smartassing:
Aren't the media in heat exchangers usually moving in opposing directions? (Most cooled smoke gets coolest air and most heated air gets hottest smoke)
Greetings and stay safe
One thing you can add to the tubes to help with the heat transfer is a plate 3" spiral flat plate in the tubes. This will cause the air to rotate outward against the sides of the heat ex-changer tubes.
Very nicely done. The only thing that I'd add would be an intake for outside air. A firebox that big will suck up a LOT of air for combustion and, unless you draw that air from outside, it will suck a lot of your already heated air out of the room and up the chimney. Also, a damper (and/or a low speed inline fan) on the intake makes controlling the combustion rate a whole bunch easier than just a chimney damper. If you want to get fancy, you can thermostatically control the intake fan to increase the burn rate in response to room temperature.
Or you can just recirculate the air inside to make it warmer. Does the furnace in your house suck air from the outside to heat your home?
@@jasongrinnell1986 you just don't get it
@@jasongrinnell1986 most furnaces will have a exhaust and a fresh air/ combustion intake. Its common and called a sealed combustion furnace.
With a fire this large (much larger than what occurs in standard furnace) it will require much more combustion air. He's recommending a combustion air intake basically. All new gas and propane furnaces have this, most are ran up through what's called a concentric vent kit.
@@jasongrinnell1986 wrong , the stove consumes AIR that's what going out the chimmey . many stove have a duct to bring in air from out side to feed in to the intake. rather than using the warm house air that get replaced via air leaks and cracks to the out side.
its called make up air , same thing with big vent hoods over stoves
@@jasongrinnell1986 A typical furnace doesn't draw that much air compared to this. While I don't think this will be an issue with his shop, modern houses (Built within the last 20 years) often are so well sealed, a wood burning fireplace can't get enough oxygen and will cause draft issues. Many new houses have a 2" pipe that goes outside to bring air in for the fireplace.
I very much enjoyed watching this build. Years ago we had a similar heat exchanger on our wood boiler made by Magic Heat. They still make them. It would throw so much heat you couldn't stand in front of it. It had a rod in the center with a handle and an internal scraper that would clean the creosote off of the exchanger tubes. It worked very well. You would simply slide the handle back and forth and it would clean the exchanger tubes. It does seem like a lot of work the way you described cleaning yours but it's important that it gets done.
TORRID AIR Blower...We had one too. Ever seen those tubes glow ?
Oh Yeah! They would glow cherry red.
Very good build. I always see people making these wood stove heat exchangers with the fire on the outside of the tubes. Typically with heat exchangers, the fluid more prone to fouling will be inside the tubes since they are easier to clean.
I bet that fire box would be even better with some fire brick in it. Very Nice Job.
Sturdiest stove on you tube. It will last forever. Very well built.
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Love your videos. I’m from Ontario
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It's like the double oil drum furnace, except you have to list it in your will.
Haha, thanks for the laugh Chris!
Great job!!!!
With a few weeks gone by, lets see the follow-up video.
Let's see it running in the shop.
That is sweet. Functional plus it looks like some kind of future robot weapon. Bonus points for that...
I love this build.
Thoughts:
-Gussets on the legs tying the legs into the body is cheap insurance.
-I wonder if you could extract more heat out of the unit by placing a shop fan at a right angle to the heater and circulate air over the heater as it’s burning. It would draw heat off the external surface of the whole unit while it moves air around your shop.
-It would be interesting to see what the exhaust gas temp is at the top of the heat exchanger. That would tell you how well the heat exchanger is doing its job. When I saw the size of this unit the first thing I thought was to put a secondary exchanger to pull more heat before the gas enters the flue. This could be thin wall, like 14 gauge steel.
Just some ideas!
Too quality build.
nice to see someone putting in clean out access. most youtube DIY stove makers don't consider it
I built one almost like that about 35 years ago to heat a shop in Montana. Made it long enough to burn old ceader fence posts. We were putting in new fence, so we had a ton of old posts. I didn't have any fancy tools for making it, just a cutting torch & stick welder. Brought it up to the Ag Show also with some custom gates & cattle guards. Most of the steel was old oil field pipe. It would make some terrible smoke welding it, im surprised I'm still alive.
