Tim, be careful using brass fittings at those temperatures, they will de-zincify, leaving a soft spongy material that will fail. Also be mindful of the dubious quality of the gutter bolts holding the lid of your pressure vessel on, best to replace them with some grade 8 or above when you start making pressure. Very interesting as usual! 👍
Thank you Tim and Sandra for your video s awesome ! In us were I worked we bent a lot heavy wall pipe we did it the old fashion way we welded a cap on one end Of the pipe pack with dry sand fill weld cap on end make fixture heat take your time bending we used heavy wall it won’t kink I’m was told u can use wax never tryed just something to think about
I liked the idea of water running through the grate a bit better than steam because keeping the steel at a lower temp would help keep it from rusting out. Guess that might have made the fire burn too cold and been a bad idea anyway. It sure is a nice design as is. The plasma cutter is the perfect tool for this stuff. Your matches don't flame up because you've got so much steam that it's pushing all the oxygen away. Matches need a bit of air after the chemical oxidizer on the tip is used up.
I agree with your idea of running water through either the grate, or a portion of the tubing in the chimney. It takes a huge amount of energy to boil water, but only a bit more to superheat it. I think the reason the steam volume was so low is that the boiler needs more surface area in boiling section and less in the super heater. Also, I would suggest a larger firebox for more BTUs before having to add more wood.
I disagree with you here, you actually don't need a whole lot of steam in terms of volume to get work from it, the most important are temperature and thus pressure, this is exactly the reason why in every coal fired power station the water is boiled in the wall of the boiler and super heated in the heating elements in the fire box, especially as the system is self regulating once you are actually running at pressure, the best way to run this system would actually to be boil the water in the chimney, then going though the flu box and finally into the fire box.
The high pressure steam blasting out is blowing out the match. You can see the match starter burning completely. He should have pulled away as soon as they started to ignite.
Detroit "TRASH BURNER" at near INTERSECTION of I-75 + I-94 ...used a heavy steel conveyor grating to *BURN GARBAGE* ...FUEL OIL WAS SPRAYED ONTO GARBAGE TO IGNITE/ BURN WET GARBAGE ...SLOWLY MOVING GRATING/ CONVEYOR SLOWLY , METHODICALLY MOVED LEFT-OVER NON-COMBUSTIBLE MATERIAL OUT OF FIRE BOX TO A DUMPSTER .....STANDARD BOILER TUBES (~5/8 thick ) ALLOY TUBES WORE THIN VERY FAST ...SO ...AUTOMATIC M.I.G. WIRE WELDERS COVERED ENTIRE BOILER TUBES WITH ~ 1/8 inch THICK STAINLESS STEEL .....IF YOU BUY A STEAM CLEANER MACHINE ...small WATER RESERVOIR or DIRECT CONNECTION TO A WATER HOSE (COMMERCIAL CARPET , STEAM CLEANING MACHINES ) ..."BOILER" IS 100% , ~1/2 inch O.D. STAINLESS STEEL TUBE IN A MASSIVE MULTI COIL ....ANYONE CAN EASILY INVESTIGATE , PHOTOGRAPH ",JUNK/SCRAP YARD" UNITS or ...NEW UNITS IN "SHOWROOM" ......IS EFFICIENCY EXCEEDING 15% .....MOST COAL FIRED POWER PLANT ELECTRIC GENERATOR (A.C.) are ~32 % efficient >>> coal in >>> electricity out ....they have a shredded metal rotating HEST EXCHANGER THAT RECOVERS HEAT FROM SMOKE STACK and FEEDS **HOT** AIR INTO FIRE BOX , RAISING EFFICIENCY ~5% (?) ....use a AXIAL , PERMANENT MAGNET A.C. GENERATOR *** NO STEEL NEAR WINDINGS *** and raise GENERATOR EFFICIENCY !! ... COMPARED TO COMMON ROTOR/ STRATOR type **1850** designs
Not sure if its been mentioned already, but depending on how much 'spare' steam you have, you could fit a blower up the chimney to increase the draught.
That's what i thought. Without knowing much about oven/boiler designing, the new design around 6:55 looks pretty darn good and professional! Reminds me of some vintage indoor ovens used in log houses? 😅
Two working safety valves is critical. These are off the shelf components from model engineering suppliers. In you UK you have plenty of sources like blackgates
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 a lot of model engineering parts are made by people in the hobby. Still at reasonable prices. I’m not familiar with model engineering in your neck of the woods but I’m sure you have them. Well worth the time. Also take a look at a blower for the chimney. Basically a ring with very small holes. 1/64th. Tiny jet of steam up the chimney drawing the fire.
You can't talk steam without the idea of a steam engine.... but that might be beyond a DIY project... however a single cylinder steam engine hooked to a dynamo would provide a quick energy source :)
At what pressure do you plan on operating the boiler at? Your feed water will have to have greater pressure then the boiler pressure to avoid a low water situation AKA turning it into a bomb. If you don't plan on making pressure greater than your standard water hose pressure a check valve would still be a good idea to prevent steam from entering your water pipes. Consider any pressure you make in a closed system will not be easily controlled you should try and have multiple safety valves. The water heater safety valve you currently have installed isn't meant for steam use but pressurized hot water. Good luck and safe boiling!
@@jameskniskern2261 Yes, as long as the steam is not put to any work, the system is opened, but as soon as the steam sees an obstacle, such as trying to operate a steam engine, pressure will begin to build.
