I like that you kept it unedited. Even if things were bungled during filming, I just giggled and appreciate the realness of your reactions. Far too many videos out there that just edits and loses the sharing of their true expressions, the behind the scenes bloopers removed. Thank you for the experimentation. I also enjoy dabbling on ideas that could work. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t, but the “finding out” is so intriguing.
I actually didn't realize these hot water heaters had this substantial of a tank inside. I think you could build a halfway decent indoor stove heater out of a pair of these. There's a stove design where people use 55 gallon drums, 1 stacked on top of each other horizontally, but they don't last long because they're such thin metal. These would last a bit longer I think. A flue duct goes from the bottom barrel to top one at the back. The flue comes out the top one at the front so you get an s-shaped path for the smoke and heat to travel through. Fresh air goes in through door, hot fire puts heat into the draft, it goes up into the top barrel and exchanges heat before going out the flue. Sometimes they'll have pipes going through the top barrel to increase the efficiency, but you've already got one in there on these. You would probably want more though. My brother scored one of these but it was made out of 1/2 inch thick steel pipe, so it will last forever. He gave it to my dad, who used it for years in the shop, then he died and my brother inherited it back. It's still in service, probably 50 years in total now.
I think a lot bigger fire in the tank & a fan where the pipe is coming into the garage would make a huge difference. I did basically the same thing once with a huge cooler & ice in my van & it worked really good. I could drive from my job (about an hour away) to my house in the dead of summer with the windows up & was perfectly cool.
You could get an old oil furnace and remove the burner and build a fire in the firebox. Hook up the furnace to electric for the fan and put a thermostat on it or wire the fan to run all the time. Once the garage is heated let the fire go out. You could even run duct work overhead as well.
Three suggestions: 1) put a carbon monoxide detector in your garage. 2) fully insulate the outside of the tank. 3) circulate interior air, in other words, don't try to heat the super cold outdoor air.
I get the idea, but I tink it would work better with the tank layed horizontal and a blower of some kind on the intake side of the heat tube. That way you would blow the air into the building making it more efficient. I'm doing that with my barrel stove on the outside of my shop, blowing the heat into the building.
Having to go outside to get the heater started/continue would be a major downside lol. The wood stoves with a built in heat reclaimer seem more convenient. I bet if you added a steel tube with holes that goes from the bottom to about midway up, and get a secondary burn started it would get the top half blazeing hot.
this is a good idea, however just wait until you have to deal with bad winds... f's it all up. Also running with no chimney will fill you up with smoke at some point or another. Chimneys make fires run better as well as getting that crap up and outta the way.. Tried using fans to pull air in but it brings in smoke if the fans to strong (cage fan from home heating furnace), and sometimes faster air doesn't heat up fast enough. so many headaches getting these to work... but when they do its all good. I use a woodstove enclosed in bricks, heats up a small area behind the stove, that heat then goes up the slinky pipe to the house/shed. It does work but in bad weather its a struggle. if that hot air sleeve pipe thing inside your tank was longer or wrapped around inside the tank it would heat air longer and hotter. weld two units on top each other haha. keep it up good vid!
So many things to comment on here. First...are we related?? lol!! I recently tore apart a water heater and have been brainstorming ways to do this and came across your video. Pretty cool. Definitely gives me more ideas, some evolutions of my own. 1: I was contemplating using a water heater as a cabin heater, buy using the stock gas burner ring under the tank. I am picturing ... Cut a round hole low on the side of the tank, and one at the top. Run an intake hose from low on the wall of the cabin into the bottom hole of the tank, then a hot air hose from the cut top hole back into the cabin. Run the tank outside on propane with the ring burner and gas valve, as is. I imagine there may be some conversion needed for natural gas to propane? 2: Same idea, but instead of running the tank outside the building with hoses, just cut vent holes around the bottom and top of the tank and run it inside. Fashion a protective fire box (larger in diameter than the water heater) out of a section of 55 gallon drum. Weld the water heater tank to it in such a manner that you can cut a hole in the side of the 55 gallon drum and run a combustion intake air hose from outside to the bottom of the tank/burner. Then just flu the top of the water heater's chimney out like normal. The combustion uses outside air, not affecting air/heat flow inside the building. The tank gets hot and convection heats your building. Thanks for this video I hope to reciprocate ideas when I get further with mine.
