Rocket Stove

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Ashful

Minister of Fire
Mar 7, 2012
19,959
Philadelphia
Saw this interesting contraption at Buckland Abbey. It was new to me, not sure how common they are.

 
This one looks pretty basic, but it has a nice clean burn. To be practical the stove needs to support and evenly heat native cooking implements.

There's an active group that is working on developing fuel efficient stoves for third world cooking where fuel is scarce and grid power doesn't exist. The US is leading in this development with some interesting stoves also coming out of China. In the US Aprovecho and the Burn Design Lab are leaders:

http://www.rocketstove.org/

Here's a video of a popular Chinese unit:

 
They are being used in cob houses and vented through long pipes to heat a sitting bench or cob bed. There are even rocket stove pizza ovens out there, although not as popular as traditional ones. They do burn clean. I am looking to build one to take ice fishing and burn scraps of wood to take the chill off or heat some stew or soup.
 
I see the term used for the long masonry bench heaters but personally I find them to be more closely related to a masonry stove that channels the exhaust through a bench seat. They are not cooking stoves.
 
I assume the idea is that the whole stove is a chimney? It's always operating in an "Overfired" state?
 
I see the term used for the long masonry bench heaters but personally I find them to be more closely related to a masonry stove that channels the exhaust through a bench seat. They are not cooking stoves.

Yes, I will agree. I watched one video of a rocket stove pizza oven that used a metal firing door with a restricted hole to accelerate the incoming air to the firebox resulting in a "rocket taking off" sound. Hence, the loose term.

Another was a more traditional rocket stove where the wood was fed in and was heating a cooking chamber above it. I'd have to search for that video.
 
I have seen these home made out of every thing from metal cans, stove pipe and rock wool (or fiber glass) to a simple stack of bricks. It's nice you can make one quickly in a situation out of scavenged stuff
When you see a good burning one fired up, you know why they call it a "Rocket Stove"
 
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