Rocket Mass Heater for my home

[matt walker]

Here's where I am here at lunch time. I decided to use one more little barrel section to meet the flue run, using the barrels as a plenum for the turn around. The whole bench is free of the floor and back wall so hopefully it will convect and draw cool air off the floor and up the back wall. Not much mass in there, but a lot more surface area than I used to have. Looking forward to firing it up tonight when things cool off a bit.

[DrewInToledo]

That looks GREAT! GO MATT, GO!!!!

[hpmer]

It will be interesting to see if there is much temperature difference between the pipe and barrel sections. I'd bet hotter in the barrel section due to stratification assuming you cut the barrels to allow for such a thing.

[matt walker]

I'm tired.





I'll work on getting this stage dry for a day or two and take a break, then figure out a top coat and finish, assuming it all works. Right now I need to go fix my water....I ran over the line with my tractor while getting cob material and it hung up and broke the line. I went up to lift up the swiveling pipe and sucked a huge toad into the line as I was pulling it up. I had to flush him out through 200' of line. Found him at the break, thankfully. I wasn't sure whether to laugh or cry when he got sucked in, but I did laugh when he came out after his awesome water park experience.

[matt walker]

[thickstrings]

Looking good Matt! Is the batch box that much hotter? What was the hole at the end of the run for?....looks covered up now...

[matt walker]

Thanks TS. Yeah, batches are able to burn about 2-3 times the fuel in about the same time frame, so lots more BTUs per hour. It's not really that it's capable of hotter peak temps, just that it typically jumps right up to peak temps every time. With the J, I could sorta regulate how hot the barrel was by fuel load, and usually kept it a bit on the cooler side, compared to this firebox.

That barrel was used in another system and that was a chimney hole, I covered it but will use it as a clean out. I covered all my clean outs and will dig them out next summer when it's time to get inside there. Easier to do that since everything will set up and I can finish much better than trying to finish when the whole thing is a runny mess.

[matt walker]

So, it's burning right now. I put a fan on top of the chimney to keep things moving. There's so much moisture in the whole thing that there's no way it would have kept drafting on it's own. Once it's all dry and warm I expect it to flow fine, but I'm going to power through these early stages with the fan.

The barrel section at the end warmed up really, really quickly. Even through all that wet mud. I plan to add another inch or two over the whole bench, but I may need to add more to get that end deeper. We will see....

Fun!

[mannytheseacow]

Holy crap! You did that fast! It looks terrific, and out under that window. You're gonna like that spot this winter.

I really like the way you've separated it from the wall and floor to convect cool air from down low. Very cool.

[matt walker]

Thanks Manny, I'm pretty stoked right now. I think that's gonna be a nice spot for sure, and I'm really excited to take the couches out of here! I love how much space these things make, even though until you live with one it seems like they are using it up.

Drew, you gave me a much needed boost when I was running out of steam this afternoon. I forgot to say thanks, so...thanks man!