I built a 100 gallon water heater from an old RV water tank and a fire place outside my shop. I’m thinking of placing the tank inside the shop and running copper tubing outside to the fire. Similar concept, but I am hoping water at 80 degrees will dissipate heat into the shop. Great video.
Did you ever get round to trying this idea im thinking of doing something similar but maybe using a household radiator inside to spread the heat better
I think the exterior of the tank and especially the exhaust should be insulated and maybe install a fan on the fresh air side to boost the volume of air going in.
I think you're on to something if maybe you insulated your pipe so you don't lose your heat between the heater and the garage door then make your chimney opening a little smaller so you can put a stove pipe on and raise it above the roof line so you won't smell smoke in the garage and last put a grate on the inside to keep the wood off the bottom so the fire can get air to burn plus it makes it easier to clean the ashes out but I really do think you have a great idea
I actually like the idea of the fire being outside the house. For me, I have a 1000 square foot house and no space for a wood burning stove inside, but this... this is interesting. I have been looking at wood boiler systems but they are costly and somewhat dangerous especially when dealing with pressurize water. I think that this idea would work if it pulled air in from the house an through the pipe to recycle and warm the air.
I would build something that could be fed from inside the garage, build a woodstove actually, that way you won't lose heat to the ductwork and outside temperature. I'd take that water heater and weld fins on the outside, then get some sheet metal and build a shroud to cover the finned tank, convection will do the air transfer.
Why not putting the burner inside the garage and use the hole that is in your garage as a chimney. And you can use the air hot duct to redirect some of the hot air where you need.
Way easier and 5x more efficient to just vent the chimney through the house. Of course there shouldn't be any leaks but any chimney shouldn't have leaks.
Installing baffles in the fire box area should improve the heat transfer, and making the top opening adjustable would also help, using something that burns with less flame might work better too, such as charcoal. In my relevant experience you can actually weld through that glass layer if you start the arc on the piece you are attaching, installing baffles should not be a big deal, other than needing steel plate to make them with. oh, and just so you know, welding on a threaded stud or attaching a bolt that you then affix a wooden handle to in order to open the door doesn't work, the heat will end up burning out the wood where it connects to the metal threads. Eventually I'm going to have to make a follow up video to my water heater to wood fired stove conversion to cover the issues I've come across :P
I've been brainstorming on such ridiculous projects....pulling the air from your garage down low pulls warmer air then the outside ambient. Making it more efficient.
How about pulling or pushing air through the heater with a blower. I think you had only a little heat because the only air flow you had was the little bit from convection in the hot pipe. If your fire was big enough you should be able to pull a ton of heat off the fire that way
All of your heat is outside. The tank should b inside w pipes leading the smoke out like a fireplace. Transfering the heat from the outside u will need a high temp furnace fan to transfer the heat to the garage if keeping outside. Jus missing acouple things to complete whatever way u choose to build your heater though.
I'm wondering if a thermal siphon would work with air? I know they use that with block heaters, or another thought would be to try and connect a return duct and pass air through the chamber with a squirrel fan.
I understand that the outdoor temps were pretty frigid, to say the least, but cutting that much metal, knowing that it would throw a lot of stuff I wouldn't want to be breathing, I would have done it outdoors, it wouldn't have been a long time out there, and both your lungs, and your workshop would have appreciated it.
There is a reason why wood stoves are usualy placed inside and smoke is vented out - the heat radiates through entire body of the wood stove. Efficiency of indoor wood-stove is about 80%, 20% of heat goes up the chimney. Efficiency of this outdoor uninsulated setup with forcing air through that pipe is around 5% and that is optimistic estimate. Plus your venting hole is directly above fire so you cannot use this in the rain
Well depending on shop size it could eat up too much valuable space or insurance coverage for the stove inside the building. This one is not very efficient but they can be made much better.
