waste oil burner

[lapeer20m]

There are various designs i've seen for waste oil burners used for heating. A buddy of mine built one with his own design, and it's wonderfully simple.

The process is started with wood to get everything hot prior to switching over to oil.

It's a standard woodstove with a slight modification. Inside is a series of steel 2" wide channel that runs the width of the stove. Each piece runs on an angle here's a cutaway diagram:




The oil enters from the top of the stove and drips onto the uppermost piece of channel. Then it runs downhill where it drips onto the next piece of channell and so on until it gets hot enough to burn up. Ideally, the oil should never make it to the bottom tray.

Safety:

There are two flow control valves. The first one is near the oil container, and it's set to control the max safe flow rate. The second one is near the stove and allows the flow of oil to be varied to control heat output.

At the bottom is a tray that can collect any excess oil that doesn't burn. There is a drain near the top of the tray to prevent overflowing problems. The hot oil just drains into a metal can outside the stove.

[lapeer20m]

another waste oil burner idea that is more complicated is using waste veggie oil in a standard fuel oil boiler.

I just got a fuel oil boiler donated to me. Hopefully tomorrow i can tear into that project.

More info on this project to come in the future.

I decided that a boiler that burns wvo would be an excellent alternative for heating my jacuzzi when the bus engine is not running. A boiler in essence is just a hot water heater..

[busone]

Check out the Yahoo groups "wastewatts" and "vegoilburners" they have a wealth of info on oil burners. My favorite is the Babington but it does take a lot more to build. Also check out "altfuelfurnace" on yahoo, they are all about converting oil furnaces. In my next house I am going to have a hot tub and heat it with oil.

[lapeer20m]

i've belonged to both of those groups for several months already.

It just seems that us crazy skoolie people seem to have a lot of the same wacky interests.

[lapeer20m]

A spending freeze is now in effect as i've been waiting a couple weeks now for the new bus to come home, just need to finish getting the $$$. Now i've put the bus remodel project on hold as it cost a lot of money. I decided to work on some cheaper projects....

I have a fuel oil buner now that works great. The boiler itself has a crack in it and being cast iron is too difficult to repair.

Good news: I found a new (used) boiler for free that is missing the burner. It's also much smaller than the original boiler i had.

my plan is to heat the water for the jacuzzi. I'll have to do some R&D, but i would immagine i can run 55 degree water from the garden hose through the boiler and have it come out the other side at or near proper jacuzzi temperature (~104 degrees). My previous heat exchanger had less than steller performance. It did take water from the garden hose and heat it to about 100 degrees, but the water was restricted to a 1/4" inlet/outlet thus reducing my water flow significantly. The boiler has 1" or lager inlet/outlet so i could move a lot more water, and i'm sure it's more fuel efficient than my previous attempt.

The boiler takes up just a little bit too much space to be mounted in the bus. Perhaps my next bus will have room for the boiler....

I think i'm going to mount the boiler in the garage, and make some quick disconnect fittings for the jacuzzi. The problem i'm trying to solve is heating water efficiently in a short period of time. If i'm driving more than an hour after filling the jacuzzi, engine heat is usually enough to heat the water. The problem is when i want to fill the jacuzzi on saturday evening and go to a party 5 miles away saturday nite.

A boiler is just a big hot water heater. The most efficient way to heat the water will be to pump it through the boiler, but i'm not sure if the inside of the boiler is clean enough. It might make the jacuzzi water rust colored. If i cannot correct this problem, i'll use a radiator of somekind as a heat exchanger.

The boiler runs just fine on diesel fuel....which i've been told is identicle to fuel oil (except the color)

I do not usually keep an insulated cover on the jacuzzi, unless it's really cold outside. I also empty and refill the jacuzzi nearly every weekend.

I'll try and take some photo's soon....

[lapeer20m]

Now that cold weather has returned, I plan to do some more research and development on the boiler project.

I think it's an excellent way to heat the jacuzzi, and the interior of the bus.

The most beuatiful thing is that fuel oil and diesel fuel are the same thing.

I would like to mount the boiler inside the bus i'm pretty sure.

[busone]

We must be reading each others minds. Just the other day I was talking to my wife about building a waste oil heater for the hot tub. I want to work with the Babington type burner. I found a round brass candle holder at a thrift store for the ball. Now I need to find some micro bits to make the hole. I might also try a copper float ball from a toilet tank. Of course I cannot do much until I get my cast off my hand. 2 week to go.

[lapeer20m]

well....i spent a good portion of the day yesterday playing with my new boiler. I've had the burner for a while, but didn't have a useable boiler until now....

I think she will almost certianly be mounted inside the bus before too long.

The boiler will have three main purposes:
Heating the water in the jacuzzi
Heating the interior of the bus
Pre-heating the engine block

Eventually i want the burner to run on wvo and wmo....but that's a story for another day...

As for my R&D....this is a pretty good "on demand" water heater. I can heat water from the garden hose from 55 degrees to 95 degrees. I'm not sure how many gpm, but we have pretty decent water pressure at the house. After i filled the jacuzzi with 95 degree water, i circulated the jacuzzi water through the boiler. It didn't take long at all the heat the 400 gallons of water up to 105 degrees.

this was all done outside at about 50 degrees burning keroseine with a fuel oil burner designed to fit a much larger boiler, so efficiency probably isn't as good as it could be, but i'm very happy.

[lapeer20m]

here's a pic of the boiler.....she isn't much to look at, but sure makes an excellent water heater......and the price was right. FREE

[lapeer20m]

I spent a good portion of yesterday trying to get the fuel oil burner to run on wvo. The principle is easy......heat the oil to near 300 degrees F and it should burn just fine in the standard beckett AFG burner.

The devil is in the details.....

The oil has to be pre-heated before it enters the pump....but if the oil is more than 120 degrees premature pump failure can be expected.

Heating the oil from 120 degrees to about 280 degrees needs to be done from the time the oil leaves the pump before it gets to the nozzle....

I heated the oil with a 110 volt 1,800 watt electric immersion heater after it passed through the pump. I coulnd't get the oil to ignite in the burner......Even tried heating the oil in excess of 400 degrees. Finally i measured the temp of the oil as it actually reaches the nozzle (approximately 10 inches from the point the oil is heated to 400 degrees.)
At the nozzle, the oil was under 200 degrees. UGGGG!

I gave up for the day.....

I did order some of these fancy band heaters to heat the nozzle and tube assembly. Others who run their beckett afg burners on wvo utilize the same heaters.

[busone]

Are you a member of the WVO/WMO conversion group for the Becketts on Yahoo. If not let me know and I will find the name of the group. It has been a while since I used yahoo.

[Eric von Kleist]

The most beuatiful thing is that fuel oil and diesel fuel are the same thing.

.....except that one has been taxed for highway use....

But you are going the other way (highway use for non-highway purposes), so you're okay.

The other day, I was toying with the idea of buying some fuel oil and putting it in my diesel tank, but decided that with my luck I would be the one motorist who gets stopped for a fuel inspection. I imagine that one could buy a lot of diesel with the money that a fine would cost!

[Jarlaxle]

You just need an extra fuel tank for the red fuel.