@@Gin-toki if the pressure builds there is a safety valve that is the blow off point. There is no collection reservoir to build pressure the pressure is created forward of the float valve. He may need a check valve on the water to prevent steam backflow. But with a safety valve at the 1st stage boiler, the entire steam generation system is protected by said valve.
Hi Tim, just in case you burn yourself, keep a bottle of clean water near. In my experience (below 250°C), it's really helpful to lower your skin temperature as quick as possible (within seconds) after a burn. Then keep the injury under a tap for as long as it hurts. Thank you and Sandra for your great videos!
And salt as well. If the burned skin is intact, just after heat contact, use cold water first and apply a lot of salt. It prevents from the 2nd degree burns and blisters, I think, due to osmotic draining of excessive liquid.
@@bonobo9904 dear bonobo9904, please, with no offense meant, look up proppper burn wound treatment online. Applying salt is one of the last things you should do as far as I am informed.
I think bending the tube would have a couple advantages. Firstly, I guess I'm not certain how it applies to steam, but for fluids like water or air, a long sweeping curve allows for greater flow without interruption or eddy currents. It would also eliminate your problems with welding and pinholes. If you find a spring that fits nicely either inside or outside of the tubing, this will allow you to make 180 degree bends without kinking the pipe. A lot of people suggest filling the pipe with sand, this works well but I think it is far too time consuming.
Nice idea. The only problem I see is the thickness of the tube wall and the radii you want here are not practical for it to work ..... and spring bending only works with copper pipe so the grate is out for that! Your pinhole problem can be fixed (next time, because there is always a next time) by grinding the cut edges of the tube to be welded at 45 degree. This would allow for deeper penetration of weld rather than just the surface .... the finished weld will look better too ;0) It is a bit out of fashion nowadays but Gas welding might give the best results with the grate but is probably not worth it unless you are doing production runs. If you had run your gas torch on the original chimney it could have started the draw causing the exhaust fumes to then take over the heating ..... but your fix was more elegant! I have just found this channel ..... Well worth a sub!
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 trumpet 🎺 and other brass horn makers use frozen soapy 🧼 water. Soapy enough to easily blow bubbles with the water. Freeze it then bend it. You'll also want to use a very high grade of stainless steel tubing meant for this type of heat exchange. At superheated temperatures 🌡, the steam will actually begin to break down some and into hydrogen and oxygen. And will rapidly degrade the steel otherwise.
In this case the extra turbulence is likely beneficial to the longer exposure of the liquid/vapor to heat. Nothing to solve, but good thiunking when flow is the restriction (it isn't here).
Copper tube would be fine, Melting point of copper is almost 2000 degrees Fahrenheit A wood fire is only about 1200 degrees Fahrenheit Also I would suggest a bigger firebox
I always want your videos to be like 30 minutes longer.. you've made great progress! My advice is, keep testing and redesigning like you already are. You're a great engineer.
By the looks of it, the matches ignited, but then they were starved of oxygen due to being surrounded by blowing steam, matches also don't work to well in "wind" (from the steam shooting out). Try to move them out of the steam while the match head is still combusting, to see if that works. Just my 2 cents worth.
Now they are making a microwave boiler that its basically like a gas boiler but with a huge magnetron inside and its super fast and efficient to heat up water using electricity, like a big microwave
I find that I need to get some draw up the flue of my rocket stove, before lightimg the main firebox. Otherwise the convection from the firebox comes straight out, rather than up the flue. In my case, I can shove a burning rag down the burn chamber and into te base of the first flue riser. Once the draw is there all is good.
1 brazing over the ground welds. 2 please learn what a locomotive steam "Dome" is and how and why they work. 3 never let a steam boiler of any kind run dry. NOT EVER NO MATTER THE REASON. 4 Please continue your experiments and consider keeping all pressure experiments inside a walled roofless enclosure perhaps made of used tires. 5 ( My personal favorite) Practice screaming the word RUN!!!!! AS you set your best foot work example. This has the added benefit of making sure no one relocates your tools or enters your shop area without a phone call or a previous reservation.
Armstrong hydroelectric machine may be of intrest-he was contiunously charging 33 square feet of a battery array or(perhaps lieden jars) .If you in England it can be found a Newcastle Museum.
You should Get a Cordless Leaf blower (With few metal Stove Flu Tube + metal Interface plate mod To Jump Start the fire in Under 3~5 mins You could use the Unused stream to Accelerate Air flow with venturi effect - Exhaust steam injector > Vacuum ejector up the flu stack with a Y Regulator valve keeps steam moving And increases the Fire Temp idling so when you put the Regulator to drive You Already have the Stream power and heat needed
The draft problem with the first version of the stove could have been solved by pre-heating the chimney with the torch. Keep something smouldering at the rim of the fire chamber to create a little smoke, then pre-heat the chimney until the smoke is drawn down and into the fire chamber, and THEN light the fire.
FWIW, I could tell just by looking that it wasn't a rocket stove. With one of those, you couldn't use copper in the chimney because it would literally melt if the water ran out. (They can easily hit 1KC in the (well insulated) chimney.) In fact, rocket stoves stop producing smoke after five minutes or so because the chimney heats up past the ignition point of the volatiles in the smoke. You couldn't even use regular steel; you'd have to use stainless steel tubing to withstand the high temperatures. What I'm saying is that you'd be better off basing your design on a rocket stove.
