This is the stuff that benefits the poorest amongst us " Instantly " in dark freezing day's like these. Bravo Robert, keep the life saving stuff coming. Keep ya cuppa warm on top 2. 👍
What is unfortunate is you're wrong. The poorest wont have the capability unless they themselves are inventive and knowledgeable. But we would all like to think you're correct.
I am 66 years old. And have been an electronics technician and electrician for most all my life. _How am I just now learning that a Joule and a Watt are the same, as far as heat???_ Oh. Right. I'm a Yanker... But, yes, stratification is the biggest problem for heating. Friend had a loft house, and was complaining about the heating bills, and the difference in temperature between upper and lower. The solution was a ceiling fan. I'm already looking at a couple modifications. Starting with a second and third leg to add stability and support to allow cooking on top. You will want a MUCH LARGER BASE to do this safely. Also, you penetrated the pie tin. It is now not a safe containment for spilled fuel. If you spread the offset on the support more, you can mount them to the cutting board, but then will also need multiple supports for stability. Three is the perfect number, here. And now I need to figure out how to make a wick adjuster easily.
Rob I would like to take this time to thank you greatly for your videos, your level of knowledge and experience is awe inspiring, You have left a library of useful videos and how you simplify complicated physics and mathematics is amazing, Your personality and watching how much you enjoy doing what you do is amazing I will use many of the great things you have thought us and I can't thank you enough, Thank you for Thinking and Tinkering, We need more great men like you May you be blessed in everything you do Thank you kind sir
I see too many accidents with the plant pots. if it cracks, especially if it's hanging, the chain will fall off. why not just use a small metal bucket istead? they come in all sizes,or I saw giant metal funnels in a car supplies store. those would work as well.
Robert, there is something this heater is not doing optimally. Shiny surfaces have low emissivity in the infrared spectrum. If you shot-peen or sand-blast the surface and blacken it, it will radiate heat much more efficiently. A shiny material will simply not emit as much radiant heat as a dull material at the same temperature.
This refer a little bit to my question if any material has its own unique ir radiation spectrum? So if you say shiny surfaces have low emissivity in the infrared spectrum, that could just mean for my understandig that it has to do something with surface area. Beacuse until the matiral not starts to glow in the visual spectrum it must give up all its additional energy in the infrared spectrum. That means that you could optimize the heater if it would radiate about 70Watts of infrared heat. I thing this could be done by weight and/or surface area.
@@chrislau9921 It isn't a spectrum like a line spectrum, but a black-body spectrum. Do you know about black body radiation? It's the spectrum emitted by an object due to its temperature. Everything above absolute zero has some level of emission of photons, and the shape of that spectrum tends to have a certain look. The more shiny and reflective things are, the worse they are at emitting black-body radiation. This is not about the surface area or weight; this is about how emissive a material is. The general trend is that shiny and reflective things are poor emitters, while dull and light-absorbing things are good emitters. Look up black body radiation on Wikipedia; the entry is pretty good. The shape of the spectrum depends on the temperature, but the intensity of the emissions depends on the emissivity.
Basically the same as the old Boy Scout heater, which I keep in my basement emergency survival station. A standard church-key can make draft holes around the top and bottom of a very large aluminum can; invert the can over a candle or two (tea lights and votives work as well as utility candles, but need to be replaced more often), and - voila! - you have enough heat to take the worst of the chill from the room.
My boy scout troop used to go snow caving. We'd often heat the snow caves with a few small candles. The walls would turn to ice and then the heat from a candle reflecting all around seemed 10x greater.
I've got a large cutting board, 2 bricks and a hamster bowl with 5x8 hour tea candles. Originally I covered it with a stew pot with handles, worked a tree then I saw your graphite plant pot and coloured it inside and out, covered the holes with aluminium foil to reflect the heat and topped it off with a little terracotta bonsai dish. I'll keep my eyes out for cracks. It was really cold one night so I put a glazed white plate on top to spread the heat outwards even more. Warms the whole room to an ambient temperature 👌🏻
Worked a treat* 😉 Great to hear though, heating your home in this manner I believe is the best way to point the finger at our poor gov and big energy profiteers
This is really clever. I think the carbon felt wick might be a really good choice but the cotton did the job by showing what can be done with less. You keep my mind engaged with possibilities and I love that. Now have several concepts in the works for my own projects. If I can just get around my work, farm and side hustles I might have time to try some. 🙂
Brilliant solution, but I'd be tempted to not cut a hole in the cake tin, just bend the strapping more, otherwise spilt fuel will go through the hole in the tin and wooden base.
@@dereksmith6126 You can get a (tapered is more stable) stainless cutlery drainer for £1.50, and stand it upside-down on a cake tin with an inverted empty -eg- powdered milk tin jammed on top (but not too tall because of stability). I'm trying this with 1 tealight; might try 3 later - it will depend on sufficient air for combustion, as Robert says.
