I'm looking at making a wood burner for the garage out of an old 55 gallon
oil drum. Plenty of plans and ideas on the Intergoogles. I'm currently
thinking of having it horizontal with the door at one end so I can just
chuck in logs 2 or 3 feet long to save sawing stuff into shorter lengths.
The biggest issue is the flue and knocking a hole in the wall to get that
outside. Is there any reason why I can't just stick a length of 5" diameter
pipe up out of the back of the drum and then horizontally through the wall
to outside and leave it like that with no vertical chimney going up above
the roof line? I'm not bothered about smoke or where it goes. The garage is
far enough away from the house and I live in the back of beyond with no near
neighbours so emissions are not an issue nor are any stupid regulations that
might otherwise prevent me doing something I want to. I just want the
cheapest easiest way to vent the oil drum.
--
Dave Baker

On 17/11/2014 14:03, Dave Baker wrote:
I'm looking at making a wood burner for the garage out of an old 55
gallon oil drum. Plenty of plans and ideas on the Intergoogles. I'm
currently thinking of having it horizontal with the door at one end so I
can just chuck in logs 2 or 3 feet long to save sawing stuff into
shorter lengths. The biggest issue is the flue and knocking a hole in
the wall to get that outside. Is there any reason why I can't just stick
a length of 5" diameter pipe up out of the back of the drum and then
horizontally through the wall to outside and leave it like that with no
vertical chimney going up above the roof line?

I suspect it won't draw properly unless it has at least some section of
flue that is least up at 45 degrees. I am assuming here that your
garage is not hermetically sealed and ventilation isn't a problem.

I'm not bothered about
smoke or where it goes. The garage is far enough away from the house and
I live in the back of beyond with no near neighbours so emissions are
not an issue nor are any stupid regulations that might otherwise prevent
me doing something I want to. I just want the cheapest easiest way to
vent the oil drum.

Not sure how long a 45 gallon drum will last in that sort of usage - you
might want to put a fire pit underneath it to catch the contents when as
seems inevitable it disintegrates some time later.

Having said that half oil drums make reasonable BBQ gear provided you
junk them before the rust eats through them.

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

On 17/11/2014 14:03, Dave Baker wrote:
I'm looking at making a wood burner for the garage out of an old 55
gallon oil drum. Plenty of plans and ideas on the Intergoogles. I'm
currently thinking of having it horizontal with the door at one end so I
can just chuck in logs 2 or 3 feet long to save sawing stuff into
shorter lengths. The biggest issue is the flue and knocking a hole in
the wall to get that outside. Is there any reason why I can't just stick
a length of 5" diameter pipe up out of the back of the drum and then
horizontally through the wall to outside and leave it like that with no
vertical chimney going up above the roof line? I'm not bothered about
smoke or where it goes. The garage is far enough away from the house and
I live in the back of beyond with no near neighbours so emissions are
not an issue nor are any stupid regulations that might otherwise prevent
me doing something I want to. I just want the cheapest easiest way to
vent the oil drum.

I would have said that you *definitely* need a vertical run to get some
"draw". Your proposed arrangement might work with the wind in some
directions (low pressure area around the outlet) but in general I would
say it is a recipe for filling your garage with smoke and fumes. You
could make it forced draught (i.e. a fan blowing air in at the bottom)
but of course would then need to have a sealed door, or induced draught
(fan sucking on the flue) but this is exposed to the flue gases. You
might not need to go above the roof line but I think it will all depend
on local wind flow, shelter, etc.

Thinking really laterally, you could pressurise the garage with a big
fan sucking air in so that the best way for the smoke to get out is via
your flue.

You of all people ought to be able to visualise this sort of stuff :-)

Why would a flue draw less well horizontally than vertically? The flue from
the oil central heating boiler in the house just goes straight through the
wall horizontally.

"Dave Baker" wrote:
Why would a flue draw less well horizontally than vertically? The flue
from the oil central heating boiler in the house just goes straight
through the wall horizontally.

Because hot air would far rather go up than along?

I'm pretty sure all oil boilers have a fans producing positive pressure
within the boiler so that's going to help things along enormously.

For very short flues on non-fanned gas boilers, I would guess that there
will be enough vertical height within the boiler to give the gases enough
momentum to travel a short distance horizontally.

Tim

On 17/11/2014 16:53, Tim+ wrote:
"Dave Baker" wrote:
Why would a flue draw less well horizontally than vertically? The flue
from the oil central heating boiler in the house just goes straight
through the wall horizontally.

