Wood Burning Pool Heater - Upgrade and Update

We have loved having this pool heater available to boost the pool temps a bit in the spring and fall. It has worked great although over the last year and a half has lost some efficiency. Taking the advice of some great feedback on the first build I am going to try a few new ideas with this and see if I can't get a more efficient heat transfer and boost the temps up even more!

The most common feedback I received was "Why don't you wrap the copper tubing around the outside of the barrel?" This is a great idea and one that I had considered before I started the first version of the pool heater. I ended up deciding to put the tubing on the inside of the barrel because I wanted it to be engulfed in the flame with no tubing exposed to the outside air and I also didn't like the look of the tubing on the outside. In the end this is what I have found...

The coil on the inside is much more efficient at absorbing the heat; however, it does not hold up as well over time since it collects soot and creosote over time and becomes less efficient. Overall this is the best approach but you will need to take the coil out each year and clean it up.

The second approach was to wrap the coil around the outside of the barrel. This also works very well but in order for it to be most efficient it will need to be covered in some sort of insulation to keep the heat around the tubing. I noticed that the outside area of the tubing is actually working like a heat sink and cooling the outer side. With good insulation wrapped around the barrel with the tubing in between the heat would be trapped and provide the best heat exchange to the water. I am currently looking for some good outdoor insulation that I can use for this application.

In the meantime I have both the coil on the outside and the one on the inside in use and the temps I am getting are fairly close to what I had when I first started the project last year.

This has been such a fun project to work on and experiment with and I am excited for the winter season so I can test it's use heating my garage again! Stay tuned for updates on that and thanks for stopping by!

Soldering equipment -

Spark start torch head - http://amzn.to/1BMl54f
Mapp Gas cylinder - http://amzn.to/14G5DdF
1/2"-3/4" pipe and fitting cleaner combo tool - http://amzn.to/1BSy2ao
Tight spaces pipe cutter - http://amzn.to/1y0INKD
Pipe cutter - http://amzn.to/1xP2qDj
Lead free solder - http://amzn.to/1wGPqvL
Flux - http://amzn.to/1yPxXqA


The Vogelzang single barrel kit can be purchased here - http://tinyurl.com/onurub9

Fiskars X27 splitting axe - http://amzn.to/1QEOfrG

All of these products and more recommended items from the SSL Family are available at the Simple Suburban Living General Store

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Top-Bar Bee Hive From Reclaimed Materials - 2

Ever wanted to have your own source of honey? Honey and beeswax have so many uses around the homestead and this is something my wife has wanted for quite some time. So, with our anniversary just around the corner I thought what better to make than a top-bar bee hive!

This is part two of the series on how I am building this hive....

I began by marking the angles on each side piece to match the angle of the end pieces. Using the table saw I matched the angle I had marked and ripped each side board at that specific angle. I was then ready to start assembly. 

I placed the end piece on the level surface of my workbench and propped the side pieces up against it at a right angle. I pre-drilled and countersunk each hole (4 per side) and attached the ends to the sides using 2 inch deck screws and wood glue. While the Glue was drying I started working on the legs. 

I clamped the legs in place on the end of the hive to match the angle of the sides. I then marked the extra that was hanging to be cut off. Once these were cut to length I then did some finish sanding on the legs and the main body of the hive to clean things up. The legs were used as a temporary stand and a coat of spray lacquer was applied to the hive and legs. 

The legs were attached to the hive using 2.5 inch deck screws and pre-drilled holes. I did not use any wood glue here in case I want to take the legs off or make changes to this later. At this point all that is left in this step was to connect the bottom of the hive.

The bottom of the hive will need to open and close so that it can be open in Summer to allow ventilation. I will also install a piece of hardware cloth to keep pest out while the bottom is open. I attached two hinges and a small latch to the bottom panel and then connect it to the hive. 

Once the lacquer had dried I did some light sanding on the surface and then applied a second coat on the entire hive. I am not applying any finish to the inside of the hive as I am not sure if this would be good for he bees. The inside will be kept dry and should not need any sealers anyway. 

Tools used in this video - 
Dewalt chisel set - http://amzn.to/1BbC4zv

All of these products and more recommended items from the SSL Family are available at the Simple Suburban Living 

General Store - http://astore.amazon.com/simpsubulivi-20 

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Music - "Crazy Glue" by Josh Woodward. Free download: http://joshwoodward.com/song/CrazyGlue

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Top- Bar Bee Hive From Reclaimed Materials - Building the Base - 1

Ever wanted to have your own source of honey? Honey and beeswax have so many uses around the homestead and this is something my wife has wanted for quite some time. So, with our anniversary just around the corner, I thought what better to make than a top-bar bee hive!

We chose to go with a top bar because they are easy to build, maintain, and are great for beginners (or so I have heard). The trick is, we have a budget of next to nothing for this project and the wife and I vowed to get each other something homemade for each other this year. I immediately started thinking of where I could get some free wood for this project. Ah yes! That old kitchen table/picnic table that has been sitting outside in the rain for three years, perfect! I grabbed the table top and benches and made my way to the garage. 