I remember looking at the plant pot design & it's really no different than the Bell heat chamber in large home masonry heaters. Eastern Europe is known for using large stone bells on the wood stove after the burn box to hold onto & radiate heat over very long times. As for the wick I took some natural hemp twine & spun a wick out of that & held it with a wadded up ball of aluminum foil. I pressed the wick into the center of the ball after I crushed a pencil into the center to make a hole. This let me put the wick & holder into the mouth of a very odd shaped bottle. Since it's foil the heat never gets to the glass of the Crystal Skull bottle I used. Very spooky too ^_^
Hi. I am using an empty glass sandwich paste jar (any flavor will do 🙂), punched a hole though the metal lid, and then filled with Bio ethonol, I pushed the wick through the hole in the lid and screwed the top on the jar, and placed in an old stainless steel bread bin. No need for plate at the bottom.. Works a treat and warms up my workshop/garage nicely
Nice idea! I think that the radiator might radiate better if it was painted with a flat black paint. Also if you put the radiator can on a slide with a lever you could simply lower the radiator onto the top of the candle to smother the flame. My marginally ADD brain is getting a little of an overload watching your videos. So many things to try! So little time! I really do appreciate what you do and the way that you present and demonstrate such practical and useful ideas! Keep up the good work!
Brilliant video, I learned some things I did not know and had never considered about soot and clean burning. Makes perfect sense, just never thought about it before. Wonderful video.
If the wick is too long/thick, the wick itself burns. When just right the wax burns optimally through the wick, it minimises the burning of the wick material.
Really taken by how you took on our comments about the flower pot heater and instead of just pushing the idea that it’s the user and not the design that’s at fault. you have taken the ball in to your court and gone and produced a new and more safer tea light heater. So nice advancement in the flower pot fire starter design. Will it make the nice click clicking noises that remind you that its time you started to feel warn? well done.
this also works with an oil lamp and your idea to use stainless steel mesh as a mantle around it instead of a glass globe. great idea and it can be scaled up significantly. had seen a 55 gallon steel drum with one end removed set on cinder blocks open end down and a pan with fiberglass insulation in a pan soaked in ethanol as a burner. worked great as a shop heater
But where's the vortex? Lol, thanks as always Robert! Your thinking is always just a little off of conventional, and that makes it genius. Simple genius.
I made something similar, with a little more mass behind it. i still had the old breaking discs of the rear breaks of my old BMW layin around. they are rather deep dished because the handbreak goes inside them. also i put a "skirt" around them made from ravioli cans, so its even more volume. takes ages for it to get hot, but stay sooooo damn hot even hours after the flame is off (okay, its several kilos of metal) of course needed to clean them quite well so i dont burn old break pad dust etc. and break pads are made to withstand high temperature differences etc. so i dont see them giving in ever from my alcohol fueled "candle" (have something similar to your contraption, just use 99% alco) edit: thinking about to make a 2nd one, since i have another disc layin around. its pretty damn effective. so if someone wants to go "next level" maybe ask in your local scrapyard if they have rear break discs for cheap, or keep them when you change your own. can only recommend
there's a video out there someplace where someone placed a few tea candles under a cast iron skillet (supported by a couple of bricks) and placed a wood stove fan inside the skillet and off it went pushing air and continued to do so well after the candle went out.. He also did the same thing by using a can filled with sand and created some hot sand that still operated the fan for a while after the candle had extinguished.
@@21stCPH .mmmm I wonder if you did something with induction to heat the cast iron instead of the candles. Would that work better than an electric heater? Thinking about using an alternate power source like wind or solar, etc... 🤔
- if one were to wrap the original plantpot in wire - straight or chicken wire - the pot won't explode / collapse if it cracks - placing inside a bunded reflector increases safety no matter the "blackbody" used.
Just add a couple of appropriately placed and spaced baffles, cut a good sized hole in the top, and add a usb powered computer fan - Voilá! Convection heater. I've done it, but with garden buckets. Works very well for just a little more work. I use a solar charged battery pack for the usb fan.
Brilliant! it seems in the US, a stainless steel toilet brush holder will be plastic, with a faux metal facade. Going to get to work finding a good alternative
Thank you very much Robert, I will test this in the ongoing dark and cold Finnish winter where strange things lurk in the shadows and peak in through the windows (even though I live in the fifth floor of our yurt). I have some anger issues so this will be a good project to distract my self from the inner malice that tries to force it self out through me. I was given a "calming" brew by the local medicine hag, but the brew has only made the things lurking around more aggravated and they have started to bang on my windows. I hope the extra warmth provided by this contraption will make my living space more hostile for the creatures. Ps. Love your positive presence, very jolly fellow.
your a breath of fresh air i love your style and the communications of your instructions' are a blessing even with that twangy accent .. thanks for your help im never going to be board even started turning my spare room into a workshop .
I wonder what if you have a giant plat pot but inside of it are sheets of tin or steel circles around a steel bolt going up through the center with each sheet of tin being separated by a washer and it is layered to make a huge thermal mass radiant heater. So the center bolt is the center thermal mass that radiates out to all the steel sheets that makes a thermal radiator that uses the plant pot to be wiped with some water with a sponge so the humidity in air helps absorb radiant heat. But that becomes a convection heater if you put holes in the right spots in the pot as it heats and circulates air.
I'm seventy now, when I was young more people kept birds in sheds as pets and they used plant pots with a light bulb in a holder inside to keep the chill off the air so it is an old idea, but I really like the new methods and materials, thanks
If you put a reflector behind the candle it it will also provide decent lighting.. I have an almost identical mop I bought just for wicks, I showed it in my recent mini alcohol stove vid
You could increase the heat in the chamber by drilling a few holes around the bottom of the chimney and lowering it on the candle. Thank you for the cool (pun intended) videos.