I have a "REAL" flash boiler. I use a stainless steel receiver placed at the focal length (10") of a 6-foot-radius tracking concentrating solar mirror, which reduces 48 square feet to 0.5 square feet. Suffice to say, my injection pump turns several droplets of water into instant 2,000 psig dry steam INSTANTANEOUSLY !!
Next time Bend the pipe with a pipe bender to make your round ends so you can weld straight bits. Also to weld 90* corners like that your going to want to use a brazing torch and high temp brazing rod.
More pressure will raise the boiling point several degrees, but the heated steam is dangerous and not just to bare hands, check valves preventing backward steam flow and an orifice with a changeable insert that allows the user a custom selection of flow control / (length x diameter variables, carburetor jets would work if used direct in line) that will pick it up to the point of removing muscular and connective tissue from bones (we used steam at the meat processing station for sanittizing and mechanical cleaning and it works thoroughly and instantly.
get rid of burning wood and make a section for a waste oil burner of your own design, steam will naturally goto a Steam engine, which can then power your house :)
NO, not more powerr... Less power, slower welding (slower feeding material) = more time to fill the cracks aka have a better flow. Not to low, because then it does not merge well. Start (testweld) low and then increase till you have a good flowbed that seals completely. For most cases, lower is better, but to low = no go... Another helpful trick for improving your welds: Tag it in position and start welding at the most difficult spot to the easiest spot. That way you weld has a higher chance to be consistent and even improve during the weld. Start the other way around... Then the chance of your weld getting worse is almost guaranteed, because the rise in difficultly.. This also prevents for spending lots of time on corrections... If the start is bad, then you have less to correct then when you finish the weld completely...
I quess if you reverse the "steamstream" in the loops it will be more effecient kinda like a liebigcooler but then in stead off cooling it will heat off course might be something to think about. Greetz from belgium
Perhaps just make the walls and floor of the firebox itself a water container. Bending copper pipe can be done with with sand or salt inside it. Americans add it to the outside of the chimney.
Mig welders are not the best for air tight welds. When you stop welding the wire can burn back towards the the tip leaving a tunnel in your weld. Enjoyed this video
That is really quite amazing. Superheated steam will set paper alight so if I had to guess I might reason the temperature of the steam still is not high enough. Perhaps a greater amount of a smaller diameter tubing in the firebox may do the trick. Enjoyable content as usual, cheers!
Why don't you just build a fire tube boiler like what's on a locomotive the Firebox is in two pieces you have an inner and outer Firebox and you have water in between the two is known as the muttering as we're all the sediments gather the bottom of 2 walled Firebox look up fire tube boilers they work a lot better than what you're trying to build
cleaning that fire box is going to be a chore, and it is rather small so you will be refueling the box often. Still a cool project. I gave you a sub because I am curious what your end goal is with the steam.
in the original design, dropping some lit paper down the stove pipe and then lighting your fuel in the main compartment should have gotten the draft moving. it's a method used in some rocket stove designs.
Your dry steam still looks a little wet. I don't know if its not hot enough, too much water, or you need a reduction pipe to increase the pressue and therefore the temperature. Keep up the grate work, lol.
Get a plumbers pressure test so you know if it will take double max working pressure. Secondly silicone rtv and heat and pressure it is bad news, great on cam box on car - not great for application your using it for
Will superheated steam not corrode the steel superheater tubes rather quickly? On my model steam loco the superheater tube is stainless for this reason.
perhaps a later try could include a small pyroliser, a can to heat wood, to produce gas and charcoal to fire the boiler together, gas for a secondary burner after the grate or something.
Great video brother I follow a TH-camr by the name of BC blades And he makes a wood gasafire Stove it gives off no smoke If you were to adapt that to your boiler it would make it more efficient Please forgive me I do not know how to put the link in the Call Matt
By the way most steam locomotives use excess steam in the starting cycle, to vent smoke out the flue. As soon as steam is being made, it is used to draw the smoke out the stack.
Very impressive. The whole thing is a boiler, not just stage 1 - you have boiled water to dry steam in 3 stages. A cyclone separator between stages 1 and 2 might improve efficiency and would certainly extend the life of the boiler, as water droplets going into stage 2 will tend to cause errosion. Stage3 is in fact a superheater as the steam ought to be dry saturated as it exits stage2. Obviously if you vent stage 3 to atmosphere this cannot be demonstrated. Your matcheads burn demonstating that the steam is dry. Don't expect a visible flame from a match in a hurricane!
What seemed to be missing when you were firing up the stove first time in the video was a blower to draw the fire up the chimney and start a good draft.
So now is the question how to convert this dry steam into a kinetic force? Next logical step for a steam locomotive would be a steam cylinder operating a rod that drives the wheels. But i think that is way to complicated to manufacture said cylinder, you need a lathe for that. How about going the way Ferdinand Porsche choose while designing his version of the Tiger tank? In order to save weight of the transmission (which was one of the Achilles heels of the final Tiger due to overload), Ferdinand went with electric powertrain. The engine powered a electric generator, while electric motors powered the driving sprocket. I think this way you will save a lot of troubles compared to a pure mechanical design. Greetings from Germany :)
Since it doesn't take much energy to superheat the steam, the grate alone may be good enough for superheating, you could use the pipe in the chimney for something else, for example preheating the feed water... You may also mount some kind of funnel to the "wood input door", so it feeds itself by gravity and you don't need to put new wood in every 10 minutes... A steam pressure regulated air inlet would also be great, so the air inlet gets closed when the steam pressure is too high. Of course that is a little hard to build, for a test version it should work with a manually regulated air inlet. But for a final version you may consider using something like a spring loaded steam piston, which opens the air inlet when steam pressure is low, and closes the air inlet when steam pressure is high...