Because hot air would far rather go up than along?

The hot air baloon principle


I'm pretty sure all oil boilers have a fans producing positive pressure
within the boiler so that's going to help things along enormously.

For very short flues on non-fanned gas boilers, I would guess that there
will be enough vertical height within the boiler to give the gases enough
momentum to travel a short distance horizontally.

Tim

Non-room-sealed gas water heaters ("geysers") which sometimes didn't
have much of an external vertical flue used to kill people regularly
from CO poisoning.

On Monday, November 17, 2014 4:35:33 PM UTC, Dave Baker wrote:
Why would a flue draw less well horizontally than vertically? The flue from
the oil central heating boiler in the house just goes straight through the
wall horizontally.

because in certain wind directions the flue would become an inlet and smoke and flames would come out of the air inlet.

Dave Baker formulated the question :
Why would a flue draw less well horizontally than vertically? The flue from
the oil central heating boiler in the house just goes straight through the
wall horizontally.

It needs to rise, so the hot gases can cause a vertical draw. Your
boiler maybe has forced ventilation.

--
Regards,
Harry (M1BYT) (L)
http://www.ukradioamateur.co.uk

In article ,
newshound writes:
Non-room-sealed gas water heaters ("geysers") which sometimes didn't
have much of an external vertical flue used to kill people regularly
from CO poisoning.

So do wood burners in garages/sheds.

Make sure you fit a CO alarm before using it.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

On Mon, 17 Nov 2014 14:26:26 +0000, Martin Brown wrote:

Not sure how long a 45 gallon drum will last in that sort of usage - you
might want to put a fire pit underneath it to catch the contents when as
seems inevitable it disintegrates some time later.

Aye, 2 to 3 ' long logs ain't light... and couple of them burning
efficiently are going to chuck out a fair bit of heat. Expect drum to
glow red...

A short stubby horizontal outlet is just asking for the wind to blow
into it or even just draw air in if a particular wind direction makes
the inside of the garage lower pressure than the outside.

You need some "draw" and in my experience(*) the only way to get that
is with a vertical section of chimney/flu. This is obviously a "it'll
do for a while" job, single skinned flue liner is cheap, cut a hole
at the top back of the drum, stuff in and seal the end of the liner,
take it through the wall and up to roof level. So the air passing
over the top creates the draw. Remember it will get hot, very hot, so
flammable things need to kept well clear, undergrowth etc...

(*) When we had central heating fitted when I was about 8 there was a
4' section of 5" flu liner left over. Used to build fire places with
old bricks and jam this section of liner in the top. Worked well
vertical, crap horizontal.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Dave Baker wrote:
I'm looking at making a wood burner for the garage out of an old 55
gallon oil drum. Plenty of plans and ideas on the Intergoogles. I'm
currently thinking of having it horizontal with the door at one end so I
can just chuck in logs 2 or 3 feet long to save sawing stuff into
shorter lengths. The biggest issue is the flue and knocking a hole in
the wall to get that outside. Is there any reason why I can't just stick
a length of 5" diameter pipe up out of the back of the drum and then
horizontally through the wall to outside and leave it like that with no
vertical chimney going up above the roof line? I'm not bothered about
smoke or where it goes. The garage is far enough away from the house and
I live in the back of beyond with no near neighbours so emissions are
not an issue nor are any stupid regulations that might otherwise prevent
me doing something I want to. I just want the cheapest easiest way to
vent the oil drum.
You can make a much more permanent one out of an old mains pressure
water heater tank.

On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 13:21:32 +1100, F Murtz wrote:

You can make a much more permanent one out of an old mains pressure
water heater tank.

Or a 15 kg butane cylinder, bit small but ample for a normal living
room.

--
Cheers
Dave.

In article o.uk,
"Dave Liquorice" writes:
On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 13:21:32 +1100, F Murtz wrote:

You can make a much more permanent one out of an old mains pressure
water heater tank.

Or a 15 kg butane cylinder, bit small but ample for a normal living
room.

On my fire training course at the fire station for one company
or another, one of the incidents covered was some guy who wanted
to use one of these for something. It was empty, so he started
to cut it open. Can't remember if it was with an angle grinder
or cutting torch, but either way, it blow up when air mixed with
the residual gas inside, seriously injuring the guy.

