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Orchard heater / smudge pot info

How the fuck have I never seen one of these before? And why don't I have one?

Is it just a pot with a pipe/stack on it with some vents? Any design guidelines for a home-fabed one?
 
I have had one for 4-5 years now and dammned if I can get it to run clean on used oil. Even tried running it on pure diesel and it still smokes pretty bad. I would think it needs more air, but opening up the vent on tank fill cap makes the flame higher and it still makes a lot of smoke. Anybody got suggestions for me??
 
These never really caught on here even though they're plentiful. Another advantage to living in the woods.
 
Defecater said:
I have had one for 4-5 years now and dammned if I can get it to run clean on used oil. Even tried running it on pure diesel and it still smokes pretty bad. I would think it needs more air, but opening up the vent on tank fill cap makes the flame higher and it still makes a lot of smoke. Anybody got suggestions for me??
Click to expand...






Something isn't getting hot enough.



Once it's up to temperature the smoke shouldn't really be noticeable.
 
Does it not have a butterfly valve at the bottom of the stack? Mine does and I could see that not being open causing it to not get hot enough.
 
Defecater said:
I have had one for 4-5 years now and dammned if I can get it to run clean on used oil. Even tried running it on pure diesel and it still smokes pretty bad. I would think it needs more air, but opening up the vent on tank fill cap makes the flame higher and it still makes a lot of smoke. Anybody got suggestions for me??
Click to expand...

Is your flue closed?
 
Don't do as I do:flipoff2:
DON'T PUT GAS OF ANY KIND IN A DIESEL BURNER:flipoff2:
Diesel burner is 30' from anything flammable.

I've had one sitting around for 10 plus years. My buddy is building a shop and I'm going to loan it to him for his kids to screw off around at the property where he is doing the shop.
So I decided to do a test burn to get any water out of the tank. I haven't used it in years so sitting out I figured the is probably a little water in the diesel tank. I
It didn't light with a small propane torch so I grabbed a diesel jug i wasn't sure of the contents and dumped in a half gallon of OLD NASTY ASS GAS. Then I stood back and aimed the torch at it and it took off. Yeah, flames.
As it was starting to die down I dumped in a gallon of used oil with just enough gas mixed in to make good flames. Not enough gas to burn up the stream of oil though. All the time it was crackling and boiling the water off the bottom. I just kept the fill door open so I could get a big ass flame out the top.
It started to burn out again so I dumped in another gallon of the gas contaminated oil. That gallon didn't last long and it burned out. But was still crackling when it died out. Now waiting for it to cool so I can dump some diesel in it and the last couple gallons of gas contaminated oil in it. I'm not even crazy enough to do that with a hot Salamander, as we called them on the drill rigs years ago.
Of course a couple pics.
20201114_165131.jpg


20201114_165124.jpg
 
And this boys and girls is why you shut it down when it's crackling and don't try to "BURN THE WATER OUT".

20201114_185201.jpg


It boiled out the fill hole, which was open. I'm guessing if it got hot enough to boil over with fill hole closed and vent open it would be a pretty impressive flame out.
Anyway it burned out quickly and then I shut top down. I'll dump the water and whatever else crap is in there out tomorrow to take to recycling.

That's your safety lesson to not try to burn water as was discussed earlier in this thread.
But there was a beer in my hand as I took this last picture so it wasn't a total waste of time.:flipoff2:
 
I never said it was a good idea, I just figured it wasn't too bad of an idea. And maybe a couple of beers.

No harm other than cleaning up some oil spill in the morning and a safety lesson for all my imaginary friends.
 
I’ve let mine do the fryer bubble quite a few times, it will do it for about 15-20minutes and burn itself out.
 
so i made one real quick and easy. and it works great. pictures are a little after start up. it warms up until there is nearly no visible smoke and appears to burn a little less than a gallon an hour.

the recipe;
-one old semi drum brake with a 3/16 plate welded on the bottom.
-4" pipe flange with about 6-8" of pipe coming up
-6" section of ducting goes over the 4"pipe and down about 1" from the top.

works pretty good and puts out allot of heat.


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Growing up in the orchards (sunsweets home town) these were piled up by the hundreds when I was a kid.
then the wind machines were brought onto the scene...
wtf did they all go?:emb:
 
So what’s the verdict on filling them, do you need to wait for them to be fully out and cooled before adding more diesel?
 
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