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 You just need higher temperatures, but the needed energy is wayyyy lower... For example: If your fire produces a usable power output(without losses) of 1kW, and you start with 1kg(approx.1Liter)of water, it takes 418 seconds to heat the water from 0°C to 100°C. To convert all the water to steam it takes additional 2230 seconds. But to superheat all the steam from 100°C to 200°C it just takes less than 200 seconds... To make this numbers more useful for continuous steam production, i calculated it for 1kW of heat input and 10°C feed water temperature: From 1kW total input power, you need 135 Watts for preheating the water, 800 Watts for producing steam, and 65 Watts for superheating the steam to 200°C. These numbers are just for steam without any pressure. As the pressure (and therefore the boiling temperature) rises, you need more energy for preheating the feed water and less energy for superheating the steam to 200°C...
What stops the steam from the boiler going back up the water supply pipe rather than/in addition to up the chimney heat exchanger? Does the water supply pipe have a one way check valve on it?
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 I said in your last blog if you could hook it up to a car turbo charger you could get some work out of it. Then if you direct the exhausted steam into a cooler chamber that will create a vacuum and reduce boiler pressure
Match stick trick was too close to the fast steam. It got blown out. You need to wave it past. In for heat and out to stay alight. Great work on the new design.
You're going to need annual boiler inspections now. BTW, they make cheap thick walled bends. In the size you want them mandrel bends are very very cheap. They have wide and narrow radii to choose from too. The thing is the way you've done it may make for more efficient heat transfer than smooth bends but it is worth knowing they're out there.
Definitly you need now an compound steam engine, to drive the chip machine or the charcoal mill...! Fantastic things you made, you inspire me to build also an narro gauge railway (600mm) in my yard for log transport to my workshop! What an fun!!
Tim, be careful using brass fittings at those temperatures, they will de-zincify, leaving a soft spongy material that will fail. Also be mindful of the dubious quality of the gutter bolts holding the lid of your pressure vessel on, best to replace them with some grade 8 or above when you start making pressure. Very interesting as usual! 👍
Good points - thanks
Thank you Tim and Sandra for your video s awesome ! In us were I worked we bent a lot heavy wall pipe we did it the old fashion way we welded a cap on one end Of the pipe pack with dry sand fill weld cap on end make fixture heat take your time bending we used heavy wall it won’t kink I’m was told u can use wax never tryed just something to think about
Thanks, Terry. But how tight were you bends?
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 the heavy wall tube we used had multiple bends 90 O on one end sand packed tight proper heat should bend what you want
The dry steam IS lighting the matches but it is also cutting off the oxygen required for full flame combustion.
That boiler design sure eh, different.
I liked the idea of water running through the grate a bit better than steam because keeping the steel at a lower temp would help keep it from rusting out. Guess that might have made the fire burn too cold and been a bad idea anyway. It sure is a nice design as is. The plasma cutter is the perfect tool for this stuff.
Your matches don't flame up because you've got so much steam that it's pushing all the oxygen away. Matches need a bit of air after the chemical oxidizer on the tip is used up.
I agree with your idea of running water through either the grate, or a portion of the tubing in the chimney. It takes a huge amount of energy to boil water, but only a bit more to superheat it. I think the reason the steam volume was so low is that the boiler needs more surface area in boiling section and less in the super heater. Also, I would suggest a larger firebox for more BTUs before having to add more wood.
I disagree with you here, you actually don't need a whole lot of steam in terms of volume to get work from it, the most important are temperature and thus pressure, this is exactly the reason why in every coal fired power station the water is boiled in the wall of the boiler and super heated in the heating elements in the fire box, especially as the system is self regulating once you are actually running at pressure, the best way to run this system would actually to be boil the water in the chimney, then going though the flu box and finally into the fire box.
The high pressure steam blasting out is blowing out the match. You can see the match starter burning completely. He should have pulled away as soon as they started to ignite.
