The best of the best burners!

Discussion in 'Burners and their construction' started by OMM, Jun 8, 2019.

  1. Tobho Mott

    Tobho Mott Administrator Staff Member Banner Member

    I've had my eyes out for a big (used) coffee urn for several years to use as an oil tank after seeing it suggested in Bill T's AA sig line. It heats up its contents, it has a tap at the bottom, it's got handles I could use to hang it up high, what's not to like? Other than the price for a new one...

    Seems like people tend to hang onto them though, and I'm not one to steal one of the 6 urns sitting in every church basement.

    Jeff
     
  2. Al2O3

    Al2O3 Administrator Staff Member Banner Member

    I think the primary factor at play that isn't being discussed in this whole efficiency and melt time discussion is the flame propagation speed. The light bulb didn't pop on for me until this Yoda discussion.

    http://forums.thehomefoundry.org/index.php?threads/ng-burner.212/

    If you search flame propagation speed (FPS) you can find figures for different fuels. They will likely be for laminar flow. Turbulent flow can increase the speed and temperature can also do so...a lot. Basically, any time you exceed the FPS of your fuel combustion must occur farther away from the burner exit. Too slow and combustion can crawl back up your burner tube and create problems. This is why a burner will always be limited by burner tube diameter, at least when operating outside the furnace. You can shove more air/fuel (energy) into a furnace through a burner tube than can be burned at the exit, but then combustion is occurring in the furnace and there has been no temperature rise of the charge entering the furnace, so it's easy to understand how that can create cool spots depending upon furnace/fire box geometry and crucible position. Though it can be because of other tune, most likely any burner that cant be lit and or operated outside the furnace is above FPS.

    A naturally aspirated propane burner runs out of air because the ejector is very sensitive to down stream pressure. A flare can reduce the exit velocity back to the flame speed and this happens naturally when inserted in the furnace. You can quickly overcome this with forced air but it won't change the limit of the exit velocity based upon your burner tube diameter and FPS. At that point you are back to combusting the fuel/air in the furnace. If you introduce turbulence through vanes in the burner, you can increase the FPS......some say by up to +2x.

    For oil burners like those in hobby furnaces, it's almost always the case that all combustion is occurring well into the furnace. If you employ an Ursutz or isolated firebox burner, you are both creating turbulence and increasing the temperature so the FPS can be very fast an you can introduce much more energy through the same size burner tube.

    If you have multiple burners, like the MIFCO furnace, there's a practical matter that is addressed with being able to use and package two small burner tubes, but when you exceed the FPS, you may also have twice the impingement surface area available to ignite excess fuel thus increasing the rate at which you can drive the speed of combustion.

    Besides burn efficiency, there's probably also an affect from the internal gas velocities on the convective heating of the crucible so if you have a very efficient combustion process but tranquil laminar burn, it may not get heat into the crucible as fast......but if the MIFCO data is accurate, combustion efficiency may carry the day.

    Instead of conventional Ursutz type burner, I always thought a stacked furnace arrangement with a false floor would be ideal. Sort of like the sketch below.

    Furnace Isolated Fire Box.jpg

    It's a bigger deal for oil burners but you could pump a lot more fuel/air of any kind into such a fire box and combust it before entering the chamber containing the crucible, plus, all of the heat eventually goes into the furnace instead of being lost to the external surfaces of typical metal Ursutz fireboxes.

    All this from a guy with a resistive electric furnace. -My thermal efficiencies are in the 90s!!!:p

    Best,
    Kelly
     
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  3. Very well put, Kelly.

    Your sketch is precisely why I directed my oil burner toward the floor, to give the burn a round of the firebox before starting to rise. With a drip burner you will always have combustion occurring later and farther from the burner because of the large drops of fuel.

    Isn't it Ironsides who has the very tall plinth, essentially the same thing but I believe the downward directed burner helps a lot. Especially when I hear guys say the bottom of their furnace is the coolest part. The plinth and bottom of my crucible heats up first.

    Avoiding burnout of your false floor above would be an issue. However you could accomplish the same thing by having an internal tapered ring between the combustion chamber and furnace, just neck the wall in a bit and you have an integral Ursutz chamber.

    Did you build your big gas furnace?
     
  4. Al2O3

    Al2O3 Administrator Staff Member Banner Member

    As dense refractory, I can't see why it would be at any higher risk than any other surface of the furnace, particularly one that sees direct flame impingement.

    Not sure I understand what you are describing, but in my rendering the false floor could have an array of holes to distribute the burn and flame gas velocity in most any manner desired.....could even emulate a ribbon burner with a bunch of holes.