Excellent idea. I have a question! Wouldn't it be too late to further weaken the metal with Fire? (sorry 65yr gal trying to make an outdoor canning/grill/smoker and ran into this idea! and clueless as to reusing an older heater, is it rotted out? Mine is 12 yrs old, just bought this old house this past summer and I know the anode rod's never been replaced cuz they put it right under the center beam (ugh, ordered a flex type rod and its proper bit and crossing fingers). Anyway, back to the question... ?
I think it just has way too many inefficiencies as it is. You had mentioned you wouldn't want to design it for real, buuuut... If you coated the outside wall (but on the inside) with that stuff you used for your foundry, that would keep more of the heat inside directed at the interior pipe. Also, I agree with the top smoke vent maybe being a bit smaller? Also, are there any materials that could help that pipe absorb more heat? Do heat sinks work in reverse? Actually, do they make corrugated metal pipe (with it being corrugated vertically, ideally) - that would create more surface area to heat up the air. Also, you are probably losing a fair amount of heat in that uninsulated pipe going from the furnace to the garage, which is probably even more important since the heated air is not moving especially fast with no fan. Plus, the intake position on your garage door is high, which would mean that the heated air just bypasses most of the garage and goes up. I'm not an engineer though, so most of this might be completely wrong. Lastly, the tank was fairly short - what if it was a longer cylinder to give the air more time to heat up while going through the interior pipe? As a side note, this was a really interesting project and I personally hope you try again to properly engineer it. Edit: One more thing - Is there any circulation of air? In the tent example you talked about an air supply beyond the fire, but did this have an air supply for the interior pipe? Would it be better to have a separate pipe coming from inside the garage where it is warmer that leads back into the bottom of the system for it to draw air from?
Hi Brent! Yep, Yes, Yeah...Uhuh.... all good points! :) I've actually finished the ceiling of the garage since filming this video. Although it's not insulated (and I might never insulate it, for lots of reasons) at least it's an air barrier now. So it might be worth a re-visit...IF I come across some suitable junk to build it from. I have a lot of wood scraps and a penchant for fire so it would be nice to figure out a way to make it work. Version 2 might involve water, though, so I don't have to make a hole in the new garage door I just installed. On your last point - when I built the solar heater, it was a closed loop, taking air from a lower hole and exhausting it out the top, and it did have a fan. In bright sunlight it generated a decent amount of heat, but was a huge eyesore (4'x8'). Finding a way to make it not look like trash in the yard will be key. The wife ordered a dumpster and sadly that water tank is already gone.
I don't see this as a total failure. He is trying to heat a large uninstalled space. He needs to re-engineer this project. Was the center pipe inside the tank open at the bottom so that cold air could be drawn in and circulated through the pipe? Instead of mounting the pipe through the top of the garage door the bottom would be better as heat rises. Instead of a coil of hot water inside the tank the heating pipe coiled with a blower would improve the design. I just stumbled on this video. I like the effort.
if the tank doesn't have any leaks, use it as a normal hot water tank. Build fire underneath as where the gas burner would be. Use water as normally. Pipe the water to the garage into some kind of heat exchanger. Perhaps an old propane tank or baseboard hot water heat exchanger. The way you are doing it might allow carbon monoxide into the garage should a leak develop. No pump needed. For cold water inlet, use the drain valve opening at the bottom without the drain valve in it. BE CERTAIN that you remove the zinc anode from the tank if you are doing it your way. Leave it if using my suggestion. The draft hood is to prevent the flue gasses from sucking out the flames on a gas burner. Not needed for your application. The input on your garage door is too high to be very effective. You are heating the air above your head where you might not want it. You might want to use a ceiling fan to circulate the warm air. Using that aluminum dryer flex vent gives off too much heat to the outside. Dampers can be helpful to control the flames. Your idea is sound, but the application needs adjustments.