Detroit "TRASH BURNER" at near INTERSECTION of I-75 + I-94 ...used a heavy steel conveyor grating to *BURN GARBAGE* ...FUEL OIL WAS SPRAYED ONTO GARBAGE TO IGNITE/ BURN WET GARBAGE ...SLOWLY MOVING GRATING/ CONVEYOR SLOWLY , METHODICALLY MOVED LEFT-OVER NON-COMBUSTIBLE MATERIAL OUT OF FIRE BOX TO A DUMPSTER .....STANDARD BOILER TUBES (~5/8 thick ) ALLOY TUBES WORE THIN VERY FAST ...SO ...AUTOMATIC M.I.G. WIRE WELDERS COVERED ENTIRE BOILER TUBES WITH ~ 1/8 inch THICK STAINLESS STEEL .....IF YOU BUY A STEAM CLEANER MACHINE ...small WATER RESERVOIR or DIRECT CONNECTION TO A WATER HOSE (COMMERCIAL CARPET , STEAM CLEANING MACHINES ) ..."BOILER" IS 100% , ~1/2 inch O.D. STAINLESS STEEL TUBE IN A MASSIVE MULTI COIL ....ANYONE CAN EASILY INVESTIGATE , PHOTOGRAPH ",JUNK/SCRAP YARD" UNITS or ...NEW UNITS IN "SHOWROOM" ......IS EFFICIENCY EXCEEDING 15% .....MOST COAL FIRED POWER PLANT ELECTRIC GENERATOR (A.C.) are ~32 % efficient >>> coal in >>> electricity out ....they have a shredded metal rotating HEST EXCHANGER THAT RECOVERS HEAT FROM SMOKE STACK and FEEDS **HOT** AIR INTO FIRE BOX , RAISING EFFICIENCY ~5% (?) ....use a AXIAL , PERMANENT MAGNET A.C. GENERATOR *** NO STEEL NEAR WINDINGS *** and raise GENERATOR EFFICIENCY !! ... COMPARED TO COMMON ROTOR/ STRATOR type **1850** designs
Channels like yours represent everything that makes TH-cam great.
Amen to that!
It almost exploded. Not a good design.
Yes!
Not sure if its been mentioned already, but depending on how much 'spare' steam you have, you could fit a blower up the chimney to increase the draught.
Definitely worth doing.
Absolutely. Just a little exhaust from stage 1 will make a huge difference in efficiency.
Keeps looking better each video Tim. Can't wait to see how well it boils water on charcoal
That's what i thought. Without knowing much about oven/boiler designing, the new design around 6:55 looks pretty darn good and professional! Reminds me of some vintage indoor ovens used in log houses? 😅
Why not mount that boiler on a frame with train sheels.... 👀
I'm very glad that there's the addition of a pressure relief valve. That's certainly much more important than most people assume
Two working safety valves is critical. These are off the shelf components from model engineering suppliers. In you UK you have plenty of sources like blackgates
But I'm not in the U.K.
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 oh! Where are you? Looks and sounds like the uk 🇬🇧. :)
@@chiefauditor1683 Ireland - so not so far away, except the import duties make buying anything from there crazy
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 a lot of model engineering parts are made by people in the hobby. Still at reasonable prices. I’m not familiar with model engineering in your neck of the woods but I’m sure you have them. Well worth the time. Also take a look at a blower for the chimney. Basically a ring with very small holes. 1/64th. Tiny jet of steam up the chimney drawing the fire.
you can use the steam to replace the oxygen in a kiln to make activated charcoal.
This is a great idea! I think he already makes charcoal on his property, and activated charcoal has lots of great uses
You can't talk steam without the idea of a steam engine.... but that might be beyond a DIY project... however a single cylinder steam engine hooked to a dynamo would provide a quick energy source :)
Collab with Keith Appleton?
At what pressure do you plan on operating the boiler at? Your feed water will have to have greater pressure then the boiler pressure to avoid a low water situation AKA turning it into a bomb. If you don't plan on making pressure greater than your standard water hose pressure a check valve would still be a good idea to prevent steam from entering your water pipes. Consider any pressure you make in a closed system will not be easily controlled you should try and have multiple safety valves. The water heater safety valve you currently have installed isn't meant for steam use but pressurized hot water. Good luck and safe boiling!
His system isn't closed. The steam is free to escape through the copper tubing. There is not valve trying to over pressure the tubing.
@@jameskniskern2261 Yes, as long as the steam is not put to any work, the system is opened, but as soon as the steam sees an obstacle, such as trying to operate a steam engine, pressure will begin to build.
@@Gin-toki if the pressure builds there is a safety valve that is the blow off point. There is no collection reservoir to build pressure the pressure is created forward of the float valve. He may need a check valve on the water to prevent steam backflow. But with a safety valve at the 1st stage boiler, the entire steam generation system is protected by said valve.
I think he's going to build a vacuum steam engine... No scary high pressure!!!??
Congrats Tim! My favourite part is that you thought to conduct isolated system testing progressively at each stage. Good development methodology!
Thanks, D. : - )
8:51 boy that wrench sure makes a funny sound!
I thought that too; I'm glad it is not just me.
Soo many know it all warriors and health and safety officers in here!
this boiler exploded in the next video....
What a clever project. Beautifully done Tim! Can’t wait to see what you come up with next. Make On my Friend
Hi Tim, just in case you burn yourself, keep a bottle of clean water near. In my experience (below 250°C), it's really helpful to lower your skin temperature as quick as possible (within seconds) after a burn. Then keep the injury under a tap for as long as it hurts. Thank you and Sandra for your great videos!
Good idea
And salt as well. If the burned skin is intact, just after heat contact, use cold water first and apply a lot of salt. It prevents from the 2nd degree burns and blisters, I think, due to osmotic draining of excessive liquid.
@@bonobo9904 dear bonobo9904, please, with no offense meant, look up proppper burn wound treatment online. Applying salt is one of the last things you should do as far as I am informed.
Don't know how much you've played with very high temperature steam, but it causes horrible burns if it hits you. Take care.
I think bending the tube would have a couple advantages. Firstly, I guess I'm not certain how it applies to steam, but for fluids like water or air, a long sweeping curve allows for greater flow without interruption or eddy currents. It would also eliminate your problems with welding and pinholes. If you find a spring that fits nicely either inside or outside of the tubing, this will allow you to make 180 degree bends without kinking the pipe. A lot of people suggest filling the pipe with sand, this works well but I think it is far too time consuming.