    Furnace yes, burner no.

    http://forums.thehomefoundry.org/index.php?threads/furnace-cart-and-lift-build.278/

    My smaller furnace can accommodate an A20 and I am yet to cast a part that required the A60. I do have a resistive electric insert for the larger furnace and use it to heat treat and cure refractories.

    Best,
    Kelly
     
  5. Peedee

    Peedee Silver

    W3 (Harry) was playing with a 'flame trainer' over on AA, unfortunately the images are trashed on that thread. Essetially it was a drop in thick tappered ring made of refractory held a few inches off the floor to impede/restrict the passage of the flame and hold it circling closer to the floor. From what I remember it was quite succesful.
     
  6. PatJ

    PatJ Silver

    Jammer used a pool noodle to give a bulge around the lower part of his furnace.
    He has photos somewhere.

    .
     
  7. Tobho Mott

    Tobho Mott Administrator Staff Member Banner Member

    Reminds me of Barry Luke's furnace, At least the bottom part of it... Maybe not quite the same thing you guys mean, I'm not 100% sure but these recent posts reminded me of how he built his.



    Jeff
     
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  8. Al2O3

    Al2O3 Administrator Staff Member Banner Member

    Flame Trainer. I think I like that.....never saw the thread though.
    I do remember this one.
    I'm guessing that's a lot like the flame trainer. That lid on Barry's furnace must weigh a bunch!

    I guess in addition to just being an open ramp, I was thinking an isolated fire box would not only promote combustion but the holes in the floor could be sized and positioned to help distribute the flame and heat........but not necessarily swirl.....though the holes could be any shape and angle desired.

    Best,
    Kelly
     
  9. Jammer

    Jammer Silver Banner Member

    I poured the refractory around the bottom tuyere and then the liner. Put the outer shell on and packed with ceramic blanket.



    furnace-1.JPG
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    IMG_2141.JPG
    IMG_2169.JPG
     
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  10. PatJ

    PatJ Silver

    Seems like the pool noodle creates a sort of Urstuz chamber at the bottom of the furnace.
    It increases the surface area inside the furnace too, and provides a path and an area for the initial combustion to take place before the heat rises past the crucible.

    I like the idea, but I am not sure how to implement it when using a 1" thick wall of refractory.

    .
     
  11. joe yard

    joe yard Silver

    [​IMG]

    In post 35 I explained how I made an emergency drip burner that worked very well. In post 36 Andy Oldironfarmer ask why I would ever want something different if the drip furnace worked so well then in post 37 PatJ explained it very well. I apologies for not getting back before this. I was running on little sleep and had to ketch up. To further explain, in my circumstance I will have a furnace that permanently installed and is never moved. The fuel system will be caged with a water separator mounted in a modular configuration where fuel is triple filtered before entering the storage container and then pass through a 10 micron filter before going to the spray nozzle.
    It sounds a bit extreme but this will give me long term fuel storage without excessive worry of contamination and other than changing the 2- 10 micron and 1- 100 micron hydraulic filters should be a close to 0 cost to maintain system.
    My furnace burn chamber is much like what PatJ is building with the bulge to allow the flame room to swirl around and combust before rising unfortunately progress has been slow as health has been up and down. Luckily it has been improved greatly!
    Here is a picture of the forum I used for my burn chamber.
    It protrude just over 1 inch around the cylinder shape and at the top has a smooth concave shape to allow the flame to make the transformation from the burn chamber to the barrel.
    Joe
     
  12. In refractory work it would be called a corbel, something like this:

    IMG_6056.JPG

    Jammer's is the best I've seen. Barry's is great construction but I didn't understand why he put in the ramp, the hot gas will rise on it's own.
     
  13. Jammer

    Jammer Silver Banner Member

    I haven't had a large enough melt to need this furnace. I melted Iron in it once with propane, and then only because my big blower quit working so I switched from drip oil to forced air propane. Just a test run but it worked.
    Shoot, I built it in 2008, gave it a ride to Tenn and back and it's sitting in my shed. Might have to get it out and play.
    IMG_2231.JPG IMG_2234.JPG
     
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  14. OMM

    OMM Silver

    Well today I was at an auction. A GRACO 600 Spraygun came up. $28 CAD (which is like $9.51 USD lol). I figure when the time comes, maybe I’ll put it to the test too. It has pretty much unlimited controls. Maybe I will give it the water test to see how much I can send through.
    5FF8A595-6992-4BC8-9099-2DAC3B7DFFBE.jpeg
    I also picked up a high heat blower for $16 Canadian (or $5.44 USD). Maybe I’ll test this too. From the instruction manual it has a 750 to 1000° F heat range at tip. Has anybody used highly preheated air as their blower air? I’m sure some guys use hairdryers??? Do they find a difference when using the high and low heat range?
    3B6D141F-A576-4FA8-814B-EAFDDA21E33A.jpeg
     
  15. It takes a lot of energy to melt metal. Is it a 1,500 watt heater? If so, it should put out 5,115 BTU/hr. If it's going from 100F to 750F that's a 650F rise. To heat dry air 650F with 5,115 BTU/hr, you can heat approximately 7 CFM. If it's a 3,000 watt heater, 14 CFM.
     