As usual another great video Sir.
Thanks!
Kyle , My hat goes off to you !! Great fab/build !! I built a wood burner somewhat like this in high school. Your's is a lot more efficient than mine. Mine was a rectangular cube with 4" pipes running side to side. We had a sheet metal guy build a sheet metal boot around it. Mounted it next to the furnace and attached it to cold air ducts. So all we used on the furnace was the blower. Needless to say, we burned up blower motor in furnace quickly. Too hot ! Once we mounted the motor outside the furnace? It worked like a charm for over 20-25 years. My dad was very happy !
Very nice. Well built
Thanks!
Man you built it hell for stout. Your grandkids will be using it!
So all the pipe and plate steel was leftover drop that was destined for the scrap barrel, I figured I could make something useful out of it
@@kylechrist absolutely! That 20” sch40 ain’t cheap when you hafta buy it. I used to sell it so I know. Great looking job buddy!
@@dwjr5129 no its not, thanks!
We built a waste oil fired shop heater from a 500 gal tank. The tank is stood up on end with 48 used 2 1/4" boiler tubes. Our steam locomotives are fired on waste oil so the technology is familiar. It will easily turn red if not monitored.
Beautiful job it looks like it drawing well and will be even better with a chimney. It would be neat to have an Isinglass window in the door.
Thanks, unfortunately all I have is a solid cast iron door
@@kylechrist A much more practical solution
My big concern is the dummy pipe between the upper and lower chamber is a sealed pressure vessel. If you don't already have a vent hole, please add one.
The welds have an 1/8" gap on the top weld in the back of the dummy pipe 👍
Looking forward to seeing this in action!
hey brother I be making complementary comments on your mig welding you are definitely burning in beautiful welds bro
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Could reach between the tubes with some 7018, stove looks good!
Kyle.... Very nice !!!
Thanks!
Neat project. I'm wondering about the lower tube - it seems like it would be blowing HOT air right in your face when tending the fire. Personally, I would consider cutting it back and putting a Y made out of a couple 90*s that would direct air to both sides.
Or cap the front and add a row of holes down the side of the middle area. There's going to be lots of heat coming out the front of the HX.
Great looking stove well built but it is a good thing you own heavy equipment to move it. No worries about burn through It will be around long after we are both gone. 👍😎
You don't move this by hand, that's for sure. The 20" sch 40 pipe that makes up the two "drums" is 123.11lbs per ft, each piece is 4ft long, so 8ft total. That puts the weight of just those two pieces at 984.88lbs. I'm guessing total weight will be around 1500lbs
You have access to a hell of a shop there son !
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Good video, Kyle! That is a beast and should be an heirloom! Great build!
Thanks Martin!
Pretty sweet setup Kyle, some thought went into this and I believe it will work great.
Thanks Larry
Beautiful design and workmanship! I hope your grates will also be SS. My rebar grates only last about 2 years!
Awesome build and it seems like a great design, please post a followup video, with maybe a pro and con. This thing is amaazing, it reminds me of the heat exchangers in the DAC boiler room when I was a kid.
On my shop stove I built a flat above the door to cook on and lined the bottom half way up the the sides with fire brick and use a shovel to clean out the stove ashes.
It would be nice to see your door,latch,hinges,and draft control.
You did a nice job.
Looks great , good job . I'll be looking forward to the update video .
Nice build. It is a beast...
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Kyle, I would tap into your blower chamber and use it to run some air into the pipe between the firebox and the heat exchanger. That would give you a secondary burn when you are calling for heat. I would come up with some sort of check valve. Most of the secondary air systems preheat the air before introducing it. I guess you could restrict the opening of your mid-heat exchanger pipe and run it back from near the exit where it is warmer and use that air for a secondary burn.
Secondary chambers are amazing when they work correctly. There was almost no smoke from the stove at my old house when it was warmed up and full of wood.
I was thinking the same thing. It would really improve on efficiency and reduce the soot buildup on the heat exchanger tubes. A fellow could just drill an 1/8" hope of 2 completely through the 6" riser and schedule 40 pipe. Then weld the outer holes closed.
