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[stratton]

Quick question……
I have read that a couple of members have added fire brick to inside of boiler. i think 10-20% Purpose is to increase temp and cut down on creosote. I would love to hear experiences or opinions

[ITO]

Stratton, I just read an article on another forum (hope you don't mind Idaho) and part of it deals with fire brick, I am wondering about that also, would it increase my efficiency?
http://www.bae.ncsu.edu/extension/ext-publications/energy/ag398-hot-water-boyette.pdf

[slimjim]

It will increase the temp of the fire itself, therefor burning more of the gases, increasing efficiency, I,ve seen it!

[stratton]

Ito
thanks for info I am going to dig into it later, looks like a good read.

[ryan_atkins@yahoo.com]

Here is a couple pics that added fire brick makes a big.difference

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[BoilerHouse]

My firebox is brick lined, and as long as the wood is fairly dry, there is never any smoke except a small amount during initial start up.  The fire tends to burn hotter and heat transfer takes place in an area of the stove which has fire tubes.  If you add fire bricks to a conventional style boiler, will you still be able to transfer heat, or will it simply pass up the stack hotter?

[hondaracer2oo4]

Ryan, what kind of boiler do you have there?

ITO, I don't know if you read that article posted earlier but it was very informative. It states that red bricks(especially the ones with holes in them) perform nearly as well as real fire bricks which cost much much more. I have a lot of red bricks laying around, I think Ill just put some down on the bottom surrounding the grate and see if it makes any difference. 

[ITO]

 Yeah, I did read it but the stove shown is sort of a primitive gasifier and in most modern conventional boilers (like mine) where would I put brick to do the most good, my floor is grates and sand and the sides are the water transfer surfaces, maybe brick on top? That part doesn't make sense to me, I can see where along the fire tubes in the stove in the article it would be different. Lots of good info, some of it dated and I didn't like the part about someone getting up in the middle of the night to stoke the boiler.
 

[idahohay]

ITO, my Heatmor came with firebrick around the base, I assume they all do.

honda, I was once considering building an outdoor pizza oven and the firebrick vs. red brick comes up quite often. The only thing i remember is that all brick isn't created equal and can vary in content and the temperature it was fired at. Hitting a brick with a hammer will cause it to break, crumble, or something in between. Ones that crumble might tend to do that when subjected to high heat so beware and be prepared to clean out some crumbled brick.

[ITO]

 Making me think Idaho? I guess I have forgotten since 05 but it's grates on the bottom above the blower and cleaning cavity with sand around it, the sides and top are all water jacket, if there are bricks they must be in the bottom? I remember filling it with sand but ours is not actually a Heatmor, it's a HeatSource1 and although they are very similar maybe they differ in this way, not sure.

[ryan_atkins@yahoo.com]

Its a Ozark biomass boiler. 300 gallons. As see in pics is a double pass flue.runs 350 to 400 in a full load flat out burn. I built the grate out of 3/4 rebar and here is the over under pic of air. The cage that slips inside has 6 firebricks in it and gets really hot during burn with no smoke in under 40 minutes. It leaves a super fine ash after many burns
, burn clean like a Gasser but can put as big as a log I want and wood is 12 to 18 percent moisture when goes in.

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[fryedaddy]

My stove is comparable to the design shown in that link.

It has a square shape and a lot of engineering on it though.
I like the design and haven't tried lining it with brick.
Link:
http://www.hickswaterstoves.com/Graphics/No.1/IndexNo1.html

It's an indoor unit made to go into a shop.

I thought using brick would rust the steel? Maybe I'm getting crossed up with a
conventional unit.

[MiHawkeye]

I have a Heiss heater gassifier. The firebox is a cement box made from refractory cement, similar tonfirebricks. The water jacket actually in pipes running through it. There is no creosote that sticks to the firebox, but it does stick to the metal door. The fire is very hot when blower is on, and the cement holds the heat for a long time after the fire is out. The cement is a refractory cement, so temps can go very high. I would definitely go with the firebricks.

[Sprinter]

You can also use sand for the bottom obviously