I'm sure it would work for bigger radii, but for bends this tight?
Maybe just use elbow fittings, and instead of using Teflon tape just use old-fashioned packing?
Nice idea. The only problem I see is the thickness of the tube wall and the radii you want here are not practical for it to work ..... and spring bending only works with copper pipe so the grate is out for that!
Your pinhole problem can be fixed (next time, because there is always a next time) by grinding the cut edges of the tube to be welded at 45 degree. This would allow for deeper penetration of weld rather than just the surface .... the finished weld will look better too ;0)
It is a bit out of fashion nowadays but Gas welding might give the best results with the grate but is probably not worth it unless you are doing production runs.
If you had run your gas torch on the original chimney it could have started the draw causing the exhaust fumes to then take over the heating ..... but your fix was more elegant!
I have just found this channel ..... Well worth a sub!
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 trumpet 🎺 and other brass horn makers use frozen soapy 🧼 water. Soapy enough to easily blow bubbles with the water.
Freeze it then bend it.
You'll also want to use a very high grade of stainless steel tubing meant for this type of heat exchange.
At superheated temperatures 🌡, the steam will actually begin to break down some and into hydrogen and oxygen. And will rapidly degrade the steel otherwise.
In this case the extra turbulence is likely beneficial to the longer exposure of the liquid/vapor to heat. Nothing to solve, but good thiunking when flow is the restriction (it isn't here).
Copper tube would be fine,
Melting point of copper is almost 2000 degrees Fahrenheit
A wood fire is only about 1200 degrees Fahrenheit
Also I would suggest a bigger firebox
I always want your videos to be like 30 minutes longer.. you've made great progress! My advice is, keep testing and redesigning like you already are. You're a great engineer.
Amazing how it only took you a couple of prototypes
By the looks of it, the matches ignited, but then they were starved of oxygen due to being surrounded by blowing steam, matches also don't work to well in "wind" (from the steam shooting out).
Try to move them out of the steam while the match head is still combusting, to see if that works.
Just my 2 cents worth.
Congratulations, I am impressed by the simplicity and the efficiency of your work.
Starting at about 08:51 in this video...
EVERYBODY'S A CRITIC...😉
Now they are making a microwave boiler that its basically like a gas boiler but with a huge magnetron inside and its super fast and efficient to heat up water using electricity, like a big microwave
I find that I need to get some draw up the flue of my rocket stove, before lightimg the main firebox. Otherwise the convection from the firebox comes straight out, rather than up the flue.
In my case, I can shove a burning rag down the burn chamber and into te base of the first flue riser. Once the draw is there all is good.
1 brazing over the ground welds.
2 please learn what a locomotive steam "Dome" is and how and why they work.
3 never let a steam boiler of any kind run dry. NOT EVER NO MATTER THE REASON.
4 Please continue your experiments and consider keeping all pressure experiments inside a walled roofless enclosure perhaps made of used tires.
5 ( My personal favorite) Practice screaming the word RUN!!!!! AS you set your best foot work example.
This has the added benefit of making sure no one relocates your tools or enters your shop area without a phone call or a previous reservation.
Armstrong hydroelectric machine may be of intrest-he was contiunously charging 33 square feet of a battery array or(perhaps lieden jars) .If you in England it can be found a Newcastle Museum.
You should Get a Cordless Leaf blower (With few metal Stove Flu Tube + metal Interface plate mod To Jump Start the fire in Under 3~5 mins
You could use the Unused stream to Accelerate Air flow with venturi effect - Exhaust steam injector > Vacuum ejector up the flu stack with a Y Regulator valve keeps steam moving And increases the Fire Temp idling so when you put the Regulator to drive You Already have the Stream power and heat needed
The draft problem with the first version of the stove could have been solved by pre-heating the chimney with the torch. Keep something smouldering at the rim of the fire chamber to create a little smoke, then pre-heat the chimney until the smoke is drawn down and into the fire chamber, and THEN light the fire.
FWIW, I could tell just by looking that it wasn't a rocket stove. With one of those, you couldn't use copper in the chimney because it would literally melt if the water ran out. (They can easily hit 1KC in the (well insulated) chimney.) In fact, rocket stoves stop producing smoke after five minutes or so because the chimney heats up past the ignition point of the volatiles in the smoke. You couldn't even use regular steel; you'd have to use stainless steel tubing to withstand the high temperatures. What I'm saying is that you'd be better off basing your design on a rocket stove.
I have a "REAL" flash boiler. I use a stainless steel receiver placed at the focal length (10") of a 6-foot-radius tracking concentrating solar mirror, which reduces 48 square feet to 0.5 square feet. Suffice to say, my injection pump turns several droplets of water into instant 2,000 psig dry steam INSTANTANEOUSLY !!
The steam engines is all but confirmed
The question is what type will it be?
Find out next time on WAY OUT WEST!
The matches wouldn't continue to burn because the steam jet is keeping the oxygen away.
Next time Bend the pipe with a pipe bender to make your round ends so you can weld straight bits.
Also to weld 90* corners like that your going to want to use a brazing torch and high temp brazing rod.
I would research a Hartford loop steam boiler, if the piping isn't ascending as you heat it, you run a risk of condensing and losing temperature.
