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kiln questions: forced air burners

updated sun 7 oct 01

 

skid on tue 2 oct 01


I'm trying to plan a small (12-15 cu.ft.) propane soda kiln, and was surprised at the going rate for forced air burners. Does anyone know an alternative to the $600/burner price tag I've seen? Or, any suggestions on how to proceed in building them from scratch? Based on a few kiln designs I've seen, I am assuming that one burner would be enough, and I'd like to add in a pilot system for safety.

I know venturis can be much cheaper but would like to avoid building a stack, due to being in a residential area. Without the draft from a stack, forced air seems to be the only option. Am I on the right track here?

I've enjoyed lurking on clayart over the years and would greatly appreciate any suggestions.

Thanks,
Scott Cooper
St. Earth Pottery
http://www.negentropic.com/clay

Dave Finkelnburg on tue 2 oct 01


Scott,
Check out Marc Ward's offerings (Ward Burner Systems) before you give up
on buying a forced-air burner. Nils Lou also sells them, I believe. You
may save yourself a lot of time and headaches buying a burner directly.
Nils shows a plan for forced air burners in his book, "The Art of
Firing." The parts involved can include a blower, miscellaneous plumbing
bits, the thermocouple, BASO valve and solenoid valve and speed controller,
plus a pilot
burner, a pressure gauge for the gas, a block valve and a
throttling valve, and a flame-retention burner head (helps in the wind).
There's a lot to a good burner, and a reason they aren't cheap.
I built two burners for my 30 cubic foot (stacking space) gas downdraft.
I used a solenoid valve to shut off gas to the main burners in the event of
a power failure, so I wouldn't be blasting gas into the kiln with no fans
running.
The pilot burners are venturi-type, so they keep running, power or no
power. The BASO, of course, shuts off gas to everything if the thermocouple
thinks it's cold.
I've sent you a picture of what I built off list. I hope this helps.
Next time around I'll buy the burners.
Dave Finkelnburg in Idaho

Mike Gordon on wed 3 oct 01


Hi,
I think you can still get squirrel cage forced air burnners at
Grangers.com pretty cheap, Mike Gordon

Frank Colson on wed 3 oct 01


On building a burner system from scratch, check out http://www.r2d2u.com .


----- Original Message -----

From: skid

To: CLAYART@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG

Sent: 10/2/2001 4:05:45 PM

Subject: Kiln questions: Forced air
burners





I'm trying to plan a small (12-15 cu.ft.) propane soda kiln, and was
surprised at the going rate for forced air burners. Does anyone know an
alternative to the $600/burner price tag I've seen? Or, any suggestions on how
to proceed in building them from scratch? Based on a few kiln designs I've seen,
I am assuming that one burner would be enough, and I'd like to add in a pilot
system for safety.



I know venturis can be much cheaper but would like to avoid building a
stack, due to being in a residential area. Without the draft from a stack,
forced air seems to be the only option. Am I on the right track here?



I've enjoyed lurking on clayart over the years and would greatly appreciate
any suggestions.



Thanks,

Scott Cooper

St. Earth Pottery

http://www.negentropic.com/clay



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Frank Colson Studio/School ofArt, Inc.

vince pitelka on wed 3 oct 01


> I think you can still get squirrel cage forced air burnners at
> Grangers.com pretty cheap, Mike Gordon

Mike -
You can get the appropriate Dayton squirrel cage blowers at Graingers, but
they do not sell power burners that would be appropriate for studio kilns.
The only burners they sell in their catalog or on their website are
replacement burners for central heating.
Best wishes -
- Vince

Vince Pitelka
Appalachian Center for Crafts
Tennessee Technological University
1560 Craft Center Drive, Smithville TN 37166
Home - vpitelka@dtccom.net
615/597-5376
Work - wpitelka@tntech.edu
615/597-6801 ext. 111, fax 615/597-6803
http://www.craftcenter.tntech.edu/

Michael Mandaville on sat 6 oct 01


On Tue, 2 Oct 2001 15:05:45 -0500, skid wrote:

>I'm trying to plan a small (12-15 cu.ft.) propane soda kiln, and was
surprised at the going rate for forced air burners. Does anyone know an
alternative to the $600/burner price tag I've seen? Or, any suggestions on
how to proceed in building them from scratch? Based on a few kiln designs
I've seen, I am assuming that one burner would be enough, and I'd like to
add in a pilot system for safety.
>
>I know venturis can be much cheaper but would like to avoid building a
stack, due to being in a residential area. Without the draft from a stack,
forced air seems to be the only option. Am I on the right track here?
>
>I've enjoyed lurking on clayart over the years and would greatly
appreciate any suggestions.
>
>Thanks,
>Scott Cooper
>St. Earth Pottery
>http://www.negentropic.com/clay


Thank you to Mel Jacobson for accepting me into this community.

Hello, Scott.

Here is a way for you to save $600:

http://www.turbofast.com.au/astrotel/furnace1.html

Although I have been able to find at least a half-dozen different forced-
air burner designs which are detailed on the internet, I have posted the
above link as an item of interest simply because the first burner which is
shown there is of the most elementary type which is possible - namely, the
fuel goes into one side of the furnace, and the air goes into the other
side of the furnace, turning the furnace itself into one rather large
burner.

Of course the advantage of having a self-aspirated pilot burner would be
that the furnace would be thereby encouraged to relight itself quickly in
the event of a flame-out, and I suppose that the best way to avoid having a
flame out in the first place would be to just have good regulation to begin
with. I don't know what the best method of automatically detecting a flame-
out would be, and perhaps somebody could help me with this - maybe an
automatic roar detector? :-)

Michael Mandaville
Austin, Texas