Hi Robert, I’m new to your channel and particularly took inspiration from this video as I’ve often thought about making my own plant pot heater. My design consists of an 8” diameter Panettone tin which is 7 1/4” tall. It is inverted so that the tea light candles can sit within the lid and act as a tray. I initially punched 4 small holes around the side, just above the lid’s lip but I noticed there wasn’t enough airflow. So I increased the quantity of holes to 15 which are just under 2” apart. This still wasn’t enough so I got my step drill out and cut 7 1”holes whose centres are 2” from the bottom. This seems to be working well now. I’m currently running 3 tea lights inside and it is giving a surface temperature in the middle of the upper surface at 114 degsC. The sides are warm to touch but not hot enough to burn me. I’m going to add a 4th candle to see if it improves the output and see how it fairs. Does anyone have any further suggestions for improvements please? Update: Adding the 4th candle takes the upper surface temp to 130degsC.
I must have gotten lucky👍🏼i used my double plant pot heater for 5 years at least for a foot warmer under the computer desk. 3 small tealight worked fine. But!! This version will heat faster and longer. 👍🏼🍺
Funny enough, I just picked up a toilet paper roll holder that would make a great cage to hold that toilet brush holder and potentially keep that burner in place! I had other plans for it, but now I'm positive I will try this.
There are several things to consider, when building these things. First, make sure no toxic substances are released from the coating/metal surface while heating. You can use a gas cooker outdoors and burn everything off the surface that could release harmful vapors when used indoors. The result wouldn't look as appealing, but it's worth it. Better use old metal baking tins (the "bread formfactor" can be used horizontally), which were designed for high temperatures anyway. Make sure no wooden/flameable furniture is close during operation. Second, when the metal reaches 57°C within a few second, it's likely to max out at 170-250°C until the balance of energy input/output is reached (depending on heat source). This creates a serious burning hazard, as everything above 70-80°C is too hot to handle. This is why the original plant pot designs are multilayered with at least one inner and one outer Pot, which doesn't exceed 70°C, when fueled correctly. For more output build a bigger one, which can handle more separated candles. Each candle has to be separated from its neighbour to prevent gas ignition. Always have a bowl filled with sand as a fire extinguisher at hand. Third, a good design would combine fast heat distribution through a metal structure inside to a much larger outer object such as a pot with a large surface area, which provides heat radiation in the most possible even and consistent way - without a large heat gradient from top to bottom. The inner metal objekt works as a diffusor and the outer body is the actual radiator. Fourth, every diy heating system has its limits in terms of physical characteristics and safety. So don't overpower it, better build another one or two (or more) and place them around the heatet area. Weaker/less candles are safer to use. With a bit of experience/trial & error you can build a kind of heat curtain around your place in a 180° angle, which can be a desk or a sofa etc. Remember to adapt your security arrangements, when small kids or animals are in the house. Hope this helps, cheers.
So this is why I keep candles in my glove box. Winter storms in Western New York often catch people unprepared. When your car runs out of fuel, people freeze. The blizzard that started on the 24th of December saw more than 27 freeze to death. A candle in a tin could have stopped this. I also carry an emergency blanket.
Dankeschön für dein Video! Es ist wirklich sehr gut gemacht und super erklärt! Ich hoffe du machst noch viele weitere. Thank you mate for sharing your experience and wisdom!
This is fantastic.I will try this with my simple glass,table top oil lamp. Maybe put a metal plate at the top on an angle,to force the heat coming out the top,to the front and sides. Can't wait to make it.I will gift it to my old mother to put in her bathroom that's always freezing.
Confining warm air has been a "fun" challenge for me this winter, since the heat and air unit died. The small space heater works well, but it needs help. I obtained the lid of a disposable roasting pan (aluminum). I bent it over the arm of the couch to form an arched "duct". In front of the heater the flow of air can be aimed better. Sitting at the table I am quite cozy, with the heat aimed underneath and captured by some makeshift "skirting" around the table.
Clever design. Thinking about household trash common in the US: aluminum pie plate, peanut butter jar, coffee can. I hadn't thought of a mop head for wick, nice improvisation! If we're parking it in an existing fireplace, we could hang the radiant can from the existing damper with a bit of chain or wire; can't knock over something that's hanging, right?
Robert must be an absolute nightmare for his other half to go shopping with. "Oh, look. This stainless bowl would make a great heater....... And this cutlery stand could make a great heater....... Ooh, and these blocks of beef dripping just needs some wicks and an enclosure to become a really great heater..... And..... And...... And...... TOILET BOWL ROCKET STOVE !!!" "But look, there's REAL pre built heaters for sale, right over there." "Nah, it's alright, I don't need one......... But if we pass an exhaust place on the way home, can we pop in?......... I need some stainless pipe, because I've got an idea for a really great heater". 🤣🤣🤣
Maybe I need more experimenting but heating plant pots didn't quite have the effects I was looking for. Atm I put a 50x50 sidewalk tile on an upside down 30liter soup pot. With 5 tea lights I have a great foot warmer for about 30 cents (6 hour tealights)
Seen a lot of videos about "1,000 hour" candles. Where you put a candle in the middle of a mason jar. Then pour molten vegetable lard around it. So the burning candle flame also melts and burns the lard as well. Wondered if there was simple way to solidify vegetable oil?
Cool. It would be interesting to know how the heat would flow if you put a cap on the toilet brush tube and added an inner tube to facilitate the circulation.
the pot heater reminds me of the 12volt diesel parking heaters that have been the new crave.. the plant pot with a intake and output.. and a fan going over the container blowing it out..
terrific illustration thank you so much. what about putting some directed holes in the upper sides to create a chimney effect and direct some air flow outwards instead of upwards. as you left it most of the heat is still going straight up.