Hey Tim a really nice and better way to power machines would be wood gas as you can use it to power normal combustion engines 😄
Yes, I might have a go at that too, one day. It's all very interesting.
More pressure will raise the boiling point several degrees, but the heated steam is dangerous and not just to bare hands, check valves preventing backward steam flow and an orifice with a changeable insert that allows the user a custom selection of flow control / (length x diameter variables, carburetor jets would work if used direct in line) that will pick it up to the point of removing muscular and connective tissue from bones (we used steam at the meat processing station for sanittizing and mechanical cleaning and it works thoroughly and instantly.
get rid of burning wood and make a section for a waste oil burner of your own design, steam will naturally goto a Steam engine, which can then power your house :)
NO, not more powerr...
Less power, slower welding (slower feeding material) = more time to fill the cracks aka have a better flow.
Not to low, because then it does not merge well.
Start (testweld) low and then increase till you have a good flowbed that seals completely.
For most cases, lower is better, but to low = no go...
Another helpful trick for improving your welds:
Tag it in position and start welding at the most difficult spot to the easiest spot.
That way you weld has a higher chance to be consistent and even improve during the weld.
Start the other way around...
Then the chance of your weld getting worse is almost guaranteed, because the rise in difficultly..
This also prevents for spending lots of time on corrections...
If the start is bad, then you have less to correct then when you finish the weld completely...
Absolutely perfect steam generator for distilling booze in the back woods.
I quess if you reverse the "steamstream" in the loops it will be more effecient kinda like a liebigcooler but then in stead off cooling it will heat off course might be something to think about.
Greetz from belgium
The heat of the steam lit the matchs and then blew them out. Stage 3 is called a 'Super Hater'. A question, "What are you hoping to do with this?"
Perhaps just make the walls and floor of the firebox itself a water container. Bending copper pipe can be done with with sand or salt inside it. Americans add it to the outside of the chimney.
omggggggg !
all that plumbing would make a Fire Lorry envious !
🤣😂😇
Probably would have worked if you used a leaf blower to get the fire going up the chimney with the first design.
Yet again I stumble upon ye on my niche tinkery endeavours, you truly seem to have dabbled in all backyard personally doable innovations
Hear the donkey laughing at ya!!! HAHA Great video, what use do you have planned for the steam?
Mig welders are not the best for air tight welds. When you stop welding the wire can burn back towards the the tip leaving a tunnel in your weld. Enjoyed this video
That is really quite amazing. Superheated steam will set paper alight so if I had to guess I might reason the temperature of the steam still is not high enough. Perhaps a greater amount of a smaller diameter tubing in the firebox may do the trick. Enjoyable content as usual, cheers!
Why don't you just build a fire tube boiler like what's on a locomotive the Firebox is in two pieces you have an inner and outer Firebox and you have water in between the two is known as the muttering as we're all the sediments gather the bottom of 2 walled Firebox look up fire tube boilers they work a lot better than what you're trying to build
steam activated charcoal ? but I think you have to get the steam temperature around 1000° Celsius
cleaning that fire box is going to be a chore, and it is rather small so you will be refueling the box often. Still a cool project. I gave you a sub because I am curious what your end goal is with the steam.
your pressure relief valve needs a whistle (if it's safe to do, that is. I'm no steam engineer.)
This is fantastic! I'm loving watching this evolve. You've got a wonderful inventive mind.
You could build a small steam engine that will light some LEDs and charge your phones.
The blow up on the boiler could be caused by the Collapsed floats being forced against the top and outlet and hole for relief valve restricting flow
8:50 It sounds like your donkey needs some oil,, 😅
Cheers Tim,, 🍻😎👍
in the original design, dropping some lit paper down the stove pipe and then lighting your fuel in the main compartment should have gotten the draft moving. it's a method used in some rocket stove designs.
What about a small shovel for feeding the fire.
Totally out their idea: parabolic mirror on the chimney for a solar booster
Your dry steam still looks a little wet. I don't know if its not hot enough, too much water, or you need a reduction pipe to increase the pressue and therefore the temperature.
Keep up the grate work, lol.
Incredible progress, Tim!
Can't wait to take a ride on your cross-country railway in a few years.
Get a plumbers pressure test so you know if it will take double max working pressure.
Secondly silicone rtv and heat and pressure it is bad news, great on cam box on car - not great for application your using it for
You might be able to make popcorn with the steam, or if it is hot enough, maybe rice crispies!
I like it!
A pair of cheap leather gardening gloves would help with manipulating hot thingies.
VERY POWERFUL YOU CAN USE IT TO FUEL ITSELF ... HHO DRY GAS...GREAT IDEA...
Many years back cant remember where I did something with dry steam and it was suppose to light some cotton wool
Will superheated steam not corrode the steel superheater tubes rather quickly? On my model steam loco the superheater tube is stainless for this reason.
perhaps a later try could include a small pyroliser, a can to heat wood, to produce gas and charcoal to fire the boiler together, gas for a secondary burner after the grate or something.
Great video brother I follow a TH-camr by the name of BC blades And he makes a wood gasafire Stove it gives off no smoke If you were to adapt that to your boiler it would make it more efficient Please forgive me I do not know how to put the link in the Call Matt
By the way most steam locomotives use excess steam in the starting cycle, to vent smoke out the flue. As soon as steam is being made, it is used to draw the smoke out the stack.
