starting from scratch

Unless you can design and weld like these guys, I wouldn't attempt anything involving pressure:

https://www.hearth.com/econtent/index.php/forums/viewthread/11492/

From a bang-for-the-buck point of view, it's hard to beat a good used boiler. There are plenty of opportunities to express your mechanical creativity in the piping, storage and controls.

I buildt my own OWB , in fact I built 3 of them and they worked good. I got the plans off the internet and was really happy. Burnt alot of wood but that was free except for my time. They lasted about 4 years and then started to leak. They also SMOKED alot but what the heck I live out in the country and noone is close so no big deal.
In doing so I have learned alot. The money that I have spent on making my own I could have bought a gasifier and had a better boiler that will last many years. I will cut less wood ( probably 40% less), and I will put out alot less smoke out into the air.
On the plus side because I built them I bought $5000 worth of metal tools, welder, plasma cutter, plus alot more. I had alot of fun and have made other things that I couldn't have with out the tools. I learned alot about boilers. The knowledge wasn't out there 7 years ago about gasification boilers and all the rage was the great OWB.
Last year I started to research gasification boilers as I knew the handwriting was on the wall for OWB and mine wouldn't last much longer. I was like most people and had bought into all the good things about OWB, and there is some very Positives with them. But as I learned I had to relearn things I thought I knew. The main thing is that NO BOILER THAT IS TOTALY SUROUNDED WITH WATER CAN EVER BURN HOT ENOUGH TO BURN CLEAN. And they will burn alot of wood.
If you are going to build your own, go for it. But do your research and build a gasification type. They don't look like they would be that hard to build and I don't think the material cost would be that much more. It will take more time because of the research and figuring it out but that is part of the fun. AND I know what being a cheapskate is as I hate to spend if I can find something that I can get cheap that will work. I love to go to auctions and yard sales. I pick up most of my valves, fittings, controls, insulation, plus my walk in freezer panels for my storage tank.
I did buy my eko80 from Cozy-heat (good choice) but the rest is scounged items and I have maybe $8000 in my entire heating system that heats house, hottub, and DHW
If you are going to spend the time do it right
leaddog

There's plenty of people around here who can help you with the specifics. You might want to take a gander at the link I posted about the guy who built his own gasifier. He copied his brother's EKO 25. Now that's a nice looking project. The homemade Garn is another one.

BTW, I see that somebody is selling a used, 120,000 btu/hour boiler for $500 in the For Sale forum. Not sure if that's a wood-fired boiler, but that's the kind of deal I was talking about earlier.

That's Garnification's homemade enhanced Garn.

winton said:

One other ? Has anyone built ,seen, heard of , or have a hahsa system?

Click to expand...

I built one about 20 years ago. The plans used plastic pvc pipe that was inside about 10yds of pea gravel. It also had a copper hx that was on the roof of the fire chamber to help distribute the heat. The instructions said to build small fires. There was a good reason for that. If you over heat it the pvc will go from 3/4 in to about 5in thin wall. Quite a job to remove 10yds of pea gravel and replace with copper. Also the gravel tended to grow and contract with temp changes and the block walls cracked then the gravel started to leak out by the chimney letting the insulation to shift against the chimney and the roof tried to heat up the building from the out side. Makes quite a glow on a -10* nite at 4am. I reworked I one more time before I went to the OWB. It did burn quite clean as it was a fire brick chamber and I could put in any size wood that I could pick up so I didn't have to split it. It would store a lot of btu's but was slow giving it back. Also it would be ok if you only wanted 140 150* water but I wanted 180* for my baseboard and I was on the edge all the time. Took alot of time, money, and sore backs. Wish I had invented the eko and I would have saved alot of agrivation.
leaddog

Seriously consider using Fred Seton's plans for a clean burning unit at http://www.rohor.com/page7.html. I am considering making one. I'll be looking at a clone sometime today. At least the bugs are worked out.

Build - it- yourself.

Interesting topic. I delivered some firewood to an old customer yesterday and met him personally for the first time. Come to find out he tests emissions from smoke stacks all over the USA' including the now defunct biomass co-gen plant I used to sell wood chips to. We were talking about alternative heating, bio-fuels, and so forth, as the future trend of energy use. He mentioned a company he does a lot of research and testing of bio fuel emissions located in Saint Mary's , Penn. The company is ARE - Advanced Recycling Equipment , builders of heating systems using bio fuel, grinders to reduce materials to uniform sizes to be augured into the burn chamber. I looked up their web site and found they are going to be at Booth # 18 at the North East Forest Expo in Vt. this spring. They are definitely going to be on my " sure to look up list " to see how they approach burning fuels.

I hear they started out building small combustion units but have moved to large Industrial/Utilities type furnaces. I'll bet they would still like to talk about how they modestly started out and may have some great knowledge for the do-it- yourself type.

Thought I would pass this info along to folks looking for ideas and a chance to meet some of these forward thinkers.

Hbbyloggr

They've been exhibitors on and off at the show for years. Nice guys, as I recall. I remember their grinding equipment, but not their combustion stuff. Maybe they never brought it along.

Winton,

The same is true even with the internet, the trick is to find the right person (s)or site with the same interests at the other end of the string. You can spend a lot of time looking around to find the right place.

10 or 20 years ago you searched out folks with first hand knowledge, good attitude, willingness to share their experiences, and the "gift of gap." Lot more fun and way better than a keyboard.

See you at the show ?

Hbbyloggr