Try painting the inside of the not flowerpot with mushu black paint to absorb the candle light and see what a difference it makes. I tried doing the same for a metal tray and just put it in the winter sun inside and was surprised how warm it got.
Most cheap toilet brush holders aren't chromed anyway. They're just stainless steel. Chroming adds extra cost to the manufacturing process. Also, chrome has a nice silver mirrored finish, whereas polished stainless steel has a grayer mirrored finish, sometimes not highly polished if you're talking about the really cheap ones. So it's easy to tell.
You could do the same process with a glass jar candle, render down 2 blocks of lard with 1 fifth beeswax until melted, for your wick use some 4mm natural jute rope soaked in the fuel, attach it to a ring pull from a drink can and secure it to the bottom of the jar, pour fuel when cool, when cured trim wick to about 1/4 inch. Works really well but you will have to trim wick every 3 hrs or so , lard only costs 40p a block, much cheaper than anything, adding beeswax roughly doubles cost but all in all still cheaper than buying paraffin candle. Lasts longer too.
If you can get something called a Sterno burner you probably need a bigger chamber above to catch the Heat because I think that would be more heat than that can radiate out giving the temperature the Sterno can
Some people have made "72 day candles" from tins of shortening, (or "Crisco" ) by pressing a wax candle into the middle for a wick. It will burn up to 72 days for 8 hours per day.
I would never trust burning crisco in the cardboard boxes they come in these days. it's just paper with thin foil inside. I remember in the old days,crisco came in actual metal cans. To be safe, melt the crisco,pour into heavy jars,or metal cups,let cool and then put the candle inside. much safer. If you use the crisco container and the candle gets warm and topples to the side, that entire paper container will catch on fire.
Kingsford Michigan , Home of the Flivver , and Henry Ford , and the largest Cornish Pump in America , plus Giant Pine Mountain , 90 meter slide , International Ski jumping in February , and the land of Trail Missles , snowmobiles !
I may be repeating what others have said- but if a contained wax or oil burner raises the temperature of the wax to flash point then whoosh! Another factor is if bits of match or any other matters such as crane flies & moths serve as extra wick the temperature can rapidly rise faster than can escape by convecting and radiating away. If the candle is near anything flammable it can rapidly spread. It can also spit globs of fire if encountering drops of water (moth juice). This is the similar principle as a chip pan fire except a naked flame is already present. You could deliberately explore this in a safe place in the garden - but either let it burn out or lid/smother it, Dont use water or try to carry extremely hot wax. Awareness of danger is consciously responsible safety. But we are not all educated to any practical degree of responsibility - but towards a sealed unit with no user access.
From Canada here. Cold as it gets frankly. This idea, although useable to heat a confined space can result in suffocation and or carbon monoxide poisoning. Homeless people die every year as a result of using candles in their tents without proper ventilation. So, I think it’s important to mention the safety issues that could arise as a result of using this to heat a confined space. Please ensure you have fresh air coming in and a place for harmful gasses to escape.
thank you for sharing this wonderful idea! I may have missed the necessary lesson at school, but, would seating the candle on a base of sand be a good safety precaution to contain any accidental spillage?
Regarding clay pots shattering - Not sure if this is correct but I believe stoneware pots, like you find in garden centres, could withstand thermal shock; they're used for outdoors so should withstand freezing and thawing at the other end of the scale, but a tin seems better anyway. Oh - what about an inverted steel bucket with holes round the rim? (normal truncated cone shape)
I need to say the only reason terocota cracks is because they are damp. I would suggest putting a terracotta pot in an airing cupboard for a few weeks to make sure it is really dry before exposing it to a heat source.
If you can't find te steel brush holder, you might use some metal flue pipe, a paint tine, a cooking pot, etc. Beware of the galvanized pipe, because te galvanized stuff gives off fumes when it gets HOT. Treuy a lard candle/burner!
this guy is the science teacher we all wanted as kids , bloody awesome bloke. love the videos.
Yeeeees exactly!!!!!!
Couldn't agree with you more
Makes learning enjoyable
Today years old I learnt a Watt is a Joule/second.
Casually dropping that into a conversation asap.😊
Thank you Mr Rob
this is the only channel i don't cancel google ads, actually I click them so I can support this guy somehow. THanks pal
This is the stuff that benefits the poorest amongst us " Instantly " in dark freezing day's like these. Bravo Robert, keep the life saving stuff coming. Keep ya cuppa warm on top 2. 👍
What is unfortunate is you're wrong. The poorest wont have the capability unless they themselves are inventive and knowledgeable. But we would all like to think you're correct.
@@420frankp, thanks , I'll reply to that later. 🧐
I am 66 years old. And have been an electronics technician and electrician for most all my life.
_How am I just now learning that a Joule and a Watt are the same, as far as heat???_
Oh. Right. I'm a Yanker...
But, yes, stratification is the biggest problem for heating. Friend had a loft house, and was complaining about the heating bills, and the difference in temperature between upper and lower.
The solution was a ceiling fan.
I'm already looking at a couple modifications. Starting with a second and third leg to add stability and support to allow cooking on top. You will want a MUCH LARGER BASE to do this safely.
Also, you penetrated the pie tin. It is now not a safe containment for spilled fuel. If you spread the offset on the support more, you can mount them to the cutting board, but then will also need multiple supports for stability. Three is the perfect number, here.