Very impressive. The whole thing is a boiler, not just stage 1 - you have boiled water to dry steam in 3 stages. A cyclone separator between stages 1 and 2 might improve efficiency and would certainly extend the life of the boiler, as water droplets going into stage 2 will tend to cause errosion. Stage3 is in fact a superheater as the steam ought to be dry saturated as it exits stage2. Obviously if you vent stage 3 to atmosphere this cannot be demonstrated. Your matcheads burn demonstating that the steam is dry. Don't expect a visible flame from a match in a hurricane!
What seemed to be missing when you were firing up the stove first time in the video was a blower to draw the fire up the chimney and start a good draft.
So now is the question how to convert this dry steam into a kinetic force? Next logical step for a steam locomotive would be a steam cylinder operating a rod that drives the wheels. But i think that is way to complicated to manufacture said cylinder, you need a lathe for that. How about going the way Ferdinand Porsche choose while designing his version of the Tiger tank? In order to save weight of the transmission (which was one of the Achilles heels of the final Tiger due to overload), Ferdinand went with electric powertrain. The engine powered a electric generator, while electric motors powered the driving sprocket. I think this way you will save a lot of troubles compared to a pure mechanical design. Greetings from Germany :)
A counter argument for the Porsche Tiger electric transmission is that the Porsche Tiger and its transmission worked worse than the production Tiger…
@@andrewreynolds4949 Well, that's true. But this isn't 1942 anymore, technology improved. 😉
Not sure that your pressure release valve is for water or steam. Steam needs a bigger opening as it occupies more space.
Ooooh, are you thinking of making steam activated charcoal?
What tempeture is on the last stage output
And yes i know its a late comment but im happy if I get an anwser
Since it doesn't take much energy to superheat the steam, the grate alone may be good enough for superheating, you could use the pipe in the chimney for something else, for example preheating the feed water...
You may also mount some kind of funnel to the "wood input door", so it feeds itself by gravity and you don't need to put new wood in every 10 minutes...
A steam pressure regulated air inlet would also be great, so the air inlet gets closed when the steam pressure is too high. Of course that is a little hard to build, for a test version it should work with a manually regulated air inlet. But for a final version you may consider using something like a spring loaded steam piston, which opens the air inlet when steam pressure is low, and closes the air inlet when steam pressure is high...
In fact you need much more energy to superheat the steam than you need to boil water
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299
You just need higher temperatures, but the needed energy is wayyyy lower...
For example: If your fire produces a usable power output(without losses) of 1kW, and you start with 1kg(approx.1Liter)of water, it takes 418 seconds to heat the water from 0°C to 100°C. To convert all the water to steam it takes additional 2230 seconds.
But to superheat all the steam from 100°C to 200°C it just takes less than 200 seconds...
To make this numbers more useful for continuous steam production, i calculated it for 1kW of heat input and 10°C feed water temperature:
From 1kW total input power, you need 135 Watts for preheating the water, 800 Watts for producing steam, and 65 Watts for superheating the steam to 200°C.
These numbers are just for steam without any pressure. As the pressure (and therefore the boiling temperature) rises, you need more energy for preheating the feed water and less energy for superheating the steam to 200°C...
Ellerinize emeklerinize yüreğinize sağlık Süper 💯💯💯💯💯
I'm loving the progression of all this. Lovely stuff Tim!
Careful out there,
I knew a guy that was mamed by a homemade boiler.
Start up issues like Crosti boilers on British Railways 9Fs!
Occam's Razor: The steam blew out the matches as soon as they were lit.
What stops the steam from the boiler going back up the water supply pipe rather than/in addition to up the chimney heat exchanger? Does the water supply pipe have a one way check valve on it?
It will do..
@@wayoutwest-workshopstuff6299 I said in your last blog if you could hook it up to a car turbo charger you could get some work out of it. Then if you direct the exhausted steam into a cooler chamber that will create a vacuum and reduce boiler pressure
that's the funniest, strangest and uniquiest boiler i've seen, loved it.
Add a venturi to the stack like the old locomotives had to help with the draft .
10:14 the out flow from my hot tub could be sanitized and sent to a thermal battery
dry steam can ignite the match, but puts it out instantly since steam is not oxygen
Match stick trick was too close to the fast steam. It got blown out. You need to wave it past. In for heat and out to stay alight. Great work on the new design.
Ah, ha! I'll try it
The first intelligent words ever uttered were "I don't Know".
No pressure relive on the system I would add a blow disk.
You're going to need annual boiler inspections now.
BTW, they make cheap thick walled bends. In the size you want them mandrel bends are very very cheap.
They have wide and narrow radii to choose from too.
The thing is the way you've done it may make for more efficient heat transfer than smooth bends but it is worth knowing they're out there.
thanks - I had no idea they were out there
Donkey: *Donkey noises*
Autosubtitles: *[Music]*
what working temp do you want?? high temp steam is very dangerous
Ceramic MIG nozzle for internal corner welding?
If it's dry steam you could use it to dry clean something :-p
You could use the steam to blow the ash out of the bottom of the fire box ;)
Definitly you need now an compound steam engine, to drive the chip machine or the charcoal mill...! Fantastic things you made, you inspire me to build also an narro gauge railway (600mm) in my yard for log transport to my workshop! What an fun!!