[Stoves] Fire Stump / stump-incuts

Fri Jul 22 10:41:47 CDT 2011

					Hello.....

      My Husband and I have created a new wood 
stove which we are looking to find a manufacturer with whom we can 
partner up with and get this product to market.
Please enjoy the 
following article and if you are interested please contact us either by 
return e mail.
Thank You, 
  Roger and Bridget Lehet 

					by Deborah Bach

					Created in desperation, boat stove becomes business venture
					Jan 12 2011 in Business of Boating by Deborah Bach

1ShareRoger Lehet with a prototype of the stove he spent about six months developing, which is now being manufactured for sale.
A year ago Roger Lehet was in a desperate situation, on the verge of 
losing his business while moving onto a boat with his family because 
they could no longer afford their house payments.

Today Lehet is filled with renewed hope, believing that the woodstove
 he designed and built to warm his boat might also be his ticket to 
success.

Lehet says his stove, which is currently being manufactured for sale,
 will burn a single presto log for at least 6.5 hours and is more 
efficient than anything else currently on the market. The stove will 
also burn wood and driftwood, Lehet says, and with simple modifications 
can also run on pellets, kerosense, diesel or glycerine.

He’s applied for a patent and says as word of his product has spread, people are showing interest.

“Every day I get phone calls from dealerships and people who want to 
be able to stay out on their boats all year, and this is definitely the 
key to that,” says Lehet, 45.

Desperate times

Last winter, business at Fireside Hearth Shoppe, the Vashon Island 
store Lehet opened in 1985, was so slow he started opening by 
appointment only. He and his wife got rid of their cars and were barely 
scraping by.

So when a customer offered Lehet a 30-foot Bayliner Contessa in 
exchange for a woodstove, Lehet — who had barely ever driven a boat, let
 alone owned one — said yes. His wife was not thrilled about the 
arrangement, Lehet says, though her 9-year-old daughter saw it as a 
great adventure.

The trio moved aboard in February, anchoring out in Quartermaster 
Harbor. The storms came, bringing pelting rain and powerful gusts. Lehet
 had to learn quickly about maintaining a boat. One of the first lessons
 was that a propane heater is not the optimal choice onboard.

“It just turned the boat into a shower,” Lehet says. “It was just icky, moldy sheets and the whole nine yards.”

He tried a generator-powered electric heater, but it used a lot of 
fuel and he worried the noise would annoy the neighbors. He looked for a
 stove with a glass door, that could burn all night on a load of fuel 
and that he could cook on. It also had to fit inside of a 12-inch wide 
cabinet, the only convenient place on the boat to put it.

But Lehet couldn’t find what he wanted, so he set about making it 
himself. The back of his boat serving as a workshop, Lehet toiled 
through the winter and spring, designing and testing his stove. The 
first version got so hot the chimney fell off and hit him in the 
forehead. Over the next four iterations he tweaked the stove’s air flow,
 gradually lengthening the burn time.

“I was able to extend the burn time much longer on the same load of 
fuel,” Lehet says. “The only problem was, it was ugly as hell. Someone 
saw it and said, ‘You should get this thing patented and make it 
pretty.’”

Lehet didn’t have the money for a patent application, but says a 
customer of his offered to pay for it. A grateful Lehet dubbed the stove
 “the Kimberly” after the man’s wife, who was also supportive of his 
project. He soon partnered with a machinist, who Lehet says is now 
manufacturing the first 500 units of the stove at a facility in Orting, 
Wash.

The first batch will have stainless exteriors and be priced at 
$3,500, and Lehet plans to also offer models with copper, brass and 
anodized aluminum exteriors. The stoves have a 316 stainless steel 
interior and a chimney that vents from the back to keep the stovetop 
free for cooking.

“We cook bacon and eggs on it, hamburgers, steak … it makes the best buttered rum,” Lehet says.

A new venture

An initial run of 500 units may seem risky, but Lehet says based on the level of interest he’s hearing, he doesn’t think so.

“I think that 500 are going to be gone in probably two months,” he 
says. “More and more people have been coming out of the woodwork and 
saying, ‘How soon can I get one?’”

Lehet is pursuing certification to ensure his stove meets U.S. 
Environmental Protection Agency standards and already has plans for 
expansion — adding water coils so the stove can double as a hydronic 
heater, developing an oven that will mount on top, making smaller-sized 
stoves suitable for backpacking, creating a line of accessories.

Ultimately, he hopes to take over an empty space on Vashon previously
 occupied by K2 Skis, which left the island nearly a decade ago and 
moved its manufacturing abroad. Lehet, who opened his shop on Vashon at 
age 18, wants to help provide jobs for his fellow islanders.

“It’s going to be a very high-quality stove,” he says. “It’s going to
 be manufactured here and we’re going to put people to work here.”