--
Andrew Gabriel
[email address is not usable -- followup in the newsgroup]

On 18 Nov 2014 09:57:25 GMT, Huge wrote:

It was empty, so he started to cut it open. Can't remember if it
was
with an angle grinder or cutting torch, but either way, it blow up
when
air mixed with the residual gas inside, seriously injuring the
guy.

So, how do you empty them so you can convert them into a wood stove?

Unscrew the valve? Even when "empty" I suspect ther might be still be
a bit of pressure so I'd be cautious and just crack the joint and
then let it sit and hiss... I think filling and rinsing with water is
also recomended before taking gas axe or angle grinder to it.

--
Today is Boomtime, the 30th day ...

Ho ho...

--
Cheers
Dave.

On 18/11/2014 09:57, Huge wrote:
On 2014-11-18, Andrew Gabriel wrote:
In article o.uk,
"Dave Liquorice" writes:
On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 13:21:32 +1100, F Murtz wrote:

You can make a much more permanent one out of an old mains pressure
water heater tank.

Or a 15 kg butane cylinder, bit small but ample for a normal living
room.

On my fire training course at the fire station for one company
or another, one of the incidents covered was some guy who wanted
to use one of these for something. It was empty, so he started
to cut it open. Can't remember if it was with an angle grinder
or cutting torch, but either way, it blow up when air mixed with
the residual gas inside, seriously injuring the guy.

So, how do you empty them so you can convert them into a wood stove?

Empty it of gas and then fill with water (or flush with an inert gas).

--
Regards,
Martin Brown

In message , Huge
writes
On 2014-11-18, Andrew Gabriel wrote:
In article o.uk,
"Dave Liquorice" writes:
On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 13:21:32 +1100, F Murtz wrote:

You can make a much more permanent one out of an old mains pressure
water heater tank.

Or a 15 kg butane cylinder, bit small but ample for a normal living
room.

On my fire training course at the fire station for one company
or another, one of the incidents covered was some guy who wanted
to use one of these for something. It was empty, so he started
to cut it open. Can't remember if it was with an angle grinder
or cutting torch, but either way, it blow up when air mixed with
the residual gas inside, seriously injuring the guy.

So, how do you empty them so you can convert them into a wood stove?

Perhaps it was an acetylene cylinder. I had an *empty* one go bang in a
farm fire. Alternatively a scrap metal collector cut up a huge (
20,000l) diesel tank with an oxy/propane torch and no precautions
whatsoever.



--
Tim Lamb

On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 11:29:21 +0000, Tim Lamb wrote:

Perhaps it was an acetylene cylinder. I had an *empty* one go bang in a
farm fire.

Empty with the valve off or empty with the valve on and closed?

The expansion of a cylinders contents due to the sheer heat of a good
fire can make cylinder go bang. At 1000 C plus steel is getting
soft...

Alternatively a scrap metal collector cut up a huge (20,000l)
diesel
tank with an oxy/propane torch and no precautions whatsoever.

Can diesel form an explosive mixture at normal temps and pressures?
It spontaneously goes bang in an engine but not before it has been
compressed at around 20:1 with that compression also heating the
mixture.

--
Cheers
Dave.

Huge wrote:
On 2014-11-18, Andrew Gabriel wrote:
In article o.uk,
"Dave Liquorice" writes:
On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 13:21:32 +1100, F Murtz wrote:

You can make a much more permanent one out of an old mains pressure
water heater tank.

Or a 15 kg butane cylinder, bit small but ample for a normal living
room.

On my fire training course at the fire station for one company
or another, one of the incidents covered was some guy who wanted
to use one of these for something. It was empty, so he started
to cut it open. Can't remember if it was with an angle grinder
or cutting torch, but either way, it blow up when air mixed with
the residual gas inside, seriously injuring the guy.

So, how do you empty them so you can convert them into a wood stove?


No hassles at all just remove the valve completely from the cylinder.
Fill with water if you want to feel safer and angle grind at will.(Even
less dangerous than old oil drums).
Just made a lead pot from one to make sinkers.
Don't go on about the dangers of lead poisoning,I do it in a gale in the
open.

On 18/11/2014 11:29, Tim Lamb wrote:

Perhaps it was an acetylene cylinder. I had an *empty* one go bang in a
farm fire. Alternatively a scrap metal collector cut up a huge (
20,000l) diesel tank with an oxy/propane torch and no precautions
whatsoever.