I was thinking on mine thats a whole different setup than yours is to run my heater pipe down downwards sense heat rises up why have the heater pipe way up for when heat rises up My setup has a chimney pipe for the smoke to go out and soon will have 2 elbows welded on then it'll be partway done
1.You need to build a fire around pipe not just one side...2. You need an ash removel opening.... 3. Need to control draft of fire...4.insulate the heat pipe to the garage...5. Insulate outside of your tank... 6 message me back if you like
Humm, not a bad idea, I'm trying to figure out how I can heat my condo without the gas furnace once in a while. . My condo by-laws state no fireplace, open fire / flame inside condo. Key work is inside condo. lol..So, I thought about something like this, only a bit more fine tuned. Using new stuff as apposed to a 15 year old hot water heater. I would want the heat source outside on my patio, run a heat pipe inside. The only problem would be for me to try to keep the smoke from the burning wood to a minimum. That , I don't know how to do. If someway I could reduce the smoke, or scrub the smoke. Any other ideas ?
90 secondsAdd some holes at the bottom for a hotter burn it will create a better draft for the fire then on the inside put a transfer box it comes with a fan to pull the heat in. Or something like that basically make a big gigantic rocket stove
Yeah, I really did wuss out on the fire. I considered hooking up my oil burner to it at one point, then was like...wait. I really would have been reinventing the wheel.
What is a hot water heater? Who would heat hot water? Also, you say as you draw, that hot air enters at the bottom. Where does that hot air come from? ???
Better idea would be to put it inside uour garage And pipe a smoke vent to the outside.then run your hot air pipe horizontally along uour interior garage wall. That results in radiant heat coming out of your actual burn tank and hot air coming out of the air pipe.
An interesting experiment. Did it work?....Yes. Did it work well enough to heat your garage?...No. My first thought was "Dennis needs to insulate his garage". How about figuring out cheap ways to insulate your garage. Once your workspace is sufficently insulated you could look into creating a 'Dennis Does' ground source heat pump...or just stick a stove in your garage!! (boring but probably what you need).
Oooh I REALLY like the idea of a ground source heat pump. Only problem will be drilling the hole through all the granite in this area. Has anyone made a home made drilling rig before?
The only way this makes any sense at all, is if you also plumb in a cold air return from your building to the bottom of the tank, and insulate the entire thing. This guy has no sense. It’s probably running at about 5% efficiency the way he has it set up. Totally stupid setup. Turning extremely cold air into hot air, and trying to push it into a building without anywhere for the displaced air to leave the building is seriously stupid.
I like that you kept it unedited. Even if things were bungled during filming, I just giggled and appreciate the realness of your reactions. Far too many videos out there that just edits and loses the sharing of their true expressions, the behind the scenes bloopers removed. Thank you for the experimentation. I also enjoy dabbling on ideas that could work. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn’t, but the “finding out” is so intriguing.
I agree
Found this channel looking for a tent.. I don’t admire many ppl but this guy is awesome! Thank you for your curiosity & wholesome humor..
Thanks man!
I actually didn't realize these hot water heaters had this substantial of a tank inside. I think you could build a halfway decent indoor stove heater out of a pair of these. There's a stove design where people use 55 gallon drums, 1 stacked on top of each other horizontally, but they don't last long because they're such thin metal. These would last a bit longer I think. A flue duct goes from the bottom barrel to top one at the back. The flue comes out the top one at the front so you get an s-shaped path for the smoke and heat to travel through. Fresh air goes in through door, hot fire puts heat into the draft, it goes up into the top barrel and exchanges heat before going out the flue. Sometimes they'll have pipes going through the top barrel to increase the efficiency, but you've already got one in there on these. You would probably want more though. My brother scored one of these but it was made out of 1/2 inch thick steel pipe, so it will last forever. He gave it to my dad, who used it for years in the shop, then he died and my brother inherited it back. It's still in service, probably 50 years in total now.
Insted of pulling air from outside u should pull from inside shop there for recycling warmer air. U could use same 90 at bottom of tank
I was going to add the same comment. :) Make it a return air just like a house to use already warm air...
And I would use a computer fan 12 v use a battery and a small solar panel
I think a lot bigger fire in the tank & a fan where the pipe is coming into the garage would make a huge difference. I did basically the same thing once with a huge cooler & ice in my van & it worked really good. I could drive from my job (about an hour away) to my house in the dead of summer with the windows up & was perfectly cool.
