[Stoves] Why TLUDs are not mass produced

[Josh Kearns]

I'd second the perspectives offered by Paul O. People in "developing
communities" are usually, in my experience, really busy. If you can make a
tin can stove by hand for very cheap, that's great, but it will break down
pretty quickly with daily use. Poor people ought to have well designed,
durable stoves to cook on. Getting the production economies of scale right,
along with appropriate financing mechanisms, could bring this about.

Mobile phones are sophisticated little devices but are now fairly
widespread, along with roadside repair shops (at least where I have worked
in SE Asia). I'm sure others have made this analogy and thought about how
it might (or might) not apply to stoves and other appropriate/sustainable
technologies.

JK




On Fri, Oct 26, 2012 at 10:43 AM, Paul Olivier <paul.olivier at esrla.com>wrote:

> Paal,
>
> Try to make a tin can by hand. This is terribly inefficient.
> Tin cans are best made by machines (mass production).
> There are many parts to my gasifier that require enormous time to make by
> hand.
> Like the analogy with the tin can, this too is terribly inefficient.
> If we need to provide work to poor people, we might try to figure out more
> productive things for them to do.
> The TLUD parts that I am proposing are not made in China, but here in
> Vietnam where I live.
>
> https://dl.dropbox.com/u/22013094/150%20Gasifier/Jpegs/JP6/150%20Gasifier%20Parts.pdf
> The factory in Vietnam has accepted to make parts virtually at cost and
> and I do not mark-up anything.
> Also I bear fully the substantial cost of making the molds and jigs needed
> for mass production.
> My profit in all of this is totally zero. So it's not about making me or
> anyone else rich.
> Without mass-production the cost of many TLUD parts doubles and even
> triples.
> If costs are inflated because I insist that things be made one at a time
> by hand in order to provide employment,
>  then a lot of poor people will not be able to afford the gasifiers that
> are so badly needed.
>
> But once parts are mass-produced, I see a place for small workshops to
> assemble parts.
> If a small workshop should somehow manage to make parts more cheaply than
> the mass-produced parts, I gladly encourage them to so so.
> In fact I will even supply drawings. There is nothing proprietary in what
> I do with gasifiers.
>
> For example, I recently gave drawings to Dr. Reg Preston,
>  and he in turn passed them on to NGOs in several countries in South
> America.
> If these NGOs need parts, I will help them out at cost.
>
> Many thanks.
> Paul Olivier
>
>
> On Fri, Oct 26, 2012 at 2:16 PM, Paal Wendelbo <paaw at online.no> wrote:
>
>>   Dear Paul Oliver
>>
>> I am not talking about gas-welding, but abut a simple TLUDenergy-unit
>> made by local tinsmiths with the tools they might have. If there is a
>> question about huge quantities you can have pre-stamped and cut, easy to
>> put together by local tinsmiths.  Mass-production of cheap stoves from
>> China will not solve the problems of unemployment in developing countries.
>> You need more poor people to buy cheap products to keep few producers still
>> rich.
>>
>> Paal W
>>
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>>
>
>
> --
> Paul A. Olivier PhD
> 27C Pham Hong Thai Street
> Dalat
> Vietnam
>
> Louisiana telephone: 1-337-447-4124 (rings Vietnam)
> Mobile: 090-694-1573 (in Vietnam)
> Skype address: Xpolivier
> http://www.esrla.com/
>
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-- 
Josh Kearns
PhD Candidate
Environmental Engineering
Engineering for Developing Communities
University of Colorado-Boulder

Director of Science
Aqueous Solutions
www.aqsolutions.org

Mobile: 720 989 3959
Skype: joshkearns
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