I'm not opposed to something like this, my only concern with this is pressurizing the burn chamber enough that I hurt or even take away the draft. The last thing I want is smoke coming back out of the door or air damper and into my shop
Being a combination pipe welder for 42 years this is extremely doable and I thank you for showing your craftsmanship and professionalism.
GREAT IDEA now I need some isos...!!?
Pretty relaxing watching that fire burning away
I agree Shane!
@@kylechrist yeah i relaxed to the point where i zoned right out and just gazed into the fire . Thanks Kyle i needed that its been a while.
Nice job, thanks.
Thanks for watching
That's so cool to have access to machines like that I always wanted to learn how to weld
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For control of the flame you can probably run a bypass tube with a simple valve from the circulation fan and feed it into the burning chamber. It should allow you to control the oxygen going into the burn chamber increasing and decreasing the burn rate of the wood for when you first fire it up you can run a lot of air in, and when the shop is up to temp you can lower the air flow rate.
Great design and assembly.
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Hey that's cool as hell great job
Looking good. She burns nice,
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Awesome welds sir 🤝
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very impressive and an amazing addition to a big shop
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Awww, 27:00 I could have enjoyed another 10 minutes of FIREPLACE video here at The End... Kyle you now have a fallback profession.!
GREAT planning!
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Wow that is huge I hope it's more than a garage you are heating. Also building a unit that heavy duty pretty much demands you make it into a hot water heat exchanger which would allow you to distribute heat anywhere and anyway you want with a variety of methods. It would still be easy to add a water heat exchanger coil to the end of those big tubes.
I already have a wood boiler that heats my house, I wanted something different and more on demand for my shop as I only work out there a couple nights a week. It's a 40x50 area I'll be heating
Good work. We shared this video on our homemade tools forum this week 😎
Now that is a stove , great work pal,nice welding to.
Thanks 👍
Nice shop
Congratulations on passing 7,000 subs
You been gone a few months??
Just noticed yer last name....
When yer last name is Christ yer just blessed frum the start I see with the abilities ta do it all and have it all.lucky feller.
I'm just funnin, I understand you worked long and hard fer whut you have and can do.wish everyone had an uncle Kyle.
Thanks for the bonus fire lol. You know as men, we are naturally drawn to fire. Just sitting and staring at it for hours, thinking about absolutely nothing 😅
Definitely need a cold air intake going into the top section for a secondary burn in your heat exchanger. Any smoke will get burned and it will also cut down on the creosote buildup.
Idk what you do for a living, but you definitely have pipe fitting of boil baking experience. Great job.
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That was a excellent build you must work in a fab shop having access to all the materials I also worked in a fab shop and the cost of pipe and tube is outrageous plus everyone don't have access to a 20 tube plasma table but that works out in your favor that thing is overkill but will last a very long time great job would like a follow up on how it performs thanks for sharing
Thanks! There is a part 2 and 3 out for the wood stove, I will also be doing a 1 year review/update soon
My grandfather made a waist oil drip for the wood stove in the shop. I can email you pics if you want. It almost doubles the BTU of the stove. I think he got the idea from farm show magazine. It's pretty simple. a steel bucket with a pipe welded to it going to a petcock, copper tube for 6" then a redundant ball valve, back to copper tube, then a transition to a 4"piece of ¼ or ⅜ pipe going into the top of the stove. It's really simple and a good way to turn old oil into a massive heat increase. It keeps our 75x50 shop warm. Only the bottom half of the walls and the ceiling are insulated. If i keep it stoked I've been in a t shirt borderline sweating with snow on the ground outside.
Looks sharp. I had the same type of heat exchanger setup. Plugged tight with hard creasoat from the moisture caking in it. Probably from burning it to slow with poorly dried wood. Couldn't burn it got enough in the basement but in a shop I think you'll have a better chance to keep it roaring n a little cleaner. 7018 n a buzz box on those long tubes would make light work of it but then you'll loose the nice look of consistent weld pattern.
Very nice build! Your a craftsman.