What's an empty acetylene cylinder?
Acetylene spontaneously explodes at a pressure of about 15 PSI so you
can't just pump it into a cylinder.
Its dissolved in acetone (IIRC) so even when there is no acetylene left
the cylinder has acetone in it.
If you draw off the acetylene too fast you also draw off the acetone and
the residual acetylene can explode when it comes out of solution.

In message o.uk, Dave
Liquorice writes
On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 11:29:21 +0000, Tim Lamb wrote:

Perhaps it was an acetylene cylinder. I had an *empty* one go bang in a
farm fire.

Empty with the valve off or empty with the valve on and closed?

I was harvesting elsewhere at the time. The slightly singed nearest
witness said he saw a jet of flame and turned to run away. The bottle
remnants travelled about 200m horizontally and heaven knows how far
vertically. From his description, I would guess the valve was cracked
open.

The expansion of a cylinders contents due to the sheer heat of a good
fire can make cylinder go bang. At 1000 C plus steel is getting
soft...

Alternatively a scrap metal collector cut up a huge (20,000l)
diesel
tank with an oxy/propane torch and no precautions whatsoever.

Can diesel form an explosive mixture at normal temps and pressures?
It spontaneously goes bang in an engine but not before it has been
compressed at around 20:1 with that compression also heating the
mixture.

Pass. When I returned from a safe distance after the tank was in two
halves, there was a small fire burning over a puddle of residue.


--
Tim Lamb

In message . com,
"Dennis@home" writes
On 18/11/2014 11:29, Tim Lamb wrote:

Perhaps it was an acetylene cylinder. I had an *empty* one go bang in a
farm fire. Alternatively a scrap metal collector cut up a huge (
20,000l) diesel tank with an oxy/propane torch and no precautions
whatsoever.





What's an empty acetylene cylinder?
Acetylene spontaneously explodes at a pressure of about 15 PSI so you
can't just pump it into a cylinder.
Its dissolved in acetone (IIRC) so even when there is no acetylene left
the cylinder has acetone in it.
If you draw off the acetylene too fast you also draw off the acetone
and the residual acetylene can explode when it comes out of solution.

Right.

I think there is also a porous matrix, possibly clay involved. All we
found was the flattened remnants of the cylinder wall.

--
Tim Lamb

On Tue, 18 Nov 2014 17:28:05 +0000, Tim Lamb wrote:

In message . com,
"Dennis@home" writes
On 18/11/2014 11:29, Tim Lamb wrote:

Perhaps it was an acetylene cylinder. I had an *empty* one go bang in
a farm fire. Alternatively a scrap metal collector cut up a huge (
20,000l) diesel tank with an oxy/propane torch and no precautions
whatsoever.





What's an empty acetylene cylinder?
Acetylene spontaneously explodes at a pressure of about 15 PSI so you
can't just pump it into a cylinder.
Its dissolved in acetone (IIRC) so even when there is no acetylene left
the cylinder has acetone in it.
If you draw off the acetylene too fast you also draw off the acetone and
the residual acetylene can explode when it comes out of solution.

Right.

I think there is also a porous matrix, possibly clay involved. All we
found was the flattened remnants of the cylinder wall.

From my metal work lessons mumble-mumble years ago I seem to remember
kapok being mentioned

Avpx

--
The river Ankh is probably the only river in the universe on which the
investigators can chalk the outline of the corpse.
(Men at Arms)
20:00:01 up 15 days, 8:39, 7 users, load average: 0.62, 0.27, 0.18

On Mon, 17 Nov 2014 14:03:42 -0000, "Dave Baker"
wrote:

Is there any reason why I can't just stick a length of 5" diameter
pipe up out of the back of the drum and then horizontally through the wall
to outside and leave it like that with no vertical chimney going up above
the roof line?

It will have a similar suck to a 90-year-old hooker.

On 19/11/14 22:27, Grimly Curmudgeon wrote:
On Mon, 17 Nov 2014 14:03:42 -0000, "Dave Baker"
wrote:

Is there any reason why I can't just stick a length of 5" diameter
pipe up out of the back of the drum and then horizontally through the wall
to outside and leave it like that with no vertical chimney going up above
the roof line?

It will have a similar suck to a 90-year-old hooker.

You leave the mother in law out of this!

--
Everything you read in newspapers is absolutely true, except for the
rare story of which you happen to have first-hand knowledge. €“ Erwin Knoll

On 11/18/2014 7:00 AM, Huge wrote:
Of course. I are an eejit.

And an assclown.