The first step for me was to get all of the wood cleaned up and cut away all of the edges and unusable wood. Once this was done I stacked it all up and started planning out some measurements. I have read that the hive should be able 12" deep, about 10 inches wide at the bottom, 120 degree angle coming up and as long as 48 inches. After some careful planning I thought I could get pretty close to these measurements with the wood that I had. 

I started by cutting the end pieces to size ( ended up with about 8.5" bottom, 120 degrees up on each side. The length that worked for the wood I had was about 42 inches with sides that were about 15" wide. In order to make the sides I needed to glue a few pieces of wood together using a make shift clamping system on my workbench. For some of the longer pieces (bottom) I glued two boards together end to end using dowels to strengthen the glue joints. 

The next step was a lot, I mean a lot, of sanding. I had to grind off years of weathering and stains ( I used the benches as saw horse for awhile so they were pretty beat up). The wood from this table looks like it is birch or maybe poplar and it really is a nice looking wood once it is cleaned up. I also used a glue and sawdust mix to fill in any holes, cracks, or other damaged areas and then sanded them flat. 

While the glue was all drying I started in on the legs. I am using 2X4's for the legs and wanted to be a little different than the other hives I have seen out there. I aligned the legs to match the angle of the end pieces of the hive and marked them where they crossed. I then used a circular saw to mill out the area where they crossed down 3/4" on each leg. I then chiseled out the area smooth so that the legs will fit nicely together and make a crossed leg similar to a baby manger (think Jesus in Bethlehem). I then secured these together with glue and clamps and let them set up. 

That takes care of all of the prep work and all I could fit into one video. Next up will be assembly and finishing touches on the main part of the hive. 

Getting started with beekeeping? Check out these items on Amazon - 

Protective suit - http://amzn.to/1dZ4frl
Smoker - http://amzn.to/1MjT3Qu
Starter tool kit - http://amzn.to/1T8hmpR
Starter feeder - http://amzn.to/1MjTaLY

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Square Foot Garden Planting Template

In this video I show how to make a easy and extremely useful template that can be used year after year to plant your gardens.

Last year we decided to start using some of the methods of square foot gardening in order to get the most out of our small raised bed gardens. The whole idea is that all of your vegetables are planted very close together using specific spacing for each variety. This is a much different process than traditional gardening and has many benefits.

Planting using a template allows you to have complete control over where each seed goes. This can save seed and does not require anywhere near as much thinning if any at all. All you do is drop one or two seeds (if they are small) into each hole and wait for them to sprout (don't just stand there staring it might take a few days). Once they have sprouted go back and reseed any of the spots that did not sprout. If you save your own seeds then you already know how important it is not to waste seeds.

The obvious benefit to using the template is the spacing. You are guaranteed to have perfect rows of vegetables and each will have it's optimum room to grow. There is a great site that I use each year when I get ready to plant here - http://www.mysquarefootgarden.net/plant-spacing/. There is a list of common vegetables and how many you should plant per square. It also gives you some rules of thumb to use if your plant is not listed there. The most common plant spacing per square foot is 12, 9, 8, 4, 2, 1 and some plants actually take up more than one square foot in which case you don't really need a template.

I first designed the template on cardboard and gave it a try to see if it actually helped make planting easier. I was surprised at how much fun it was and the kids loved using it. So, I decided to make a more permanent design.

The first step is to get a 12" X 12" piece of wood. Any wood will do but not too thick as you don't want it to be heavy. Once you have your wood cut and sanded start marking grid lines every 3/4" horizontally and vertically. Every fourth line should be a different color (I choose orange). This will give you a 16 square grid to start with.

The next step is to mark the spots where holes need to be drilled. I would recommend checking out the video for the best placing. Once the holes are marked you can drill them out using any size drill bit you choose. I used a pea seed as a guide to select mine. I wanted it to be just big enough to fit through as this is one of the larger seeds I normally plant.

Next I used a couple of different sized washers to make circles around the holes and then painted them various colors. This  will allow you to identify the various seed spacing easily. I then added some handles using a small piece of 3/4" X 6" piece of wood.

The next thing that I needed to do was to cut out a section where the template will need to fit around the corner and center support posts in our raised beds. I marked out two 3.5" X 1.5" squares on the bottom two sides and then cut them out. I then used two small hinges to secure the cutout pieces back to the board. This will allow me to move them out of the way when needed and swing them back in to place.

Lastly I designed a small push stick using a 1/4" dowel and a square piece of wood as a handle. This was then color coded with markings every 1/4" so that you can easily make holes to whichever depth you need. It also pushes the seeds down tot he proper depth. 

The template has been working great so far and the best part is it gets our kids excited about planting in the garden!

 

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Music - "Shot Down" by Josh Woodward. Free download: http://joshwoodward.com/song/ShotDown

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Outdoor Wood Burning Garage Heater - Heat Your Garage For Free Using a C...