Thanks!
Good and stout! I like it.
Nice design, I built one 40 years ago. 28inches on burner box 24inches on exchanger. Used 2 inch boiler tubes. Basically the same blower setup. My leg set up the same, but found out after it is to top heavy, safety factors. Splayed out the new base about 1 ft off the sides.
After about 30 yrs of burning hot fire ( burns 3 half length rail ties) the exchanger tubes started cracking out, cut me out and replaced. Arc gouge and 7018 rod. Probably get another 30 yrs service before maintenance again.
Thanks, I'd love to get 30-40 years use out of this
Nice! Gonna build one like that, if I can find my plate and pipe laser cutters.
An extremely interesting project. I admire your skills and ingenuity. Possibly it would be advisable to mount it on locking wheels
It's not going to be portable as the exhaust has to go out the roof
Nice job, and some nice toys to assist with that! Thanks for sharing.
For ideas you might entertain (after the build is done, of course, and maybe you've addressed these, but having the fire exhaust pass around the tubes in the exchanger makes for a lot of surface area for creosote to accumulate. Creosote fouling reduces exchanger efficiency and requires frequent cleaning. Way back in my younger years, my dad added an eight inch stack heater to our wood stove flue which is pretty much your basic exchanger design, just a bit smaller. It had a free-running tube plate attached to a pull-rod that could be pulled out and in at any time which would scrape off the creosote debris. Another idea might be to pass the flue gasses through the inside of the tubing, and blow air around the outsides - reverse of your design, but that could be a bit more challenging and disruptive to cleaning since each tube would need brushed out individually by removing an access plate, much like I did on my oil boiler.
Just some food for thought. Have a Happy New Year!
Excellent Work & Design
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Very nice wood stove
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Wow this is blowing me away a wood burning stove on steroids great job. The bad part is the steel and labor cost would be like Six grand or more..and on the good side in two winters it will pay for itself on fuel costs and last longer than a cast iron stove. And anybody that comes over is going to want you to build them one haha
Haha this is my one and only stove so it has to last 👍
nice build that plasma cutter makes easy work then the torch lol, i have made one smaller from scrap pieces laying around few years ago and used 1 id pipe for the blower fan in the back so the air would stay constantly hotter was pushing 140 to 160 degree air out warms the shed up fast and no wasted heat
😎👍🔥cold potato slices on the eyes
Love it looks amazing and I think it will work a treat! My only complaint and it’s my idiosyncratic brain was the out of level bonus fire footage had to zoom in to ignore🤣 Beautiful work
I built one very similar to this and works amazingly
Only thing is after using it a while it clogs up and have no way to clean the soot out
Drill a couple holes in the dummy pipe, fill it with water and it will add some moisture to your shop..
Kinda looks like a simplified boiler. I like it. I hope it works like you envisioned.
More or less that's exactly what it is, thanks Clyde
Very good Video 👍👍👍
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I don't know if you can do this, but if you have the fan suck instead of blow you will probably get more efficiency out of your heat exchanger. If the air moves through the pipes in the opposite direction to the smoke then the hottest end of the air pipes will also be at the hottest end of the smoke, so more heat can be extracted.
Fan will overheat.
Now this would be absolutely killer the buy this a a diy kit with different sizes
That's a nice stove. I like the heat exchanger and the heavy weight of it. I would have added a flat surface on the top of the burn chamber right in front for a cast iron water pot for steam in the shop. Maybe for cooking a pot of beans.
Great Job, for better stability I would add some 1/ 2 flat bar steel on the feet that extend 4" past the legs!!
Hope you'll update when you get it 'finished' and installed. I need to build something bigger for my 40x40 shop ... tired of being cold trying to get things done haha
Will do 👍
Top Work,looks like a Machine Gun.I think made a lot off heat. Good work
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this is really nice and beefy. you should build these and sell them!!!!
Maybe build in a scraper plate in the heat exchanger that you can pull back and forth to knock that build up off the tubes.
Nice build👍 Your voice sure sounds like Chris Wolfe🤔 from Wolfe ridge log splitters.
I feel warmer already!
Just need to install it yet haha