The best of the best burners!

I’m not into you for the laughs! If you’re comparing yourself to that video for decent content, you need to give your head a shake , your wealth of knowledge should value!

There is a difference between factual entertainment/education and The oldest trade ever, sexual entertainment.

Sometimes the best of the best are not acknowledged. PIC, FO, SO, TO...

I run a low profile on Instagram and YouTube as I am now a PIC trainer comparable.

If you think she’s doing well, a nine-year-old called Ryan just reported $22us million last year, For reviewing toys... please don’t watch this link with out a five-year-old boy!

 

Wow! That is one seriously pathetic video. Makes the KOR look like a brain surgeon with his plaster of Paris furnace.

 

This may be a little sad on my part, but after the third toy got its arms stretched ... I kept watching in hopes the kid would loose grip and one arm would fly back and boink him in the face.

I guess maybe that was flashbacks of playing with Stretch Armstrong when I was a kid.

 

I remember stretch....

 

Yeah, I'm bumping this thread.

Has anyone measured their air to fuel ratio? 10:1, 15:1, 20:1..... And what fuel they are using??

Many know what they burn per hour(gal, Litres)? It might be somewhat unscientific....but as a bench mark. how long does it take to fill up a garbage bag with air, at tip of your torch, in seconds? I shake open 1-2 bags a week. (I use the 3mil HUSKY 42gal, 158L).

I finally found a plug for my big blower to add 2=> 1/2" NPT to 3/4" hose thread from the 2" NPT.

I had to angle the head at 10° each way to get the fittings in. I’ll drill and tap in the morning.

 

I know what I burn in fuel, but don't have any specs for a microwave blower feeding a ketchup bottle. Does it really matter anyways? I suppose an exhaust analyzer could provide some answers.
Go for it man! https://www.amazon.com/Gas-CO2-NOx-Exhaust-Analyzer/dp/B075VBQWCT

Nice part btw.

 

Combustion analyze analyzer can be had for about 300

 

Or less. But the ones I have seen will not tolerate continuous exposure to the temperatures we are seeing in our furnaces. The automotive ones are situated in a cooler area of exhaust. I had in mind to use one at one time. I planned to "sniff" the exhaust stream for seconds at a time to measure combustion completeness. But, other projects pushed that one aside. Now, I think I can learn what I need to know pretty well by observing the exhaust. So, most likely will not go with the sniffer. That is not to say I would not like to have one in my setup. I would very much like it as I have found that measuring fuel flow rate accurately helps me a great deal. So every measurement takes out some of the guesswork and makes the whole process more predictable. I am all for that.

Denis

 

I'm with dennis. I can judge the color of the exhaust and the flame length licking out the hole. After pouring a few times too hot or too cold will make you get smart in a hurry,
You can have all the "data" you want, but there is no better experience teacher than F'ing up a part that took a ton of hours to make!

 

Wait a second, I said I wish I could measure combustion %. As a definite second-best I do try to judge the flame length and color coming out of the chimney. But that is not as precise as I would LIKE. When I am finishing an Iron melt, very very slight subjective differences in the tuning of the furnace can mean the difference of an additional 10 minutes or and additional hour. And, getting that right is tricky. This is especially so given that the ambient light conditions vary greatly whether it is a cloudy winter day bordering on drizzle near evening vs a bright winter midday vs a mid-july day when the sun is way up in the severe-clear sky. If I had a reliable O2 sensor in the exhaust, what was subjective is suddenly objective and repeatable.

So, yes, through many hours of melting metal and not a few slow melts, I have gotten better at judging. But I would like it sooooo much better if I could measure flame temperature or O2 concentration.

Denis

 

The foundry owner who's teaching me mentioned that his gas furnace, when running at the "right" fuel mixture is still burning rich or incomplete: they put a woven mesh of fine platinum wire in the exhaust stream high above the flames and it immediately went yellow/white hot as it catalytically burnt the exhaust gasses. So running the furnace for lean, complete combustion can cause extra oxidation of the metal in the crucible too. Also some government inspector came round to test for noxious gasses at some point and despite being warned the exhaust was too hot, stuck his sampling probe into the exhaust and promptly destroyed it. The inspector was not happy but left and was never heard from again.

 

Rich or incomplete----YES. I use a piece of clean metal, usually a skimmer held in the exhaust stream to confirm that it will soot up a bit in a few seconds. If not, I am too lean and that means for sure too cold. That is still inexact as the is soot up "a little' vs soots up "a lot" which also means not enough air and not quite the hottest temp.

Denis

 

My math (sorry for the mix). If 1kg. of air = 27 ft.³ (or 764L)

I’m hoping to get a max output of 40 CFM of air. This should be close to 15:1 if I am burning 0.1L per minute.

 

Too lean really screws my silicon bronze up. Everything in life runs on a bell curve, this is no different! I lean for peak (middle of the scale) and then enrichen slightly. After you get a handful of decent melts under your belt, you'll get a sense for how long it should take. If you really want, I will tell you to closely watch the surface of the bronze. You are looking for a swirl to happen. It's hard to explain, but you will know it when you see it. WTF it is, I dont really know. Someone told me it's the silicon floating around. When I see it, I check with my pooper scooper, put down my 2nd beer and pull the crucible. Next I'm watching the color of my crucible. IF you've seen my videos, I pointed out once when I over heated a crucible of bronze. You can clearly see the color difference of the crucible. This is the main reason I prefer to pour at night. Barring any of this voodoo, you can always build a pyrometer. No a laser thermometer does not work due to the reflectiveness of the metal.

Commit this picture to memory. Or print it off and hang it on your wall!


Sure this is not the fastest, but that's not the name of this game. A quality bronze melt is more important than how fast you can melt.

 

I've heard that zinc works well for this test. I've never done it and I can't remember which condition indicates what color the zinc turns. I watch my exhaust hole. If it's white in and around the hole then I know I'm way too lean. If it's black then I'm way too rich. I know that's kind of a shotgun approach but it's at least closer than a wild ass guess.

Pete

 

Yes, I read about and thus used the zinc metal exhaust test at first. But, I found that steel or zinc gave the same results---zinc does not change color but just soots up in rich conditions. So, simplicity suggested just using what I had in hand already---skimmers. Just makes for one less thing to drag out for a melt/pour. The added plus of using a skimmer and sooting it is that sooting it makes it shed iron and slag very nicely.

Denis

 

I use the clean exhaust method then smoke it up a touch with flames licking 2-3 inches out my hole.
Since I started doing that, no more surface finish issues. Smooth as a babys ass.

 

Hot zinc oxide is a light yellow colour and goes white when cool, not an intense yellow but distinctly yellow, so if the zinc is in an oxidizing flame it'll go that colour.

 

There’s a lot of visual Hints. Thanks guys.

I am going to put a VFD on the oil gear pump and I’m going to put a Vfd on the blower. I should be able to tweak these in based on the read out of the VFD reading rpm of the motor. I can measure very easily the diesel or WVO per minute and build a chart. The air, I’ll see if I can borrow a hot wire manometer from work.

The only thing I won’t be able to calculate is the back pressure that is created inside the furnace. I might be able to do this a little bit, as the VFD will increase output amperage to maintain blower speed.

Tonight I finished up the plug adaptor for the blower.