[Stoves] Geopolymer, ceramic like cookstoves

[T Hastings]

On Sun, Jul 13, 2014 at 2:53 AM, Ronal W. Larson <rongretlarson at comcast.net>
wrote:

> Thomas:
>
> 1.  I agree.  It is about time.  You have an interesting story to tell -
> and seem well qualified to be doing this very interesting stove work.  I
> think I have now viewed all 10 of your videos and more at your (well done)
> company website
>  www.unitystoves.com - which eventually led me to these as well:
>
> https://www.facebook.com/unitystoves  and
> http://prezi.com/f4yjjgigf5un/the-unity-stove-concept/
>

 >>Thank you for looking into these sites. Some of the information may be a
little outdated as I have to balance stove promotional work with new stove
research work all in my spare time.

>
>
> 2.  This list obviously can't be supporting single companies, and I
> certainly don't know enough about yours to want this to be an endorsement.
>  However, you do seem to have a production approach that is very promising
> and presumably you can eventually supply materials to list members.  Even
> if that is not the case, you have plenty of new stove design ideas that I
> want to recommend all serious stove designers to see what Thomas has
> introduced us to today.
>

>>Whilst I may have made the appearance of a trading company I am still
just an enthusiastic amateur. I am serious about pursuing these stoves and
promoting the Unity Stove manufacturing concept and are using all my design
knowledge, tools and abilities to present it as professionally as possible.


>
>  3.  Not at all below, but on your website, there is a hope for financial
> backing.  Since this could be of interest to some on this list - can you
> describe what you have in mind?
>

>>To see this new technology be of benefit to the people of developing
nations I need to demonstrate the Ksial material and the abilty to produce
stoves in mini factories. There is a pressing need to address this
situation and my efforts are split between stove development and working to
financially support my family. Whilst there are several avenues of funding
from the GACC, World Bank and the Asian Development Bank these programs are
only open to companies trading in the field of clean cookstoves. The
funding I am seeking is to help me bridge this gap and become a trading
company which can then apply for the GACC Spark Fund etc.

>
> 4.  It seems likely that the main new key feature of your work is what you
> have called "Ksial".  Could you explain more on when that will be available
> from you.  Is it proprietary?  What is behind this most unusual word?
>

>>The name Ksial is inspired by the chemical composition of the material.
It is a proprietary material I have researched and developed and is not yet
available for sale. It is not particularly easy to use so may never really
be available as a one bag product like portland cement. As per point 2 and
3 I may have appeared to have made a commercial posting on the stoves list
it was more of sharing my efforts in the cookstoves field. I will certainly
try and help out others with their stove designs and prototypes but please
remember that I am making these efforts with a full time non stove related
job and a young family to support.

>
> 5.   I found a single 2013 unanswered question on whether you were
> planning a char-making stove.  This is the only type of interest to me.
>  The reason is one you have yourself given in the "story" part of your
> site, where you say:
>  *"Just to provide one million stoves will make a huge difference with
> a CO2e reduction in the order of one million to three million
> tonnes every year."*
> That is a carbon neutral number - interesting, but nowhere near the much
> larger carbon negative number if you had a char-making version  (which
> should be cheaper and easier to make with your nice mold approach).  And
> you could still have about the same carbon neutral number you give - and
> that is obviously important to you.
>

>>I have made a combination stove that burns wood and produces char. I do
find a flame out problem when trying to run on producer gas only and use
the wood or charcoal to ignite and keep alight the producer gas flame. I am
not sure if is a common problem with steel stoves but once the flame is out
the gassifer becomes a smoke machine! I really don't want to get into the
char debate, especially having presented a simple Charcoal stove. I do
believe that char stoves present a huge potential to sequester carbon,
provide agriculture benefits and can very clean burning.

>
> 6.  I have talked to a few list members about what I consider most
> interesting and will test as soon as some promised material is received.
>  Thomas used the term "basalt" - and showed some soft (like cotton candy)
> "rock wool".  I hope we can have a discussion of this general class of high
> temp insulative material.  I am looking (as I think Thomas is) at a more
> rigid variety.
>

>>Basalt is volcanic rock. Rock wool is an insulation made from basalt
fibers and blast furnace slag. It is more economical than ceramic wool type
materials. It was used in some of my prototypes which used a thin wall
(5mm) Ksial combustion chamber in a steel can outer. It was a variation on
the popular tin can rocket stove that I am sure a lot of "stovers" started
with.