And now I need to figure out how to make a wick adjuster easily.
Rob
I would like to take this time to thank you greatly for your videos, your level of knowledge and experience is awe inspiring,
You have left a library of useful videos and how you simplify complicated physics and mathematics is amazing,
Your personality and watching how much you enjoy doing what you do is amazing
I will use many of the great things you have thought us and I can't thank you enough,
Thank you for Thinking and Tinkering,
We need more great men like you
May you be blessed in everything you do
Thank you kind sir
When u use plant pot, u should wrap some wire around it. So if it crack, it still stay it form and not fall apart and u do not burn all stuff.
I see too many accidents with the plant pots. if it cracks, especially if it's hanging, the chain will fall off. why not just use a small metal bucket istead? they come in all sizes,or I saw giant metal funnels in a car supplies store. those would work as well.
Robert, there is something this heater is not doing optimally. Shiny surfaces have low emissivity in the infrared spectrum. If you shot-peen or sand-blast the surface and blacken it, it will radiate heat much more efficiently. A shiny material will simply not emit as much radiant heat as a dull material at the same temperature.
This refer a little bit to my question if any material has its own unique ir radiation spectrum? So if you say shiny surfaces have low emissivity in the infrared spectrum, that could just mean for my understandig that it has to do something with surface area. Beacuse until the matiral not starts to glow in the visual spectrum it must give up all its additional energy in the infrared spectrum. That means that you could optimize the heater if it would radiate about 70Watts of infrared heat. I thing this could be done by weight and/or surface area.
cheers mate
@@chrislau9921 It isn't a spectrum like a line spectrum, but a black-body spectrum. Do you know about black body radiation? It's the spectrum emitted by an object due to its temperature. Everything above absolute zero has some level of emission of photons, and the shape of that spectrum tends to have a certain look. The more shiny and reflective things are, the worse they are at emitting black-body radiation. This is not about the surface area or weight; this is about how emissive a material is. The general trend is that shiny and reflective things are poor emitters, while dull and light-absorbing things are good emitters.
Look up black body radiation on Wikipedia; the entry is pretty good. The shape of the spectrum depends on the temperature, but the intensity of the emissions depends on the emissivity.
Basically the same as the old Boy Scout heater, which I keep in my basement emergency survival station. A standard church-key can make draft holes around the top and bottom of a very large aluminum can; invert the can over a candle or two (tea lights and votives work as well as utility candles, but need to be replaced more often), and - voila! - you have enough heat to take the worst of the chill from the room.
You are one of a few people I like to see wacking things
My boy scout troop used to go snow caving. We'd often heat the snow caves with a few small candles. The walls would turn to ice and then the heat from a candle reflecting all around seemed 10x greater.
I used to be a Boy Scout Leader but I got the sack.
I wasn't prepared for that.
@@loucipher67 least you can still put stuff in a sack 😉🤙
@@P8FPV I'll see you around the back
Ahh sht ... that's probably why I got the sack
snow is a great insulator because of all the air that is trapped in it. giving you a greater R value the thicker the snow pack.
That heater works awesome Mr. Smith! I can tell because you went from wet hair to what looked to be completely dry hair in just minutes
I've got a large cutting board, 2 bricks and a hamster bowl with 5x8 hour tea candles. Originally I covered it with a stew pot with handles, worked a tree then I saw your graphite plant pot and coloured it inside and out, covered the holes with aluminium foil to reflect the heat and topped it off with a little terracotta bonsai dish. I'll keep my eyes out for cracks. It was really cold one night so I put a glazed white plate on top to spread the heat outwards even more. Warms the whole room to an ambient temperature 👌🏻
What did you serve with the hamster?
@@ricos1497 Chips of course mmmm
Worked a treat* 😉
Great to hear though, heating your home in this manner I believe is the best way to point the finger at our poor gov and big energy profiteers
@@callumbillington8395 couldn't agree more 👌🏻
This is really clever. I think the carbon felt wick might be a really good choice but the cotton did the job by showing what can be done with less. You keep my mind engaged with possibilities and I love that. Now have several concepts in the works for my own projects. If I can just get around my work, farm and side hustles I might have time to try some. 🙂
Brilliant solution, but I'd be tempted to not cut a hole in the cake tin, just bend the strapping more, otherwise spilt fuel will go through the hole in the tin and wooden base.
I wish I had any tools to make this.
Being unemployed, it would be nice to have a modicum of heating at this time of year.
@@dereksmith6126 you could make this with a stone and a penny
@@dereksmith6126 You can get a (tapered is more stable) stainless cutlery drainer for £1.50, and stand it upside-down on a cake tin with an inverted empty -eg- powdered milk tin jammed on top (but not too tall because of stability). I'm trying this with 1 tealight; might try 3 later - it will depend on sufficient air for combustion, as Robert says.
@@elgorrion52 Thanks, I'll have a look next time I go out.
@@elgorrion52 3 tealight is just over 200w, the toilet brush holder is £3 and a 100 tealight is £3.50 from the w chainstore
I remember looking at the plant pot design & it's really no different than the Bell heat chamber in large home masonry heaters. Eastern Europe is known for using large stone bells on the wood stove after the burn box to hold onto & radiate heat over very long times.
