Waste Oil Heater Forum - Your definitive source for burning waste oil for heat.

So you just preheat the oil in the tank and not right before the nozzle?

Sounds good Kyle.  Thanks for the info, I think you and I are the only ones out here.  I was hoping for more activity.  Maybe in time?

I am going to fire up the burner on #2 and see if it works soon.  Then on to finding or making a heater block.  I would like something I can put a cartridge heater in and control the heat with a PID controller.  I wish I knew someone who made a heater for a pressure type system.  Do you know of any one Kyle?  Might have to get together with a friend at a metal shop. 

Talk to you later...

Russ

Well, the Lennox is home.  Had the wrong spelling in the title I guess.  Anyway, here is what it looks like.  What do you think?  Not sure what kind of burner it is.  Does Lennox make their own?

Russ

Here is a copy of "TestDriver's" post from over on frybird:  (copied with his permission)

Hello,

I just found this thread by accident and thought I'd share.

I finished building a waste oil heater for my 20x24 shop this past winter. The original plans I used were the MEN design. However, I used a cast iron bell trap drain as the burner. I flipped the bell upside down and spaced it off the drain cap with a 2" section of iron pipe. Of course, the cap no longer pivots on it's hinge. The assembled cap/bell sits on the p-trap part of the drain.

The tank is a former electric water heater (40 gal?) with a 4" downpipe and 7" flue. The reason for the dimensions were strictly based on availability. I cut a door on the side of the tank and used a couple of stainless door hinges to mount it back. The clasps use a couple of more hinges to close the door with some tension. The clasps themselves use off-axis washers as the cams and work quite well and can be adjusted as things wear in.

After fiddling with the burner height, I found the oil splattered off the burn plate too much coating the entire lower section in used motor oil. This stuff never burnt off and eventually leaked past the cancerous seams of the heater tank. I solved this by installing a 3/4" pipe all the way down the middle of the vent onto the burner plate. The pipe has four notches cut onto the bottom where the oil flows onto the burn plate. There must be some cool fluid dynamics going on since the oil is still dropped from the top of the heater, directed down the 3/4" pipe I installed and it never touches the sides of the small pipe. Whatever small air amount that is drafted down the small pipe helps to keep the drops of oil off the pipe and I can hear the oil drops hit the plate bottom.

I put the tank in my shop next to a large vertical bandsaw. The saw had an unused lubricant tank which I adapted to feed the heater. It's about 3/4 of a gallon with a sight glass and a convenient npt fitting. The fitting is hooked up to a needel valve which then runs to the heater with a total drop of about 2 feet. Everything is connected using 1/8" copper tube.

The combination of short drop, small tube and cold temperatures make for a slow feed. I can't build up enough flow to get the heater very hot and it barely makes my shop area comfortable though it's well insulated. This is something I aim to address for this coming winter.

To light it, I pour some kerosene on the trap basin and close the door. The draft is immediate and I start the oil flow as soon as the door is closed. The burn is fairly clean and the resulting deposits fairly easy to clean off.

Another possible upgrade for this winter will be a sort of heat reclamation device for the flue. I'm loosing way too much heat up the exhaust but some of this might be lack of experimentation since I have'nt gotten to run it often.

If my descriptions are lacking, I can further describe or maybe put up some pictures.

Ramon

I have my sights on a Lenox furnace.  The guy couldnt tell me if it has a beckett burner or not.  He mentioned that he seen suntec on it, which I am guessing is the pump.  Do you guys know if it is more than likely a beckett?  Would a Lenox be a good brand to get a hold of?  He wants $20 for it.

I had plans of building a Roger Sanders style heater, but have decided to go with a fuel oil furnace style burner instead of the drip system.  Anyone looking to experiment with the drip system might find this burner useful.  If you are interested in the burner, let me know.

Dripping oil probably isnt the best slogan since most are probably shooting oil into the fire?  What should the slogan be?  Anyone have a clever idea?