[TheForge] preheating forge blower air

Tue Feb 5 17:13:33 2002

One of the reasons I have been thinking about this is
that in a welding fire, you want the oxygen to be
consumed as soon as possible so that you get the heat
without having a lot of oxygen around to oxidize the
surfaces. This can be accomplished by a deep fire, but
I have found that if it is too deep, the coal on the
top ends up not burning at all and adds no heat. It
seems that if the air is hot, it will be consumed
lower down in the fire so you won't need as deep a
fire for welding.

Energy is not free. If I preheat the air from the
bottom of the firepot, I am effectively cooling the
fire indirectly. If I were to preheat the air as it is
going up my chimney, then I will lose draft in the
pipe. I am just curious about real experience with
this and where is the best place to get the preheat.

I have a preliminary design for a cast firepot with 4
parts that would create this effect and want to know
whether it is worth the effort of having it cast.

Frederick
--- Daniel Crowther <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> I've often wondered about this as well.
> 
> >  With all the recuperative appliances the idea is
> that the hotter the 
> > combustion air, the hotter and more efficient the
> fuel conversion is.
> 
>          Or does it actually work against the
> combustion process because 
> hot air is less dense.  Dodge experimented with
> Intercooled aspirated car 
> engines on the principal that colder air is denser
> and will give more 
> oxygen for the same volume.  The HP did increase, so
> it worked for them.
>          Is there something else going on that makes
> preheating for forge 
> combustion good and bad for auto combustion?
> 
> 
> Daniel Crowther
> Oak & Acorn
> http://www.oakandacorn.com
> Valley Falls, NY
> 
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