Hi all,
After 2 years I have finally finished my boiler project, I like to share the result on this forum, hope you like it.
Except for the fittings, this boiler in mainly made from scrap and leftover parts, the fittings are purchased from Bengs.
The diameter is 92mm and the total height is 350mm with a total weight of 5 kg.
The unit has been brassed with 60% silver and pressure tessed at 8 bar.
Working pressure will be around 4 bar, still have to decide which engine I will add.
The ceramic burner is still to be finalized and tested, hope it is big enough.
Regards,
Maurice.
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Congratulations, that is one super-sharp boiler, great job!
This is a really nice, very attractive home made boiler. Thank you for sharing.
I assume the coiled pipe above the fire tubes is a superheater for the steam?
Hi quick,
Thanks, a superheater is normally placed in the fire side, mine is placed on the smoke side in order to minimize the overheating, I rather call it a steam dryer.
Overheated steam can give lubrication issues on the engines, I rather prevent this.
Maurice.
Hello Maurice,
I can only congratulate you on this work. Very neatly worked. I am thrilled.
A very impressive build!!!
Well done, and thanks for sharing
Incredible job Maurice , very industrial looking & all the fittings are very robust & of the highest quality...Well Done !
Hi Maurice,
A excellent good looking boiler you must be very pleased. I will be surprised if the ceramic burner doesn't make enough heat to produce a reasonable amount of steam. I have made a few vertical boilers using ceramic burners and have found that you need quite a lot of combustion space between their top and the tube plate to get the best results. Most of the boilers were centre flue with either cross tubes or other forms of heat exchangers; the couple of fire tube ones made had a bit of a problem getting the gases to flow through the tubes and were rather smelly, I corrected this by using a fan to start and then either a blower or the engine exhaust to draw the heat. This worked OK and the smell disappeared.
During Covid I did some experiments with ceramic and mesh burners if you haven't already seen it it might be worth a look:
https://youtu.be/CdR_aoMGs-gThe test boiler is a centre flue and the tube plate has 20 heat exchanging pins, all the burners tested are 28 mm in diameter.
I hope this is found useful.
Take care Tony.
Hi Tony,
Thanks for the video, interesting burner concept.
I have tried to maximize the amount of pipes with the available materials, the heating surface and flue gas area is very large if I compare it with other boilers, in this case the chimney will be the bottleneck.
I am looking forward to steam this boiler !
Regards,
Maurice
Bonjour Maurice,
I agree with the other members, great job indeed. Just a question, why did you install a Microcosm gas regulator on this static boiler ?
And personnaly speaking, I would not have installed it directly vertical upside down without having made a siphon to protect its membrane :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RHSrvRRYzNc&t=28s
Hi Raphael,
Thanks for the video, I placed this control valve to automatically regulate the boiler pressure when I conect the steam engine(s).
The steam pipe to the regulator will fill with condensate at first use, I believe that the pipe is long enough to cool the water sufficiently before the heat will reach the control valve.
Regards,
Maurice
Hi Maurice,
I have tried to maximize the amount of pipes with the available materials, the heating surface and flue gas area is very large if I compare it with other boilers, in this case the chimney will be the bottleneck.
That is more or less what I found, the burner worked and smelled less with the top of the boiler and chimney removed. It worked better still with the chimney back in place with a blower fitted, it needed very little steam to make the boiler and burner work really well.
Take care Tony.
Maurice:
You did a fine job on this boiler build.
Thank you for sharing.
Charlie
Hi Maurice,
I have tried to maximize the amount of pipes with the available materials, the heating surface and flue gas area is very large if I compare it with other boilers, in this case the chimney will be the bottleneck.
That is more or less what I found, the burner worked and smelled less with the top of the boiler and chimney removed. It worked better still with the chimney back in place with a blower fitted, it needed very little steam to make the boiler and burner work really well.
Take care Tony.
Hi Tony,
I just checked out some of your YouTube videos, impressive and very usefull information.
I am wondering what the flue gas fan looks like, any video or picture on that ?
Regards,
Maurice