I was surprised to see that you cut a door hole and made the chimney so large that you could dro wood into easily.
You could get an old oil furnace and remove the burner and build a fire in the firebox. Hook up the furnace to electric for the fan and put a thermostat on it or wire the fan to run all the time. Once the garage is heated let the fire go out. You could even run duct work overhead as well.
I would add a Fan perhaps? Maybe an insulated flex pipe?
Very cool. Good idea.
Three suggestions: 1) put a carbon monoxide detector in your garage. 2) fully insulate the outside of the tank. 3) circulate interior air, in other words, don't try to heat the super cold outdoor air.
I get the idea, but I tink it would work better with the tank layed horizontal and a blower of some kind on the intake side of the heat tube. That way you would blow the air into the building making it more efficient. I'm doing that with my barrel stove on the outside of my shop, blowing the heat into the building.
you got a "SUBSCRIBE" when you drew the door up! LMAO
Nice that was cheap and fast I want to do this for my camper , fireman lol
Having to go outside to get the heater started/continue would be a major downside lol. The wood stoves with a built in heat reclaimer seem more convenient. I bet if you added a steel tube with holes that goes from the bottom to about midway up, and get a secondary burn started it would get the top half blazeing hot.
Kool idea man! It can work.
Presentation, 10 out of 10!
this is a good idea, however just wait until you have to deal with bad winds... f's it all up. Also running with no chimney will fill you up with smoke at some point or another. Chimneys make fires run better as well as getting that crap up and outta the way.. Tried using fans to pull air in but it brings in smoke if the fans to strong (cage fan from home heating furnace), and sometimes faster air doesn't heat up fast enough. so many headaches getting these to work... but when they do its all good. I use a woodstove enclosed in bricks, heats up a small area behind the stove, that heat then goes up the slinky pipe to the house/shed. It does work but in bad weather its a struggle. if that hot air sleeve pipe thing inside your tank was longer or wrapped around inside the tank it would heat air longer and hotter. weld two units on top each other haha.
keep it up good vid!
Yeah man I think you'd have been good to go with an inline duct work fan
So many things to comment on here. First...are we related?? lol!!
I recently tore apart a water heater and have been brainstorming ways to do this and came across your video. Pretty cool. Definitely gives me more ideas, some evolutions of my own.
1: I was contemplating using a water heater as a cabin heater, buy using the stock gas burner ring under the tank. I am picturing ...
Cut a round hole low on the side of the tank, and one at the top. Run an intake hose from low on the wall of the cabin into the bottom hole of the tank, then a hot air hose from the cut top hole back into the cabin. Run the tank outside on propane with the ring burner and gas valve, as is.
I imagine there may be some conversion needed for natural gas to propane?
2: Same idea, but instead of running the tank outside the building with hoses, just cut vent holes around the bottom and top of the tank and run it inside. Fashion a protective fire box (larger in diameter than the water heater) out of a section of 55 gallon drum. Weld the water heater tank to it in such a manner that you can cut a hole in the side of the 55 gallon drum and run a combustion intake air hose from outside to the bottom of the tank/burner. Then just flu the top of the water heater's chimney out like normal. The combustion uses outside air, not affecting air/heat flow inside the building. The tank gets hot and convection heats your building.
Thanks for this video
I hope to reciprocate ideas when I get further with mine.
Why not just put the hot water heater on the inside and vent it to the outside like a wood stove.
I built a 100 gallon water heater from an old RV water tank and a fire place outside my shop. I’m thinking of placing the tank inside the shop and running copper tubing outside to the fire. Similar concept, but I am hoping water at 80 degrees will dissipate heat into the shop. Great video.
Did you ever get round to trying this idea im thinking of doing something similar but maybe using a household radiator inside to spread the heat better
I think the exterior of the tank and especially the exhaust should be insulated and maybe install a fan on the fresh air side to boost the volume of air going in.
12 volt computor fan and have cold air return frm shop and much smaller stack wth damper
I think you're on to something if maybe you insulated your pipe so you don't lose your heat between the heater and the garage door then make your chimney opening a little smaller so you can put a stove pipe on and raise it above the roof line so you won't smell smoke in the garage and last put a grate on the inside to keep the wood off the bottom so the fire can get air to burn plus it makes it easier to clean the ashes out but I really do think you have a great idea
Silly lol ,your supose to put the furnace in the garage and vent the smoke out . That way the heat of the furnace warms up the gorage.
