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Messages - ribs1963

Pages: [1]
1
Home Made / Re: indoor/outdoor
« on: December 03, 2010, 11:58:37 AM »
my brother in law and myself built a forced air outdoor furnace last year.it sits outside but could easly be put in a metal shed.Also firechief makes a pretty good sized outdoor forced air wood furnace.I have a post under the homemade section about my furnace.My brother in law built his and it sits inside a galvanized steel hog hut that stands on its end and is protected from the elements.

2
Home Made / Update
« on: December 03, 2010, 11:49:00 AM »
after over one year of service the clothes dryer blower motor finally gave out.The start up windings went bad and it would not start up on its own but would run if you could spin the motor while plugging in the power supply (not recommended).The company I work for has a house for it's drivers to take breaks and had an old maytag dryer in the basement that the heating portion had went out on.They gave me the dryer and i took the motor and blower out on lunch hour and took it home to wire it to my system.An hour and a half later,all installed and back in service.COST-- nothing,75 degree home,PRICELESS :thumbup:

3
General Discussion / Re: Getting to know one another
« on: February 19, 2010, 10:17:05 AM »
1. First name is Kevin
2.46 years old
3.I dispatch over the road trucks/drivers
4.Horseback riding/6 horses,two ponies
5.99'dodge ram 1500
6.Poulon Pro
7.Married 23 yrs,three kids 21/17/13

4
Fire Wood / Re: Osage Orange?
« on: February 12, 2010, 02:24:50 PM »
You'd know it if you saw it.Very rarely is there a straight section over 4 feet long and they have those ugly green hedge balls in the autumn about the size of a softball.

5
General Discussion / Re: OWB/KEEPING IT RUNNING AFTER LOST ELECTRIC
« on: February 11, 2010, 09:43:15 AM »
I have a 5700 watt generator and installed a manual transfer switch next to the main fuse box in the house.The manual transfer switch plugs into the generator via the 220 volt plug in on the generator and a twenty foot cord.I can run six 110 volt circuits.I have one of these circuits wired to the electric service needed to run the fan on my outdoor furnace.Connecticut electric made the one I have.It cost $185 at menards and I spent an additional $40 on the cord and incidentals and had it wired in about half an hour.I just keeep the generator close by and i can have it up and running in about three to five minutes and it runs eleven hours on a tank of gas

6
Home Made / Re: My homemade/modified forced air wood furnace
« on: February 10, 2010, 03:30:56 PM »
The only other manufacturer I know of is the firechief located in missouri also.Their outdoor furnace is really big but the basic idea is the same.Heatup the air surrounding the stove and blow it into the house.My brother-inlaw is building the one for his shop using a 100 gallon rectangular fuel tank standing on end for the firebox.It will sit inside a 250 gallon round fuel barrel as the heat exchanger.Thats still way to big for what you want to do but its the general idea,you just have to play around with the the size fan that you need versus the size of the air plenum surrounding the firebox.I just got lucky.Grainger sells a number of squirrel cage fans so you should be able to find one that suits your needs unless you have a few old clothes dryers around that you can toy with

7
Home Made / Re: My homemade/modified forced air wood furnace
« on: February 10, 2010, 07:53:02 AM »
I dont have any pics yet but the firebox is approx 14 inches wide,27 inches deep,and I think it's around 22 inches tall with an ash compartment below.Then the outer insulated caseing leaves around four or so inches of space between the insulation and the firebox.The whole thing just looks like a common small forced air furnace.There are places online that you can get super high heat insulation that is used to refurbish old stoves.I think its spun ceramic and is rated at 2200 degrees.So far our Highest electric bill has been $175.The house temp hasnt fell below 72 degrees since we installed it and we've had it a lot warmer than that just to see what it would do.Theres a place in Missouri that sells manufactured ones similar in design to mine,I think it's called LIL' House wood heater.The one thing I forgot to mention was that I made a "heat dump" trap door on top of it just in case something should ever happen to the fan and I wanted to let all the hot air out before I could shut down the fire.