As for the wick I took some natural hemp twine & spun a wick out of that & held it with a wadded up ball of aluminum foil. I pressed the wick into the center of the ball after I crushed a pencil into the center to make a hole. This let me put the wick & holder into the mouth of a very odd shaped bottle. Since it's foil the heat never gets to the glass of the Crystal Skull bottle I used. Very spooky too ^_^
Hi. I am using an empty glass sandwich paste jar (any flavor will do 🙂), punched a hole though the metal lid, and then filled with Bio ethonol, I pushed the wick through the hole in the lid and screwed the top on the jar, and placed in an old stainless steel bread bin. No need for plate at the bottom.. Works a treat and warms up my workshop/garage nicely
And if you want to use it as alight put that paste jar in a hot dog sausage jar I had that idea last week lol great minds think alike
Nice idea! I think that the radiator might radiate better if it was painted with a flat black paint. Also if you put the radiator can on a slide with a lever you could simply lower the radiator onto the top of the candle to smother the flame. My marginally ADD brain is getting a little of an overload watching your videos. So many things to try! So little time! I really do appreciate what you do and the way that you present and demonstrate such practical and useful ideas! Keep up the good work!
If you paint it black, it'll just radiate the energy faster, but in the end, all energy will be radiated out, regardless of the colour.
Brilliant video, I learned some things I did not know and had never considered about soot and clean burning. Makes perfect sense, just never thought about it before. Wonderful video.
If the wick is too long/thick, the wick itself burns. When just right the wax burns optimally through the wick, it minimises the burning of the wick material.
Really taken by how you took on our comments about the flower pot heater and instead of just pushing the idea that it’s the user and not the design that’s at fault. you have taken the ball in to your court and gone and produced a new and more safer tea light heater.
So nice advancement in the flower pot fire starter design. Will it make the nice click clicking noises that remind you that its time you started to feel warn?
well done.
this also works with an oil lamp and your idea to use stainless steel mesh as a mantle around it instead of a glass globe. great idea and it can be scaled up significantly. had seen a 55 gallon steel drum with one end removed set on cinder blocks open end down and a pan with fiberglass insulation in a pan soaked in ethanol as a burner. worked great as a shop heater
I've used the top off a gas bottle.. a big dog food tin fits nicely over the top
But where's the vortex? Lol, thanks as always Robert! Your thinking is always just a little off of conventional, and that makes it genius. Simple genius.
Once again, great idea well made. Thanks Rob.
I made something similar, with a little more mass behind it.
i still had the old breaking discs of the rear breaks of my old BMW layin around.
they are rather deep dished because the handbreak goes inside them.
also i put a "skirt" around them made from ravioli cans, so its even more volume.
takes ages for it to get hot, but stay sooooo damn hot even hours after the flame is off (okay, its several kilos of metal)
of course needed to clean them quite well so i dont burn old break pad dust etc.
and break pads are made to withstand high temperature differences etc. so i dont see them giving in ever from my alcohol fueled "candle"
(have something similar to your contraption, just use 99% alco)
edit: thinking about to make a 2nd one, since i have another disc layin around. its pretty damn effective. so if someone wants to go "next level" maybe ask in your local scrapyard if they have rear break discs for cheap, or keep them when you change your own. can only recommend
there's a video out there someplace where someone placed a few tea candles under a cast iron skillet (supported by a couple of bricks) and placed a wood stove fan inside the skillet and off it went pushing air and continued to do so well after the candle went out.. He also did the same thing by using a can filled with sand and created some hot sand that still operated the fan for a while after the candle had extinguished.
Oooo, an inverted cast iron Dutch oven could be real nice!
@@colleenforrest7936Great idea
@@21stCPH .mmmm I wonder if you did something with induction to heat the cast iron instead of the candles. Would that work better than an electric heater? Thinking about using an alternate power source like wind or solar, etc... 🤔
@@colleenforrest7936 I am installing solar panels this week so I could utilize solar. I will still test the candle method to heat the sand as well.
@@21stCPH maybe a mix of the two. Candles for when it's cloudy, solar to conserve the candles...
- if one were to wrap the original plantpot in wire - straight or chicken wire - the pot won't explode / collapse if it cracks - placing inside a bunded reflector increases safety no matter the "blackbody" used.
Perfect adaptation for my van👏👏👏
Thanks for sharing your thoughts 👍👍👍
Just add a couple of appropriately placed and spaced baffles, cut a good sized hole in the top, and add a usb powered computer fan -
Voilá! Convection heater. I've done it, but with garden buckets. Works very well for just a little more work. I use a solar charged battery pack for the usb fan.
Brilliant! it seems in the US, a stainless steel toilet brush holder will be plastic, with a faux metal facade. Going to get to work finding a good alternative
Thank you very much Robert, I will test this in the ongoing dark and cold Finnish winter where strange things lurk in the shadows and peak in through the windows (even though I live in the fifth floor of our yurt). I have some anger issues so this will be a good project to distract my self from the inner malice that tries to force it self out through me. I was given a "calming" brew by the local medicine hag, but the brew has only made the things lurking around more aggravated and they have started to bang on my windows. I hope the extra warmth provided by this contraption will make my living space more hostile for the creatures.
Ps. Love your positive presence, very jolly fellow.
they arent hostile they are playful. Make funny faces and maybe they will too. They love singing. Play with them and you may feel less angry.
your a breath of fresh air i love your style and the communications of your instructions' are a blessing even with that twangy accent .. thanks for your help im never going to be board even started turning my spare room into a workshop .
Robert. I wonder how adding sand into the design would contribute to the efficiency of this heater? A sand battery/heater.
Another dose of common sense ……. So DESPERATELY needed in these times! THANK YOU SIR👍👍👍👍!