The rigid, structural insulation of my one piece designs is perlite which
is used as an aggregate with a Ksial binder. Apart from providing strength
to completed stove this overcomes the problem of loose perlite becoming
very powdery and leaking from the stove.

>
> 7.  Your design (CO5??) with a sleeve in a night-time WBT was very
> interesting.  Can you share any numerical data for that - and compare to
> that without a sleeve?  The pot was interesting (new to me) as well.  I
> hope we can see/hear more of that - with such pots appearing on the market.
>  I was surprised that you had such a tight fit.
>

>>The design of the pot is most interesting. You could call the Unity Stove
open source contribution to cookstove development. It is something that a
University could experiment with and document the efficiencies. Apart from
increasing the surface area the dimpled form allows the pot to have
intimate contact with the side of the stove in several places. In operation
the combustion gases are heating the side walls of the stove as well as the
pot. This design allows some of that heat to flow from the side walls to
the pot as the pot is relatively low temperature (full of water) Converting
a spun aluminium pot to a Unity pot is easy, a block of wood and a hammer
and 10 minutes of hammering.

The sleeve or pot skirt is part of the stove design, it does not come off.
If the wok, which sits on top of the stove, is used to boil water the
observed efficiency is lower.

>
> 8.  I hope to stamp out all char-consuming stoves however.  That char is
> too valuable for atmospheric and soil reasons to be burnt.  I did like
> though that you made your own char - and the tandoor video showed how that
> was happening.  With a char-making stove, it would be much easier to obtain
> that char - and more of it.
>

>>Actually the char comes from our house heating stove, which is an old
Fisher Stove Mama Bear retrofitted with stainless steel baffles (yes they
came to Australia as well) The tandoor stove could well be used to produce
char if I tapped off the producer gas or treated is a big TLUD, it is
really just a well insulated retort. I should look into that.

>
> 9.  I could go on with a few more observations - but hopefully this note
> will direct more list members to your most interesting site.  Best of luck
> in what I hope will be a new surge of interest in low weight, high
> temperature stove materials.
>
> Again - Thomas - thanks for one of the most interesting stove messages we
> have ever had on this list.  It only hints at what is at your several
> sites.   I should add that you have made excellent use of Facebook.  I
> don't think I am ready yet, though, to try the same.
>


> Ron
>

>>Thanks for your thorough analysis of my post.

Regards
Thomas

>
>
> On Jul 12, 2014, at 6:39 AM, T Hastings <mrthomhastings at gmail.com> wrote:
>
> Hi All,
> I've been reading this list for a while and thought it was about time I
> introduced myself and the work I have been doing.
>
> I am Thomas Hastings from Australia and have been doing the
> citizen-scientist and design, prototyping and testing work that it seems
> many people are doing to help reduce emissions and improve the life and
> health for the billions who cook with solid fuels.
>
> My background is in Industrial Design and my "day job" is design and
> managing the production of retail displays. My passion is for cookstoves
> and the geopolymer material I have been developing.
>
> As I designer, I know how much the cost of material in today's manufacture
> with super low labour costs (well relative to Australian labour costs)
> affects the end cost of production.
>
> FeCrAl alloys or stainless steels are expensive and always will be. They
> can only be produced in capital intensive factories and the pricing is
> mature and well developed.
>
> I have pursued a material class that could be, in volume, produced at a
> cost comparable to cement. There is a lot of work going on to develop
> Geopolymer as a replacement for OPC in building construction. It is very
> close nowe, its out of the lab and buildings have been made.
>
> The material developed by Unity Stove is a bit different to but similar to
> these Geopolymer construction materials. It does perform exceptionally well
> in cookstoves and does not crumble like cement. It can be moulded easily
> and unlike fired ceramics, reinforcing and insulating materials can be
> incorporated.
>
> We have made prototypes stoves to show how a stove could be made. Whilst
> the Unity Charcoal Stove you will see works very well, the Unity Stove
> concept is actually a material and method for making stoves using low cost
> tooling to many designs.
>
> Whilst I could talk about this for another twenty pages it may be best if
> you have a look at some videos for a quick into. Hopefully you will see
> that high performance stoves can be made locally and at minimal cost
>
> Thank you,
>
> Thomas Hastings
>
> 2 minute introduction
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wth9cwc3_Mc
>
>
> 15 minute video WBT 4.2.3 Test using the Unity Charcoal CO5 stove
> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O3GN0HVMXG4&list=UU3kB6NKWunKR-dcZb3CRYGg
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