Building a waste oil burning stove for my shop

[Farwell]

The biggest complaint I have heard and read is the smell of the burning oil. I use one of the quick oil changers when I get my vehicle oil changed, they use an oil burner, it does not smell and the shop is always toasty warm.

 

[patrick_g]

The previous owner of my quarter section was in the business of making golf courses and such so he had big dozers and a 35x70 shop with traveling jib crane with electric hoist etc. That building had two forms of heat. an overhead suspended propane furnace with fan and a DIY waste oil burner. The waste oil stove was make from a medium sized pressure vessel about 4 ft long (mounted horizontally) and about 18-20 inches in diameter. It has a gate valve to control the drip from an over head tank. and a 6 inch exhaust stack which he ran out a window with a piece of sheet metal as a filler around the flue pipe.

Seemed to work OK. If I were to improve it I'd add a ceramic bowl to catch the drip and contain the fire.

Pat

 

[Iplayfarmer]

I read the whole MEN section on waste oil burners a while back. I'm excited to see someone on TBN go through the process. Keep us posted. I'm eager to see your progress and learn your lessons along with you.

 

[Donman]

The key to these men stoves is controlling the oil. . . . . .

. . . My friend has a ceiling in his shop. It only takes about 30 minutes to bring his heat up to about 75 to 80 degrees. My shop is insulated, so I should be able to bring the heat up pretty quick.

75 to 80 degrees? Thats too hot for me! Does he work in his underwear?

 

[LetsRoll]

I wanted to play with that style burner for some time. For now I would plan on this as supplimental heat, at least get the bugs out and see how much oil you will need. Don't sell your nice radiant heater too soon! Are you going to make access panels to clean the top barrel?

Bill, I will be making an access door for the top barrel. I just have to decide on the design cause I have to make this stove air tight other than the air intake. Once the oil goes into a gas form and the air hits it, the right amount (air and fuel ratio) of oil vapor and air must be acheived or the flame will smoke causing soot real quick and I'm talking BLACK smoke.

I machined a conical burner at work yesterday (Monday). Just like the one Roger from the link I provided above in my first post, he machined one for this waste oil burner. Mine is 6 inches in diameter (6.000" OD) and it's 1 inch thick (1.000"). I cut from the edge to the center at 12 degrees. I radius the edges and also cut a 3.500" circle on the bottom of it and the circle is .080" deep. This hole if for the bracket that this conical will set on. This little diagram is what it looks like --->|\_/| I dont have a picture of it yet. But I will hopefully have one by tonight. Mine is a little dirty right now cause I took it over to my friends house and used his stove. When my stove is done, it will look just like his, except I will be burning waste oil and he will be burning firewood unless I can change his mind. Several things happened today. I was able to get a hot burn and a low burn. The low burn was controllable by adjusting the valve for the oil drip. I used a ball valve which is not the right valve to use. But that is all I had in my tool box. Once my stove is finished, I will be buying a needle valve which will help better control the oil drips. But the ball valve allowed us to try a few test. The ball valve did not allow us to get a real good oil stability. The needle valve will take care of that. But, we was able to control the hot burn and the low burn. Which was my main concern. One thing we did not have right was the intake air ratio. Are air intake pipe was only 2 inch in diameter. I think more volume would have helped, just dont need the higher pressure (Roger talks about this on the mother earth news website). But we was able to get a decent flame. We did have some smoke coming out of the exhaust pipe outside. not allot, but some. I will say this, this set-up worked better than I thought it would. The hot burn was really hot and I mean hot. My friends stove uses the some natural gas pipe that mine is using. We both got the pipe from the same company that sells used natural gas pipe. On the hot burn, the oil pool was a little over 5 1/2 inchs on the conical burner. And it did not take very long before we both had to step outside to cool off. As of now, I have a better feel of how this burner will perform using waste oil. I have a few ideas in my head that I will be trying out. Once I have the stove done. I have several test that I want to try and see what the results will bring. To be honest, efficiency as of right now and from what I've learned today, is not a big concern. I have a real good idea of how this stove will work. Oil consumption is one of my concerns. I did realize or I should say has/had found out the hard way, this type of stove will burn a large amount of oil during a hot burn. I didn't monitor the oil consumption during the low burn. The first hour or so of using this stove (when I finally get mine done), will be for the hot burn. This is to get the heat up so I can enjoy what I need to do in my shop, after that, I can turn the oil down. As for oil, that is not a problem. My bother-n-law owns a mechanic's shop and he does a ton of oil changes. Lets put it this way, he has so much oil on hand, he has to pay a company to come and take his excess oil. So, oil is not a problem.

