New Furnace with Heat exchanger (Pic heavy)

[Biolit11]

Well the new furnace has been designed and thought through intensely and the final verdict has been passed. PLEASE READ THIS THREAD which contains the start of the idea and changes up to the final product that will be made if you do not understand the bottom illistrations.

Click on pic for a bigger one.


Blue - Air route through heat exchanger
Green - Exhaust gas route through heat exchanger

I will be using a used electric hot water unit for the shell and the internal molds will be made in separate pieces that will fit together using a 1 inch dowel that will be centered and hold everything in place while the refractory is poured and rammed. Pictures of the actual pieces and building will follow soon.

[w3]

The pictures are purdy but it sure looks like it is going to be a monster to build. Have you got any kind of timeline on taking this off paper?

I still think that if you can get 1k degrees out of the exchanger you will likely be the first backyarder to crack 4k degrees with a liquid fuel. I recently took my oil burner over 3k and i think it still had some legs to it but unfortunately I ran out of thermometer, until I get some means of gauging higher temps I am done pushing it, that is right up at the service rating of my refractory anyhow... what are you going to use in this and for the exchanger to be able to handle the temps and are you looking for ultra high temps or super efficiency?

w3

[Biolit11]

I have already started w3, reason for this thread :P . At first Im going for efficiency because I dont have enough moola to make the exchanger handle high temps and with this one it will destroy the exchanger if I try and push for high temps. I am hoping I can run steel temps without too much damage to the exchanger. But nice thing about this one is that down the line I can build another heat exchanger that will be able to handle high temps and hook it up without mods.

Click on pic for a bigger one.

The hotwater unit for the shell before and after cutting.

Click on pic for a bigger one.

It was actually pretty clean on the inside. All the lime just fell out.

Time to serve the eviction papers.


Click on pic for a bigger one.

Here is the start of the internal forms. As you can see Im using a 1 inch dowel to line pieces up that will get slid in as I put in the refractory. I did this with my first build and it worked very nicely. I still need to fab up the donut form but for that Im going to use some polystyrene from packaging I have. This will make it easy to remove the center core and then break out the poly when its all ready. I am using 12 inch quicktubes with plywood supports at each opening to keep it round. Also used this in the first build and I like how easy it made it. Its also sturdy when you start packing in the refractory against it and doesnt give in.

So next up is the donut, exhaust port, burner port forms, and some more fab work on the furnace shell that will support the exhaust port and cutting holes where need be then I will be ready to pour some refractory.

[w3]

Looks good, what are you using for refractory/insulation?

Love the duct tape shoe repair too

w3

[_3D_]

Construction time. And goes quickly i think. :wink:

_3D_

[Biolit11]

Will be using 3 inch layer of ceramic wool with 1 inch of mizzou 3000 deg refractory.

And its my work at home shoes, dont need anything pretty to get dirty here.

[John Kurman]

The forms look awfully pretty. Going for the Iron Cross look? I'd award you the Iron Cross (for bravery) on putting what looks like a nightmare of a heat exchanger together. Best of luck with that, and I'm sure it will be fun (not being sarcastic here).

I just got done reading a book about automating inventions and the creative process called "The Genie in the Machine". Not a particularly good book in terms of the current art, but it makes me wonder what optimal shape of the firing chamber would look like if you used a neural network or genetic algorithm to determine best heat retaining geometry? Something for the engineers to tinker with.

[Sylar]

A sphere would retain energy best ofcourse. Smallest surface per volume.

Hard to make a spherical furnace, or use all the space in it for that matter. Flame trainers seem to work miracles though 8)

[w3]

8)

w3

[Tim]

The best spherical furnace is... ...an arc furnace. 8)