 

Recently I made a homemade outdoor wood burning boiler system to heat our garage. I have been excited to get this put together ever since I built our wood burning pool heater earlier this spring. I realized that with the same setup I was using for the pool, I could also heat water for an indoor heat system. All I needed was some sort of indoor radiator and fan and some underground tubing to cycle the water through. 

I am planning to expand my small garage wood shop this winter and did not want to have to run an electric heater all the time to heat the garage. My other options were to purchase a small propane heater, kerosene heater, or some other type of more powerful heat system but those can be expensive.  So, I decided on the wood burning heater instead. In most cases people will just put the barrel stove right in the garage, and that is a very efficient way of heating. However, my insurance company would not allow any wood burning stove (especially a homemade stove) inside the home. So this is where the wood burning boiler system design works the best. Although it is not quite as efficient as having the wood burner right in the garage it works very well to heat up our small insulated garage.

 

We've been running it for approximately three weeks now, and with the temperatures dropping like they have, we're really happy with the results.

 

For information on how I built this system, watch the video below.  Thanks for watching!

 

 

 

 

 

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Update on the Wood Burning Pool Heater - How Well Does it Work?

I have had quite a few requests to provide some more detailed information on how well the wood burner works.  I would like to share some temperatures with you using a AGPtek Dual Two Channel Digital Thermometer.

I have been very happy with how well this pool heater has worked for us this year. We have had such a cold summer here in Michigan this year and this heater has been one of the only reasons we have been able to enjoy the pool. Normally, the solar heater and solar cover can keep the pool comfortable but this year it has just not been adequate. I have run the wood burning heater only when needed, maybe once or twice per week at the most. We have been able to easily keep the pool temperature above 75 degrees so far this year.

The numbers and methods here are just for rough estimation of how well the heater works, this is not meant for the science books, but should hold true with a heater of similar size and efficiency.

I measured about 69 gallons per hour with a 33 degree average warm up to the water. This was with an average sized fire going as the temperature here will fluctuate as you add wood and let it burn through. I have seen it as high as 45 degrees and as low as 15 degrees, so it just depends on how much and what material you are burning.

Calculations I used:  15,000 gallon pool divided by 69 gallons per hour (filled one gallon in 52 seconds) gave me 217 hours to heat all of the water 33 degrees. Or if you reduce, it comes down to about 27 hours for 4 degree rise for the entire pool. You can also just divide 33/217 to get a coefficient that can be used to create a formula. Y = .15x where Y is the degrees you will heat 15000 gallons of water and x is the number or hours you run the heater. So if we plug in 24 hours for x we get y=3.6 degrees Fahrenheit.

Hopefully that makes sense to be used as a ROUGH estimate for calculating how much you can heat a similar sized pool.





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This post has been shared at:  The Homestead Barnhop, Simple Saturdays Blog Hop, The Backyard Farming Connection Hop, Natural Living Monday, Frugal Crafty Home Blog Hop

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Wood Burning Pool Heater - Heat Your Pool For Free!

 

 

You do not have to own a large homestead in order to produce your own food, live sustainably, and save money in the process.  Our goal for our family is to find ways to save money, reduce our waste, and reuse the things that are normally thrown away or recycled. 

Of course we recycle in our home.  But reusing is even better.  And landfill waste is a last resort.  This Ted Talk completely changed how we think about recycling.

Our green scraps are composted or fed to the worms or chickens.  Our paper and cardboard waste is reused.  We shred all of our paper and cardboard.  The shredded paper is composted and the shredded cardboard is turned into briquettes that we then burn in our wood burning stove.   We will post soon on that process.

I converted the Vogelzang Barrel Stove Kit I built into a simple pool heater and so far it has been working great. In this video, I show the conversion process and how I am diverting the water using the existing pool pump. This is an excellent way to heat your pool for free! I have been using recycled paper logs as well as free pallet wood for fuel and a few seasoned logs to extend the burn time.  I will post actual temperatures as soon as I get the thermometer installed into the diverter.

Copper pipes coming out of stove:

Diverter:

Watch this video to learn how to heat your pool using an inexpensive wood burner!


Todd





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This post has been shared at:  The Homestead Barn Hop, Simple Saturdays Blog Hop, HomeAcre Hop, Simple Lives Thursday, From The Farm BlogHop, The Backyard Farming Connection Hop

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Constructing the Vogelzang Barrel Stove

Need an inexpensive wood burning stove?

The Vogelzang barrel stove kit can be purchased for under $60...

...and converts any 55 gallon steel-drum into a small wood burning heater/stove.

This stove can be used to heat a garage, pole barn, or other structure. We burn free pallet wood and biomass briquettes we make from our recycled food cardboard boxes in our new stove.  Free energy! 

In this video, I document the easy process to assemble the wood burner and will convert it into a pool heater in another video.

Thanks for watching!

Todd




This post was shared at:  From The Farm Blog Hop, The Backyard Farming Connection Hop, Homestead Barn Hop

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