As for losing heat up top. A ceiling or vapor barrier is out of the question. I have a two post Rotary lift in my shop and I need the extra clearence for the vehicles that I service. As for using ceiling fans, I plan on putting three in as soon as I get this stove up and running.

Thanks guys,
Cliff

By the way....I hope everyone of you and yours have a Happy Thanksgiving!~~ ~~

 

[LetsRoll]

75 to 80 degrees? Thats too hot for me! Does he work in his underwear?

No, he needs the heat for painting muscle cars in his paint booth. He restores show quality muscle cars on the side for extra money. Some paints and primers need a certain temperture to cure right. Humidity is another factor he has to deal with...ect...ect...ect. You get the point.

 

[Iplayfarmer]

...I will be making an access door for the top barrel. I just have to decide on the design cause I have to make this stove air tight other than the air intake...

...I machined a conical burner at work yesterday (Monday). Just like the one Roger from the link I provided above in my first post...

Thanks guys,
Cliff

Great Details. Thank you.

I'd love to see pictures!

 

[Renze]

I converted the oil heater in my workshop to wood last winter:
I kept going around the neighbors for waste oil, because it was gone in 3 days. With neighbor's waste oil included, i could keep it warm for a week.

I built a steel pan over the oil pit, perforated the pan with a drill, so that the air is spread through the heater, so the wood will burn better.

First time i used wood in it, the buildup of years of creosote dripped down the sides, which later turned out to have heat exchanger pipes...
Now its burned clean, it gives a lot more heat.

Anyways, i have some guys at work who need to get rid of their waste oil... as soon as that's up, i will drop down the ash pan and start burning wood again.

 

[skidsteer.ca]

I have been toying with this idea for some time now too. I had read Rogers article a year or so ago. Currently I heat my 2400 sq ft shop (18 ft ceiling) with wood and supplement it with a gravity feed oil drip system controlled by a ball valve.
This system works good if you need lots of heat.
The problem is that the oil burns rich if you try to throttle the draft down on the stove. It looks like black cotton candy inside and the smell is all over the yard
I had been thinking of using 2 old 100 lb lpg bottles. Dump the dirty oil into the first tank, seal it and use regulated compressed air to chase it through a strainer then a oil filter into tank # 2
The first tank would have a cleanout for sludge and water at the bottom.

From the clean tank the oil would be fead to the stove again with regulated air pressure.
I had considered using a pressure washer nozzle to atomize the oil and feeding it into a venturi where airflow would be controled by another regulator.

After seeing Rodgers version I'm not sure I should take all this experimenting on or just go with something I'm told is tried and true.
However even with his conical burner I think I'd use air feed as opposed to gravity just because you can make the "hill" as high as you want. Also as I found in my drip system it is easy to plug it up with crud in the oil. So plan on a cleanout somewhere.
One of these
Surplus Center Item Detail
should work good for a flow control valve, especially if you could control the pressure as well.
I'll be watching this thread closely and look forward to learning more.
We generate 150 to 200 gallons of used oil anually, so it would be good to put it to use.
Ken

 

[svcguy]

I really like your interest in Rogers heater, as it makes a lot of sense. Waste oil heaters are very efficient when working well. The problem you might have is the thickness of your steel pipe (stove sections). The M.E.N. heater was originally created from a water tank, which is fairly thin material and quite tall. Although thin steel is not as safe as your heater design (which looks really good by the way), it does tend to radiate quite efficiently. Rogers conical burner is brilliant, not only because of the efficiency of the burner puddle (size vs depth), but because of its ease of cleaning. Any waste oil heater not atomizing the fuel is a total pain to clean. Roger explains this very well in his article and his burner is the answer (without a doubt).

What you may find is that your efficiency may be limited by the thickness of your material (heat bypassing the stove body and heat exchanger). Radiant heat is dependent on wall thickness (you will know by the amount of heat escaping up the chimney). To counter act the thickness of material, you might find it an advantage to weld a series of 1/8 or 1/4 by 4 inch fins over the entire length of your heat exchanger to "wick" heat out into the room. These could be inside the tube as well as outside. Welds should run the length of the fins on both sides to ensure for good heat transfer. The greater the surface area, the better the heat transfer.

I am really excited about your project and will be looking forward to hearing more about your experience with the heater. Keep everyone up to date with photos and details.

All the best, Tom