What changes can we make to our lives to deal with the economic and energy crises ahead? Have you already started making preparations? Got tips to share?
Tess wrote:ps i'm not discounting the rayburn idea. There are good things in favour of it. I just hadn't previously considered it.
Of course there are other makes of range, and more alternative ways like rocket stoves, Cobb Barbecues, earth ovens, masonry stoves, passive solar, loads of insulation..........
Rayburns aren't the only wood-burners thaty can heat water. I have the same stove as Vortex (Charnwood County 6) with a back boiler. It provides all the hot water we need, plus running a rad.
Of course, what you cook on it then a bit of an issue. I'm currently installing a range in the kitchen that is just used for cooking. It'll reduce our reliance on gas bottles which is what we currently run our gas stove from.
If it is a Charnwood County 6 then yes, it needs a few inches for the pipes behind the stove. This means jigging the flue as well. By some coincidence we have fitted a back boiler to ours today.
We can recommend our Wamsler stove, Tess. Next spring we will be experimenting with our jet fires again and building one to heat water for the loo block built for this summer's Green Gathering. I bought a 10mm thick x 450 x 900 steel plate for £50 for the hot plate of the larger one we have. The pot boiler is very efficient. I'll see if I can post some pictures of them.
Catweazle, the carbon in the soil trick is called Terra Preta and Cornell University in the US has a lot of info on their website. Googleing gives loads of interesting sites.
I've built a self firing charcoal burner from a 45 gall oil drum, some 2" galv. ms pipe and some concrete blocks. I've got to add a system to take some of the gas off as it burns too hot at the moment. You require a temperature between 350 & 500 deg C. Ours, when burning on the gas produced, sounded like a jet engine and looked like one too. I've got a second oil drum which I could use, upturned in a water bath, as a store. I will either run the gas into our diesel genny or into a jet fire water heater.
There is some uncertainty whether or not Terra Preta will work in temperate latitudes so there is much experimentation to do. The low temperature charcoal should work as activated charcoal to hold onto the nutrient ions and we do have ?michorizal? fungi in our soils to get the nutrients out of the pores in the charcoal, but how fast the system will work in temperate latitudes conpares to the tropics is not know.
We have an Esse wood fired cooker which also supplies hot water (to a 280 litre Gledhill Torrent Solar cylinder)
The Esse can also be configured to provide a certain amount of central heating as well. I think the max output is around 25,000 BTU (combined hot water and heating)
Very pleased with ours so far but quite a financial investmentin the first place!
We demand that reality be altered because we don't like it [� oilslick ]
Tess wrote:I think SunnyJim has turned into a rayburn evangelist
Certainly have. They are magic. I can see why people went off them though. When you burn coal on it its horrid, and that was the main source of fuel wasn't it?
Burning wood they are delightful. Quick to warm up, responsive and cosy.
Jim
For every complex problem, there is a simple answer, and it's wrong.
"Heaven and earth are ruthless, and treat the myriad creatures as straw dogs" (Lao Tzu V.i).
SunnyJim wrote:
The tank is the heart of the system. We got a gert biggun from the Newark Copper Cylinder company. It holds something like 250L and can store all the heat from our Rayburn throughout the day, and we can then use the heat stored in the tank to power radiators at night, and in the morning. And have a bath.
Jim we are thinking of getting a triple coil cylinder, so we can use our existing oil boiler, our new rayburn (about to be installed) and possible solar in the future, is yours a triple, and if so how much was it roughly?
SunnyJim wrote:
The tank is the heart of the system. We got a gert biggun from the Newark Copper Cylinder company. It holds something like 250L and can store all the heat from our Rayburn throughout the day, and we can then use the heat stored in the tank to power radiators at night, and in the morning. And have a bath.
Jim we are thinking of getting a triple coil cylinder, so we can use our existing oil boiler, our new rayburn (about to be installed) and possible solar in the future, is yours a triple, and if so how much was it roughly?
Ours is quadrouple!!! It is very big and cost about £700. It is the heart of our system. It can store a day's heat and release it at night as required. You need heat storage, in just the same way as the UK needs gas storage.
Jim
For every complex problem, there is a simple answer, and it's wrong.
"Heaven and earth are ruthless, and treat the myriad creatures as straw dogs" (Lao Tzu V.i).
SunnyJim wrote:
Ours is quadrouple!!! It is very big and cost about £700. It is the heart of our system. It can store a day's heat and release it at night as required. You need heat storage, in just the same way as the UK needs gas storage.
Wow a quad, mad, that said £700 seems pretty reasonable for a future-ish proof cylinder.
High transfer rate 22mm connecter coil to attached a pumped circuit to the radiators. - When the tanks hot, we can turn a pump on and provide heat to the radiators. Handy for winter mornings when the rayburn has died down.
Standard 22mm connector coil for connecting to the gas boiler. We're on LPG, and have virtually cut all use of that stuff. We could probably have done without this coil, but felt it prudent to have the LPG option as a back up, especially as we didn't know how well the system would work! This is pumped (it's own pump controlled by the gas boiler control system).
A 28mm connector coil for the rayburn to connect to. This has no pump and works via thermosyphon.
A 22 mm connector for a solar panel. We haven't had this fitted yet but hope to get one put up in the spring. I've held of getting it fitted, because I like to fit it myself. Navitron do courses to learn to install their panels, and I'd like to do the course so that I could put in panels for friends and family.
A good, quality tank, built to specification, and well lagged. Can't say fairer than that!
Jim
For every complex problem, there is a simple answer, and it's wrong.
"Heaven and earth are ruthless, and treat the myriad creatures as straw dogs" (Lao Tzu V.i).
Tess wrote:Only half an acre, but it'll take us a while to use that. It's all rather overgrown at the moment. I'm gonna see if I can get involved in the adjacent woodland - i understand our new neighbours to one side manage it, while it's owned by other neighbours down the road ...
The property is near Carmarthen.
When I were a teenager in the mid 1980s we used to go out on Friday/Saturday nights in Carmarthen. The police used to call it the Wild West. Quite an energetic <cough> rough town at times, at least back then.
But the Teifi valley is my patch and more my cuppa tea, find Carmarthenshire a bit too open, not quite flat but sort of anonymous. But if you need to travel then it makes sense to be within striking distance of the M4.
Susukino wrote:But the Teifi valley is my patch and more my cuppa tea, find Carmarthenshire a bit too open, not quite flat but sort of anonymous. But if you need to travel then it makes sense to be within striking distance of the M4.
Suss
I'm considering the Teifi Valley, but it feels pretty remote.