I actually like the idea of the fire being outside the house. For me, I have a 1000 square foot house and no space for a wood burning stove inside, but this... this is interesting. I have been looking at wood boiler systems but they are costly and somewhat dangerous especially when dealing with pressurize water.
I think that this idea would work if it pulled air in from the house an through the pipe to recycle and warm the air.
So get some good pipes, and on the inside install a duct fan to pull the heat into the shop
I would build something that could be fed from inside the garage, build a woodstove actually, that way you won't lose heat to the ductwork and outside temperature. I'd take that water heater and weld fins on the outside, then get some sheet metal and build a shroud to cover the finned tank, convection will do the air transfer.
Why not putting the burner inside the garage and use the hole that is in your garage as a chimney. And you can use the air hot duct to redirect some of the hot air where you need.
Way easier and 5x more efficient to just vent the chimney through the house. Of course there shouldn't be any leaks but any chimney shouldn't have leaks.
You need air flow thru the pipe I’d drill out the chiming tube on the bottom and extend a pipe from it out a few feet so it can draw air in
Hey, it sort of works... You can always add a fan...
Installing baffles in the fire box area should improve the heat transfer, and making the top opening adjustable would also help, using something that burns with less flame might work better too, such as charcoal.
In my relevant experience you can actually weld through that glass layer if you start the arc on the piece you are attaching, installing baffles should not be a big deal, other than needing steel plate to make them with.
oh, and just so you know, welding on a threaded stud or attaching a bolt that you then affix a wooden handle to in order to open the door doesn't work, the heat will end up burning out the wood where it connects to the metal threads. Eventually I'm going to have to make a follow up video to my water heater to wood fired stove conversion to cover the issues I've come across :P
I've been brainstorming on such ridiculous projects....pulling the air from your garage down low pulls warmer air then the outside ambient. Making it more efficient.
How about pulling or pushing air through the heater with a blower. I think you had only a little heat because the only air flow you had was the little bit from convection in the hot pipe. If your fire was big enough you should be able to pull a ton of heat off the fire that way
That's some good shit bro, and funny too!!! Good job man, keep it up!!!
All of your heat is outside. The tank should b inside w pipes leading the smoke out like a fireplace. Transfering the heat from the outside u will need a high temp furnace fan to transfer the heat to the garage if keeping outside. Jus missing acouple things to complete whatever way u choose to build your heater though.
I'm wondering if a thermal siphon would work with air? I know they use that with block heaters, or another thought would be to try and connect a return duct and pass air through the chamber with a squirrel fan.
I understand that the outdoor temps were pretty frigid, to say the least, but cutting that much metal, knowing that it would throw a lot of stuff I wouldn't want to be breathing, I would have done it outdoors, it wouldn't have been a long time out there, and both your lungs, and your workshop would have appreciated it.
There is a reason why wood stoves are usualy placed inside and smoke is vented out - the heat radiates through entire body of the wood stove. Efficiency of indoor wood-stove is about 80%, 20% of heat goes up the chimney. Efficiency of this outdoor uninsulated setup with forcing air through that pipe is around 5% and that is optimistic estimate. Plus your venting hole is directly above fire so you cannot use this in the rain
Well depending on shop size it could eat up too much valuable space or insurance coverage for the stove inside the building. This one is not very efficient but they can be made much better.
Excellent idea. I have a question! Wouldn't it be too late to further weaken the metal with Fire? (sorry 65yr gal trying to make an outdoor canning/grill/smoker and ran into this idea! and clueless as to reusing an older heater, is it rotted out? Mine is 12 yrs old, just bought this old house this past summer and I know the anode rod's never been replaced cuz they put it right under the center beam (ugh, ordered a flex type rod and its proper bit and crossing fingers). Anyway, back to the question... ?
