How not to build a Foundry Iron-Melting Burner

the artfull-codger · Nov 18, 2024

abby said:
You should research the history of iron founding , and in particular the life of Abraham Darby. The amount of charcoal required to produce a ton of iron decimated the forests of England and Wales.
The impurities in coal , particularly sulphur , meant that it could not be used as a smelting fuel until Abraham Darby discovered how to use coke in his blast furnace.
This is recognised as one of the factors that started the industrial revolution , or as some might say the beginning of the end.
If you are ever in the UK try to visit the Iron Bridge Gorge where the remains of the original blast furnaces can be seen.
Incidentally my first forays into metal melting some 60 years ago used coke as a fuel , it was readily available as almost every town had a gas works.
A 10 foot stove pipe provided all the draught required to melt brass or bronze with a pleasant quiet of operation that was almost therapeutic.
You would be hard pressed to buy coke in the UK now.
Dan.

Yes coke is not so easy to get now, like you I built my furnace 50 odd yrs ago fired with coke,we always had a couple of tons in for the Aga Rayburn the only info then was B Terry Aspin's book, i still use coke [burnt a few furnaces out along the way] I built a propane furnace but it's expensive,,coke burning is nice & quiet as you say, just light it with sticks & spray with red diesel & it's away in 5 minutes, I still have about 3/4 ton left so that'll see me out at my age as we don't use it on the aga now.

Fidlstyks · Nov 27, 2024

Here is the burner from a heating furnace burner. The actual spray nozzle is missing, which may have been the most important part to show.
But one may see the air swirl mixer here. The fuel is sprayed from a pump on the end of the shaft right before this vane area.
The way I am setup, I can replace the blower in minutes and blow out the tip quickly if plugged.
I would think one if these might hold oneur4e back when problems arise but are great on aluminum. .

GreenTwin · Nov 27, 2024

That is a nice combo burner/blower/pump unit.
Needs a little TLC.
I considered using one of those, but the all-in-one package makes it a bit heavy/bulky to handle/move around.
I am building a pressure-style burner from separate parts (I may have posted that somewhere here), so it is the same thing, but in easily transportable pieces, such as separate blower, motor/gear pump, burner tube with nozzle, etc..

The gear pump is built onto the end of the motor shaft, and then the combustion air blower vanes.
Combustion air quantity is controlled by the adjustable damper that is next to the gear pump.

You can buy the pressure nozzle and adapter to go in the center of the burner tube; that would not be much trouble to replace.
These burner types usually used a spin vane at the end of the pressure nozzle, but that is more for discharging the burner into a large open heating unit combustion chamber.
I don't use a spin vane with my burner tube, since they don't seem to accomplish anything.
The fuel/air mixture has to spin around the crucible immediately when it enters the furnace anyway.

Attached is a Beckett exploded diagram, and all you need is the pipe from the pump output over to the pressure nozzle that is in the burner tube.
The pressure nozzle is like the one attached, and it screws into a standard Delavan #17147 adapter.

Ironsides/luckygen/100model mentioned that a gearpump needs a good filter ahead of it, since it will not tolerate any trash, so I am using a spin-on inline filter ahead of mine.

Edit:
I posted some of my foundry burner info here, including the pressure nozzle burner I am building which starts at post #7.

https://www.homemodelenginemachinis...iphon-nozzle-style-foundry-oil-burners.35340/

.

GreenTwin · Nov 28, 2024

Here is what they typically put on the front of a combo oil burner.
You don't need the electrodes.
.

Raygers · Nov 28, 2024

abby said:
Just out of interest here is a painting of Bethlehem steel works , mid 19th century.

Here is a painting of Bedlam furnaces in the iron bridge gorge also in the early/mid 19th century.

Bedlam is a shortened version of Bethlehem , which was also the name of a mental hospital in London.
The term Bedlam came to be used to describe disorder or hell-like scenes such as the furnaces at night.
The use of the the same name for the two sites has always amused me.
Dan.

And was Jerusalem builded here,
Among these dark Satanic Mills?

abby · Nov 30, 2024

Nah ! that was at iron bridge

100model · Dec 4, 2024

abby said:
The impurities in coal , particularly sulphur , meant that it could not be used as a smelting fuel until Abraham Darby discovered how to use coke in his blast furnace.

Sulphur does not go away when coal is turned into coke. Using coke in a cupola it has to be a very low sulphur content otherwise it dissolves into cast iron and makes it very brittle and very hard.

100model · Dec 4, 2024

Fidlstyks said:
When burning waste oil, the first must is having an afterburner to burn the unspent fumes

If you burn the oil properly in the first place the is no need for a afterburner. When I use waste oil there is no smell or smoke.

Fidlstyks · Dec 4, 2024

100model said:
If you burn the oil properly in the first place the is no need for a afterburner. When I use waste oil there is no smell or smoke.

If you burn oil in a fourdry furnace, the right agent would shut you down without an after burner. I see little smoke either. Just a politically correct statement. I do not care what you do.
A tractor is puts out more smoke than I do.

GreenTwin · Dec 4, 2024

The newer Kubota tractors apparently catch fine soot particles, and every so often, the tractor goes into some sort of a burnout mode.
The intructions say don't have the tractor near a shop, house, car, etc., so I guess the exhaust gets extremely hot when it turns out whatever is catching the particles.
Sort of like a chimney fire I would guess.
A high rpm, such as 2500 rpm, is suppose to stop most of the particulate buildup.

Tractor trailers inject some sort of stuff; I forget what it is called.

.

100model · Dec 5, 2024

Fidlstyks said:
the right agent would shut you down without an after burner

Where I live (Australia) There don't seem to be those right agents to shut me down.

ajoeiam · Dec 6, 2024

GreenTwin said:
The newer Kubota tractors apparently catch fine soot particles, and every so often, the tractor goes into some sort of a burnout mode.
The intructions say don't have the tractor near a shop, house, car, etc., so I guess the exhaust gets extremely hot when it turns out whatever is catching the particles.
Sort of like a chimney fire I would guess.
A high rpm, such as 2500 rpm, is suppose to stop most of the particulate buildup.

Tractor trailers inject some sort of stuff; I forget what it is called.

.

I think it is a requirement for any diesel engine over 70 hp (haven't checked but its about ubiquitous!!) and its called DEF.

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