Excellent candle radiator instructions.
I hid out in snow caves many winters. Heated them with candles. Comfy and drove my parents to distraction trying to find me 😁
Looks like it should be a nice little room heater for a winter emergency or power outage.
I wonder what if you have a giant plat pot but inside of it are sheets of tin or steel circles around a steel bolt going up through the center with each sheet of tin being separated by a washer and it is layered to make a huge thermal mass radiant heater. So the center bolt is the center thermal mass that radiates out to all the steel sheets that makes a thermal radiator that uses the plant pot to be wiped with some water with a sponge so the humidity in air helps absorb radiant heat. But that becomes a convection heater if you put holes in the right spots in the pot as it heats and circulates air.
I'm seventy now, when I was young more people kept birds in sheds as pets and they used plant pots with a light bulb in a holder inside to keep the chill off the air so it is an old idea, but I really like the new methods and materials, thanks
Great idea , you make the science easy to understand
I'm glad your out there, so fun.
I love this channel so much! Great channel for all of us inventors. Much love everyone.
and thanks for all your brilliant work. Mr. Murray-smith you are the best.
Put your metal toilet brush holder above a standerd oil lamp and enjoy the heat in the light.
From a sunny warm South Africa 😊
I have a dutch stove. Have to say it's a good versatile life-time investment. Will not crack 😊. Can be used to cook too 😊
If you put a reflector behind the candle it it will also provide decent lighting.. I have an almost identical mop I bought just for wicks, I showed it in my recent mini alcohol stove vid
You could increase the heat in the chamber by drilling a few holes around the bottom of the chimney and lowering it on the candle. Thank you for the cool (pun intended) videos.
Hi Robert, I’m new to your channel and particularly took inspiration from this video as I’ve often thought about making my own plant pot heater.
My design consists of an 8” diameter Panettone tin which is 7 1/4” tall. It is inverted so that the tea light candles can sit within the lid and act as a tray.
I initially punched 4 small holes around the side, just above the lid’s lip but I noticed there wasn’t enough airflow. So I increased the quantity of holes to 15 which are just under 2” apart. This still wasn’t enough so I got my step drill out and cut 7 1”holes whose centres are 2” from the bottom. This seems to be working well now. I’m currently running 3 tea lights inside and it is giving a surface temperature in the middle of the upper surface at 114 degsC. The sides are warm to touch but not hot enough to burn me.
I’m going to add a 4th candle to see if it improves the output and see how it fairs.
Does anyone have any further suggestions for improvements please?
Update:
Adding the 4th candle takes the upper surface temp to 130degsC.
I must have gotten lucky👍🏼i used my double plant pot heater for 5 years at least for a foot warmer under the computer desk. 3 small tealight worked fine. But!! This version will heat faster and longer. 👍🏼🍺
Funny enough, I just picked up a toilet paper roll holder that would make a great cage to hold that toilet brush holder and potentially keep that burner in place! I had other plans for it, but now I'm positive I will try this.
Please say you'll use toilet paper as the wick just for completeness. Please. 🤣
@@paulrattray8121 Now that you mentioned it, I believe I have no other choice!
There are several things to consider, when building these things.
First, make sure no toxic substances are released from the coating/metal surface while heating. You can use a gas cooker outdoors and burn everything off the surface that could release harmful vapors when used indoors. The result wouldn't look as appealing, but it's worth it. Better use old metal baking tins (the "bread formfactor" can be used horizontally), which were designed for high temperatures anyway. Make sure no wooden/flameable furniture is close during operation.
Second, when the metal reaches 57°C within a few second, it's likely to max out at 170-250°C until the balance of energy input/output is reached (depending on heat source). This creates a serious burning hazard, as everything above 70-80°C is too hot to handle. This is why the original plant pot designs are multilayered with at least one inner and one outer Pot, which doesn't exceed 70°C, when fueled correctly. For more output build a bigger one, which can handle more separated candles. Each candle has to be separated from its neighbour to prevent gas ignition. Always have a bowl filled with sand as a fire extinguisher at hand.
Third, a good design would combine fast heat distribution through a metal structure inside to a much larger outer object such as a pot with a large surface area, which provides heat radiation in the most possible even and consistent way - without a large heat gradient from top to bottom. The inner metal objekt works as a diffusor and the outer body is the actual radiator.
Fourth, every diy heating system has its limits in terms of physical characteristics and safety. So don't overpower it, better build another one or two (or more) and place them around the heatet area. Weaker/less candles are safer to use. With a bit of experience/trial & error you can build a kind of heat curtain around your place in a 180° angle, which can be a desk or a sofa etc. Remember to adapt your security arrangements, when small kids or animals are in the house.
Hope this helps, cheers.
So this is why I keep candles in my glove box. Winter storms in Western New York often catch people unprepared. When your car runs out of fuel, people freeze. The blizzard that started on the 24th of December saw more than 27 freeze to death. A candle in a tin could have stopped this. I also carry an emergency blanket.
Dankeschön für dein Video! Es ist wirklich sehr gut gemacht und super erklärt! Ich hoffe du machst noch viele weitere. Thank you mate for sharing your experience and wisdom!
This is fantastic.I will try this with my simple glass,table top oil lamp. Maybe put a metal plate at the top on an angle,to force the heat coming out the top,to the front and sides. Can't wait to make it.I will gift it to my old mother to put in her bathroom that's always freezing.
