Homebuilt Boiler Project

[bioman]

This is a project I started early spring, boiler holds 950 Gal, + 500 Gal propane tank, heated my shop march & april , built with old iron around the farm. Don't know how many BTU. Heated the first load of water from wellwater cold to boiling in 3 hrs. with osage orange. Plumbing will be next, just finished insulating yesterday. Plan to heat my house, shop & DHW. very economical from what i see. Thanks for all the vast knowledge from hearth.com. Very interesting & fun project, burns awsome with no smoke.


Larry

 

[burnt gloves]

hay larry

looks great.... nice job....were do u get the door ? looks like a garn..maybe?also do you have any pic of the inside....please.. were did you get inslation.
anyway hope im not asking too much. as im gearing up for a new build this fall .my last build is working good just need to finsh ha ha .. brent

 

[bioman]

Brent, I built the door from the end of a propane tank i used for the firebox, the hinges are an old drawbar, the outside is an old disc blade with part of a hay rake wheel. The insulation is fiberglass R-19 wraped with radiant barrier. the inside is an old 30" propane tank 32" long. Horizontal 4" exhaust.

 

[Vinced]

Your boiler looks well built. I'd be interested in more about it. Do you have any pictures of the inside? Is there more to the inside then the firebox? How many times does the exhaust pass through the water jacket?

 

[sparke]

Well done! Do you have pictures of the boiler as you were building it? the boiler looks like a minature Garn, is that the premise for design?

 

[sdrobertson]

Well done! Do you have pictures of the boiler as you were building it? the boiler looks like a minature Garn, is that the premise for design?

Nice and clean set-up....
I've often wondered about a small boiler based on a miniature Garn. You could hook it up to any size storage you wanted or needed. Also, what about a portable boiler that could be moved house to house to recharge storage. Each house with lots of storage and you get the boiler for recharging the tanks. No problems with insurance as the boiler is never installed.......just hook-ups to transfer the heat. I know...weird ideas in the middle of summer :smirk:

 

[bioman]

sorry for the slow reply,been in the field. it's a five pass heat exchanger, about 60ft. of pipe inside, flue temp runs about 350-375 * on the last pass, 150* outside. went a little overboard on some parts,but thats what i had laying around. double welds everywhere, lots of grinding,2- 30 # spools of wire. anxious to burn it after i've insulated.

 

[bpirger]

Most definitely looks like a small Garn. I believe I heard Garn is working on a smaller model....looks like this is a test bed for them.

Looks really nice! Don't forget to pay attention to the water chemistry inside.

 

[bioman]

I'll watch that for sure, have the chemicals in my shop. Thanks for the advise.

 

[burnt gloves]

holy smokes...... im drooling envy envy.... nice.. very nice.just go to show what can be do with some time and know how
again bravo larry ..................... inspiration to all................. dont just dream and forget.... dream and build......










brent

 

[Sawyer]

Looks like you did a professional job on design and fabrication.

Bet it cost a lot less than mine. ;-)

 

[Vinced]

Thanks for the build pictures. It looks like it is very well built. How did you figure out the size of the secondary chamber and is it refactory or ceramic lined? What is the length and diameter of the outer tank? I'm curious how you figured out how to size everything, or did you just use what you had on hand?