8
Fire Wood / Re: Osage Orange?
« on: January 20, 2010, 07:11:10 AM »
I've burned oak,ash,walnut,and other unknown wood and so far osage orange (hedge)outburns them all.Burns hot and long.Only a couple (rounders) needed to keep the stove at operating temps for about 6 hours.The issue with the sparks only happens when the wood is fresh cut,if you have seasoned it then it doesnt spark.and it only does it when you open the fuel door and let in a lot of air to the firebox.Where we live they planted it in fencerows back in the 1930's to help slow down wind erosion so it's pretty abundant and easy to get to.When you first cut into it you'll know it's osage orange by the bright yellow color.Also I dont think I've ever see one of those trees grow straight,they always gorw in a twisted/bent fashion

9
Home Made / Re: My homemade/modified forced air wood furnace--update
« on: December 08, 2009, 10:22:36 AM »
It's been down in the teens at night and around 30 degrees in the day and the stove is working perfectly.We found the right combination of wood to keep the stove hot from about 11:00 p.m. till 5:00 a.m. when I get up.The firebox is fairly small but we fill it with aged oak chunks and some ash wood and the house stays above 75 degress all night and there's still some wood left in it when I get up in the morning.My son fills it once or twice in the day when I'm at work and everything is working perfectly

10
Home Made / Re: MY homemade/modified forced air wood furnace
« on: November 23, 2009, 08:04:57 AM »
On another note,It's much safer,and cleaner than having the add-on furnace in the basement which was my goal and I think the goal of most people that install outdoor furnaces

11
Home Made / Re: MY homemade/modified forced air wood furnace
« on: November 23, 2009, 07:48:51 AM »
I'ts not a boiler,Just forced air.The furnace is insulated and cold to the touch even when the plenum temp is 200 degrees.The duct is also insulated so no part of this furnace is hot on the outside except for the chimney which is meets fire codes for our county.Google outdoor wood furnace and you'll find a few out there and this one is similar to most of those except this one didnt cost $1600 to $3000.I dont think you were rude at all just curious. This unit's fan is also wired to a circuit that can be switched over to run off my generator when the power goes out during winter storms so the unit wont super heat during a power outage

12
Home Made / My homemade/modified forced air wood furnace
« on: November 19, 2009, 08:22:10 AM »
Hello,I'm new to this forum and I thought I'd share what We did at our home.I had researched outdoor wood furnaces for about a year and I wanted to go with a forced air unit.I had some idea on making my own but never got around to it.This past summer a co-worker offered me an indoor add-on wood furnace that was in the basement of the house he had bought a couple years ago.This was my chance get things going.I thought I could modify it in order to put it outside so there wouldnt be any mess inside and my insurance company told me that as long as it was outside they didnt care if we had one.We hauled it home and tore into it only to find that the fire box was warped and rotted through in many places from the previous owner leaving the ash in it and rainwater entering from the chimney.This was obviously a major problem.My brother in law is pretty handy with a welder so I took it over to him and he had no doubts that he could beef it up and get it going for us.I also purchased a junk livestock trailer around the same time for $50 and I took it to ny brother in law so he could use as much metal as he needed to get the stove back in shape.Two weeks later I went over and we test fired it to check for leaks and found absolutely no leaks.I hauled it back home and started installing it.I placed it about 40 inches from the house,put it up on concrete blocks.bought some 8 inch duct work to pipe the hot air into the house and also 8 inch ducting to run a cold air return back to the furnace.The next step was a blower fan.I knew it need to be fairly small so it would'nt overcool so I went down to the scrap heap at the back of our farm and pulled out a clothes dryer that I had taken back there a couple years ago and took it to my barn to dismantle the blower motor/fan assembly.I used the sheet metal from the dryer to make a plenum in which to put the fan and attach it to the lower back of the furnace.tested the motor,wired it through a fan limit switch that came with the original add-on furnace.I also ordered some high heat insulation to place inside the outer casing of the furnace.With buying the chimney,raincap,duct work and the stock trailer i probably have less that $150 in the whole unit.I fired it up in late september of this year on a night when the temp dipped to 26 degrees.and man was i surprised.This little baby kept our whole 2400 square ft house warm as toast.we have been using it off and on for about six weeks and I have never been more pleased with one of my projects.I ran the heat duct in through my living room window and made a plywood frame with foamboard insulation so that no cold air can get in and no hot air escapes.I also wrapped the duct with the high heat insulation so I dont have to worry about the framework in the window getting hot.I placed an oven thermometer in the duct work and we average from around 100 degrees to around 200 degree air coming into the house and the return duct is hooked into our central heating return air duct so the air circulates through the whole house. 
 
   
 
 

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