How much of a vacuum was created and how well did it work?
smaller hole for smoke and add a smoke pipi to it with a damper for more heat
wow thx something to think about .. thx Ed Loretto Ontario Canada
I think it just has way too many inefficiencies as it is. You had mentioned you wouldn't want to design it for real, buuuut... If you coated the outside wall (but on the inside) with that stuff you used for your foundry, that would keep more of the heat inside directed at the interior pipe. Also, I agree with the top smoke vent maybe being a bit smaller? Also, are there any materials that could help that pipe absorb more heat? Do heat sinks work in reverse? Actually, do they make corrugated metal pipe (with it being corrugated vertically, ideally) - that would create more surface area to heat up the air. Also, you are probably losing a fair amount of heat in that uninsulated pipe going from the furnace to the garage, which is probably even more important since the heated air is not moving especially fast with no fan. Plus, the intake position on your garage door is high, which would mean that the heated air just bypasses most of the garage and goes up. I'm not an engineer though, so most of this might be completely wrong. Lastly, the tank was fairly short - what if it was a longer cylinder to give the air more time to heat up while going through the interior pipe?
As a side note, this was a really interesting project and I personally hope you try again to properly engineer it.
Edit: One more thing - Is there any circulation of air? In the tent example you talked about an air supply beyond the fire, but did this have an air supply for the interior pipe? Would it be better to have a separate pipe coming from inside the garage where it is warmer that leads back into the bottom of the system for it to draw air from?
Hi Brent! Yep, Yes, Yeah...Uhuh.... all good points! :) I've actually finished the ceiling of the garage since filming this video. Although it's not insulated (and I might never insulate it, for lots of reasons) at least it's an air barrier now. So it might be worth a re-visit...IF I come across some suitable junk to build it from. I have a lot of wood scraps and a penchant for fire so it would be nice to figure out a way to make it work. Version 2 might involve water, though, so I don't have to make a hole in the new garage door I just installed. On your last point - when I built the solar heater, it was a closed loop, taking air from a lower hole and exhausting it out the top, and it did have a fan. In bright sunlight it generated a decent amount of heat, but was a huge eyesore (4'x8'). Finding a way to make it not look like trash in the yard will be key. The wife ordered a dumpster and sadly that water tank is already gone.
"Handy Man Corner" Red Green anyone?
I don't see this as a total failure. He is trying to heat a large uninstalled space. He needs to re-engineer this project. Was the center pipe inside the tank open at the bottom so that cold air could be drawn in and circulated through the pipe? Instead of mounting the pipe through the top of the garage door the bottom would be better as heat rises. Instead of a coil of hot water inside the tank the heating pipe coiled with a blower would improve the design. I just stumbled on this video. I like the effort.
I like this guy. "I could potentially burn down my garage, house and kill my cat Andy, but, I'm going to do it anyway. 😜
Your burners good but the door cut out is to low making it so you can't really pack much wood chunks in
You kept it simple you were fun to watch
if the tank doesn't have any leaks, use it as a normal hot water tank.
Build fire underneath as where the gas burner would be.
Use water as normally.
Pipe the water to the garage into some kind of heat exchanger. Perhaps an old propane tank or baseboard hot water heat exchanger.
The way you are doing it might allow carbon monoxide into the garage should a leak develop.
No pump needed.
For cold water inlet, use the drain valve opening at the bottom without the drain valve in it.
BE CERTAIN that you remove the zinc anode from the tank if you are doing it your way.
Leave it if using my suggestion.
The draft hood is to prevent the flue gasses from sucking out the flames on a gas burner.
Not needed for your application.
The input on your garage door is too high to be very effective.
You are heating the air above your head where you might not want it.
You might want to use a ceiling fan to circulate the warm air.
Using that aluminum dryer flex vent gives off too much heat to the outside.
Dampers can be helpful to control the flames.
Your idea is sound, but the application needs adjustments.
I was thinking on mine thats a whole different setup than yours is to run my heater pipe down downwards sense heat rises up why have the heater pipe way up for when heat rises up
My setup has a chimney pipe for the smoke to go out and soon will have 2 elbows welded on then it'll be partway done
Hot water needs no heating, it's a water heater.