  16. Petee716

    Petee716 Gold Banner Member

    I have the same heat gun. I use it for shrink wrapping product at work when I don't have the wrapper's heat tunnel turned on. That was a steal for $16! That thing will definitely give you some blistering heat but maybe not volume or pressure. I've only used a hairdryer for charcoal and propane preheating for my oil burner, neither of which requires much air volume at all. I never figured it was any advantage to run it hot for those applications, plus I wanted it to last as long as possible. My girl only gets a new hairdryer every 6 months or so so one has to take care of such a commodity (lol).
    I've seen a number of attempts at preheating air. Colin Peck has an interesting design in his book for preheating and I take him at his word as to its effectiveness. I think Jimmy Cogg may have used that design for his rig. There have been a few threads at Alloy Avenue about redirecting exhaust gasses for the same purposes (brain fart: I can't think of the correct term) but I don't think anything ever came of them.

    Pete
     
  17. OMM

    OMM Silver

    I'm just entering this game. I don't want to be close minded to any one particular set up. Who knows, in the end I might try all (including the grumpy)!

    Most of my career life I've shape medal of all grades and types. I've welded almost everything. I've also heat-treated and tempered almost everything. I've also built my brides wedding Bands from wax. I cut the wax the wax using CNC. Then sent out for platinum casting. I'm the one that set the main stone with a jig grinder. The jeweler guys refused to set the stone with my design as the stone was part of the sizing of the ring of the ring. The center wax ring was cut out. It was just there there to maintain a close sizeing well I CNC it.

    It was centrifugal pored. I was not allowed to take pictures or video during the process.

    9633BF02-BB89-4EA1-B214-EFDFE1BD8880.jpeg 09A0D7B3-A10D-44DE-8F72-2F011CA9DD2D.jpeg B082082D-5F28-4588-A479-A5777262162F.jpeg C2883616-CD7F-4C74-B085-428171CD6CDD.jpeg 91C536CF-55BA-4645-9C26-0EDEF792C4D0.jpeg 3F10D243-EE80-457E-8118-CBF5E7B38DFA.jpeg 01938EBE-8217-4ABC-A826-1D5CF3A950D2.jpeg 0A6AE15B-1FD6-4C4B-AF6A-C96D4AED1B3B.jpeg EFCA0D9C-21EF-4F91-82D0-D5B731E150D4.jpeg


    Now I'm really into getting into the big stuff. I think, I have wasted too much time in the little stuff. Now I want to start to Pour!

    I’m sick of making the patterns and somebody else get it to pour my small stuff. This is a 2 part cope drag pattern of mine. But I’m not yet set up to pour. So but I paid my buddy $25 each. But he has a large Coke furnace and can pour 15,000 pounds.
    DD2AEBD7-4D95-4E91-9067-1EF64840859A.jpeg
     
    Last edited: Jun 11, 2019
  18. Melterskelter

    Melterskelter Gold Banner Member

    It seems like as a group we have over the last couple months developed a better sense of optimal furnace design and function. Had I known some of this info I might have made my furnce somewhat differently 6 or 8 months ago. Oh well. For iron work furnaces have fini the lifespan. I should get another chance. But I am starting to grasp the benefits of a very tall plinth and maybe a corbel or flame controller disc.

    Denis
     
  19. Melterskelter

    Melterskelter Gold Banner Member

    Also, note that he comments around 5 mins in on a grill he placed above his vent that did not melt or sag. This is relevant to recent discussion concerning combustion temps, vent temps, and cast iron melts and is consistent with the results I had with a similar grill.

    Denis
     
  20. Jason

    Jason Gold

    My family owns a jewelry store in florida and we do 90% work in house from cad to print, all the casting....
    but that has got to be the silliest thing I've heard in a while. o_O Next time, send me the wax, I'll cast it and let you film it. Hell, you can come down and pour it yourself if ya want and I'll film it. There is this website these days called youtube. Wanna see how yellowcake is made? :D

    Hey what did you set in those posts?
     
    Last edited: Jun 12, 2019

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