[Stoves] Fuel qualities as the limiting factor, and getting rid of WBT (Was: Frank on helium surrogate)

[Crispin Pemberton-Pigott]

Dear Frank

>"If airflow, temperature and pressure, dilution etc. is needed then you can forget it."

We use temperature, mass change, gas composition and dilution rate to generate the outputs. The method is relatively easy to run and accurate. More than1500 tests have been processed in this manner. 

>But you have the entire stove on a balance? and monitoring the total weight loss?

Yes. We can read the scale pretty well to 0.1 g and very well to 1g.

A good quality scale can give 300 kg to 1 g precision read 20 times per second. The 75 kg scale is read about 170 times per second. 

>The lower heat value? Meaning the moisture and hydrogen in the wood are somehow separated in the weight loss? Perhaps I do not understand how that works. 

It is now possible to separate the emitted water vapour into the fuel moisture and fuel hydrogen sources, even as it evolves in real time. I made presentations on this at Brookhaven National Laboratory in April and the NYSERDA meeting in Albany last year. 

>The chemical composition will change as the volatiles finish and the chars start to combust. This change in primary combustion gasses monitored very accurately with Helium (If it even works!).

That is not close enough to reality. The trick is to know how much moisture left the fuel and when, and when the volatiles and carbon burned (or not).

It is a chemical mass balance method and it has already been shown to work by an independent group in Buffalo. 

I am just doing the theory. 

Regards 
Crispin