Genius
Why not make the fire up the midde pipe like a rocket stove and pipe the air from the outer tank to the house
1.You need to build a fire around pipe not just one side...2. You need an ash removel opening.... 3. Need to control draft of fire...4.insulate the heat pipe to the garage...5. Insulate outside of your tank... 6 message me back if you like
Also you should have six in stove pipe out top ..
You should have added a damper
I'm no expert but heat rises, so should the hole be lower?
Humm, not a bad idea, I'm trying to figure out how I can heat my condo without the gas furnace once in a while. . My condo by-laws state no fireplace, open fire / flame inside condo.
Key work is inside condo. lol..So, I thought about something like this, only a bit more fine tuned. Using new stuff as apposed to a 15 year old hot water heater. I would want the heat source outside on my patio, run a heat pipe inside. The only problem would be for me to try to keep the smoke from the burning wood to a minimum. That , I don't know how to do. If someway I could reduce the smoke, or scrub the smoke. Any other ideas ?
Just like Scandinavian Furness
90 secondsAdd some holes at the bottom for a hotter burn it will create a better draft for the fire then on the inside put a transfer box it comes with a fan to pull the heat in. Or something like that basically make a big gigantic rocket stove
Oil burner. That's the ticket.
Good idea! Though I think we just reinvented the oil furnace.
Serious up some...
Draw the cold air bottom from garage inlet not from outside air
Also the burn box top have more closed to keep heat - better burn , like a damper
Iput a fan on it
Just read @Brent Williams comments.... yeah what he said. Of course you could have build a way bigger fire. Isn't bigger fire always good? 😀
Yeah, I really did wuss out on the fire. I considered hooking up my oil burner to it at one point, then was like...wait. I really would have been reinventing the wheel.
What is a hot water heater?
Who would heat hot water?
Also, you say as you draw, that hot air enters at the bottom. Where does that hot air come from?
???
The hole into the house should be at the bottom toward the floor because heat rises
Killing time lol. My bet, the wife thinks you're nutts, but what the heck it was a good video. Interesting entertainment lmao.😂
Get a fan to pull in air
Amazing video, the quality of video is what you would expect from someone with 1mil subs. Great editing
Listen! The guy tried, at least he did , about all the ones that are making fun of him? Have you done anything, instead of put him down?
Why did you cut a hole in your garage door when you have a window right next to it ?!?!?!?!?!? 12:22
You need to have the inner tube in your burner sticking from below under through cylinder to tour garage...
Just get a wood stove lmao
12:10 This nerd has a wife??????? LOL
LOL
Better idea would be to put it inside uour garage
And pipe a smoke vent to the outside.then run your hot air pipe horizontally along uour interior garage wall. That results in radiant heat coming out of your actual burn tank and hot air coming out of the air pipe.
An interesting experiment.
Did it work?....Yes.
Did it work well enough to heat your garage?...No.
My first thought was "Dennis needs to insulate his garage". How about figuring out cheap ways to insulate your garage. Once your workspace is sufficently insulated you could look into creating a 'Dennis Does' ground source heat pump...or just stick a stove in your garage!! (boring but probably what you need).
Oooh I REALLY like the idea of a ground source heat pump. Only problem will be drilling the hole through all the granite in this area. Has anyone made a home made drilling rig before?
BHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAA
cut it outside......i didnt wanna say this but.....
The most stupiest project i ever seen 🤕🤕😱💯
A reason not to make one of these? Cn you say carbon monoxide poisoning?
The idea seems sound. But you talk too much...
"...a Wood Furnace from a Hot Water Heater" Why would you want to heat hot water?
Hahaha
The only way this makes any sense at all, is if you also plumb in a cold air return from your building to the bottom of the tank, and insulate the entire thing. This guy has no sense. It’s probably running at about 5% efficiency the way he has it set up. Totally stupid setup. Turning extremely cold air into hot air, and trying to push it into a building without anywhere for the displaced air to leave the building is seriously stupid.
I assure you the air has lots of places to go with all the gaps and holes in my garage lol
You are going burn down your house !
It's a good idea but you talk too much..m
You talk to much.