Fireside Hearth Shoppe
 is now back to regular opening hours, and Lehet and his family have 
moved back into their house, which he co-owns with his mother. Though 
the past year has been a struggle, Lehet also sees it as a blessing.

“I’m very thankful I hit rock bottom. I needed it,” he says. “I’ve 
had my fat years and I’d gotten kind of lazy and complacent. To have 
everything stripped away — all the toys are gone and you’re going to be 
living on a boat because you don’t have a choice — it’s a very humbling 
experience.

“Had we never come to the brink of destruction business-wise and 
moved onto a boat and gone through these experiences, I never would have
 done this.”

From: boll.bn at t-online.de
To: rongretlarson at comcast.net
Date: Fri, 22 Jul 2011 17:08:05 +0200
CC: stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org; peetersfrans at telenet.be
Subject: Re: [Stoves] Fire Stump /  stump-incuts

Ron,

            The pictures were
taken with horizontal laying stump, because the vertical pictures did not show
the type of in-cuts very well.

But I only burnt the
stump upright ( circle-surface standing on bottom).

 I thought there was
enough air coming through the lower side-in-cuts to feed the central hole.

The burn was very uneven
(and not symmetrical). And the rest of the stump – (it cracked apart because
the bottom-in-cuts were going to far upwards)  was partly un-burnt wood with
some charcoal at the inner side. The rest was more like a fire that died without
burning to the end, than a gain of charcoal.

Possibly the very dry
condition of my fir-wood  (it was cut in log and with asterisk in-cuts at least
a year before burning was done) made another burn-pattern then more fresh wood.

I have another 3 stumps with
bark and in-cuts (only cross-in-cuts from top) resting without my attraction in
dry condition.

If I would (expect much
and long would!  J ) start another experiment series, I would then prefer
to set the stump into a short big-sized stove-pipe, or at least put a small
metal girdle around.

By doing with a
stove-pipe surrounding (some controllable air from bottom as condition to work
with) of the stump, it would be interesting with a concentrating plate on top
of the stove-pipe.

So it would tend in the direction
of an old-fashioned saw-dust-stove. I can imagine that could make some
torch-like flame, possibly with need of little air-push from a fan.

In that configuration, I
can imagine some charcoal-production. – But make it somehow possible to
cut off the primary air at the end of the out-gassing burn. 

Regards

 Martin

Von:
rongretlarson at comcast.net [mailto:rongretlarson at comcast.net] 

Gesendet: Freitag, 22. Juli 2011
00:59

An: Martin Dr. Boll

Cc: Frans Peeters; Frank Shields;
stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org

Betreff: Re: Fire Stump /
stump-incuts

Martin

   The videos of this approach show them as being interesting and
unusual.  Is there anything at all practical?   It seems you had
one ignition in a horizontal position;  I wonder if you tried it vertical?

   With the wrapped aluminum, you can have more control of
airflow,   

    My interest is in whether there is any configuration that
ends up with charcoal?

    Thanks for the continued information and photos.

Ron

From: "Martin Dr. Boll" <boll.bn at t-online.de>

To: rongretlarson at comcast.net

Cc: "Frans Peeters"
<peetersfrans at telenet.be>, "Frank Shields"
<frank at compostlab.com>, stoves at lists.bioenergylists.org

Sent: Thursday, July 21, 2011
2:01:38 PM

Subject: Re: Fire Stump /
 stump-incuts

Ron,

- Frans, Frank and
„Stomp-Stovers“ -

Here some pictures from
a fire-stump. It is laying around in a garage for a year of three. I just took
the pictures to explain, without need of many words.

With such a type (but
with bark) I did my test as I described in the stoves-list. But that burn was
without aluminium-foil. 

I was discontent with my
first test, which I made in summer last year. The burn of the dry pine-stump
did not happen as symmetrically as I expected, and the stump had several times
to be turned for using the wind direction to direct the burn.

The in-cuts from the
bottom were done too high, so the stump burnt too early in pieces. The central
channel appeared in begin too small.  (A commercial fire-stump in the web
has on top a sort of dish/cup which seems to work better)

.

The idea to wrap it (in
different test in somehow different manners) with aluminium-foil came by
reading the thread about the fire-stump. So I cannot say anything about that. I
have not yet planned how to play with the foil-wrapping. Here is for the moment
lack of time and appropriate weather. But possibly is someone interested in
that first step to struggle further.

The difference with this
stump is:

There is a channel from
top to bottom, not made by a drill, but by chain-saw-in-cuts in 60° angles

Picture 001 shows that
by a metal-stick going through the central-hole.

Picture 008 shows (with
good will of the viewer) that the asterisk has a central channel, going
through.

Pictures 010 and 012
show the different position of the in-cuts from bottom in comparison to the in-cuts
from the top,

-By going further with
fire-stumps, I think it would be useful to remind the old-fashioned type of
saw-dust –stoves with the central hole.

Regards 

Martin

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