Confining warm air has been a "fun" challenge for me this winter, since the heat and air unit died. The small space heater works well, but it needs help. I obtained the lid of a disposable roasting pan (aluminum). I bent it over the arm of the couch to form an arched "duct". In front of the heater the flow of air can be aimed better. Sitting at the table I am quite cozy, with the heat aimed underneath and captured by some makeshift "skirting" around the table.
I've subscribed and have been binge watching. Very clear instructions from a very informative guy.
As always excellent ideas, Your both an inspiration.
Clever design. Thinking about household trash common in the US: aluminum pie plate, peanut butter jar, coffee can. I hadn't thought of a mop head for wick, nice improvisation! If we're parking it in an existing fireplace, we could hang the radiant can from the existing damper with a bit of chain or wire; can't knock over something that's hanging, right?
You are so fun! LOVE your videos...so informative and entertaining! Making my 'candle' now...thank you.
This is best channel on this subject ive seen.
You could also add some insulation on the back side to make it a directional radiator(heat the person not the space and all)
Robert must be an absolute nightmare for his other half to go shopping with.
"Oh, look. This stainless bowl would make a great heater....... And this cutlery stand could make a great heater....... Ooh, and these blocks of beef dripping just needs some wicks and an enclosure to become a really great heater..... And..... And...... And...... TOILET BOWL ROCKET STOVE !!!"
"But look, there's REAL pre built heaters for sale, right over there."
"Nah, it's alright, I don't need one......... But if we pass an exhaust place on the way home, can we pop in?......... I need some stainless pipe, because I've got an idea for a really great heater".
🤣🤣🤣
Maybe I need more experimenting but heating plant pots didn't quite have the effects I was looking for. Atm I put a 50x50 sidewalk tile on an upside down 30liter soup pot.
With 5 tea lights I have a great foot warmer for about 30 cents (6 hour tealights)
I have found that too. They are great as hand warmers but for heating a room.....
Well done good amount of humor along with the knowledge
Happy new haircut Robert.
You noticed that too. 😆
One of the best videos ive seen on this subject- again well done !
Really appreciate the data for calculations. Top job. Ta.
Seen a lot of videos about "1,000 hour" candles. Where you put a candle in the middle of a mason jar. Then pour molten vegetable lard around it. So the burning candle flame also melts and burns the lard as well. Wondered if there was simple way to solidify vegetable oil?
mix veg oil with a bit of melted lard? Trouble with candles in mason jars is they don't get enough oxygen as they burn down and they get sooty.
Wow, you're smart, entertaining, and very educational!! Thanks for sharing.....
We built snow caves in our yard every year put a candle in there's a few times nice and warm
Hair cut looks good lol. Great job once again. 👍👍
The only thing this is missing is a Stirling engine fan put on top to help direct the air. Or maybe one of those peltiers with a motor and a fan blade
Super Smart Simple Solution. I'll be building one of these very soon. Thanks for brilliant idea.
If you drilled little holes around the top of the copper pipe would that increase liquid flow & air to fuel ratio balance?
Thank you for the excellent demonstration.
Cool. It would be interesting to know how the heat would flow if you put a cap on the toilet brush tube and added an inner tube to facilitate the circulation.
the pot heater reminds me of the 12volt diesel parking heaters that have been the new crave.. the plant pot with a intake and output.. and a fan going over the container blowing it out..
terrific illustration thank you so much. what about putting some directed holes in the upper sides to create a chimney effect and direct some air flow outwards instead of upwards. as you left it most of the heat is still going straight up.
Nice one Robert, l may look for an old storage heater as their bricks are a decent size for this
Try painting the inside of the not flowerpot with mushu black paint to absorb the candle light and see what a difference it makes.
I tried doing the same for a metal tray and just put it in the winter sun inside and was surprised how warm it got.
This looks like a great topping for a Bright Betty lamp!
Progably worth mentioning to avoid chromed containers - very dangerous when heated.
Can you explain why?
Chrome doesn't vaporise under normal heating use.
Most cheap toilet brush holders aren't chromed anyway. They're just stainless steel. Chroming adds extra cost to the manufacturing process. Also, chrome has a nice silver mirrored finish, whereas polished stainless steel has a grayer mirrored finish, sometimes not highly polished if you're talking about the really cheap ones.
So it's easy to tell.
Thank you so much. An excellent little heater.
Brilliant 🤩 what an awesome job 👍👍👍👍👍🕯🪔🕯🪔✅❤️🙏🏻
Fiberglass strands from the woven cloth would make good low maintenance wicks well.
You could do the same process with a glass jar candle, render down 2 blocks of lard with 1 fifth beeswax until melted, for your wick use some 4mm natural jute rope soaked in the fuel, attach it to a ring pull from a drink can and secure it to the bottom of the jar, pour fuel when cool, when cured trim wick to about 1/4 inch. Works really well but you will have to trim wick every 3 hrs or so , lard only costs 40p a block, much cheaper than anything, adding beeswax roughly doubles cost but all in all still cheaper than buying paraffin candle. Lasts longer too.
AND you get the smell of bacon!
@@kke you don't tbh. Only when rendering it, when you burn it its no different to any other oil.
If you can get something called a Sterno burner you probably need a bigger chamber above to catch the Heat because I think that would be more heat than that can radiate out giving the temperature the Sterno can
Made a mini one with a shallow tin, some tea candles, and tea infuser (LJUDLÖS) from IKEA. Brilliant idea
Great idea in this bitter cold thank you
Great video. Imagine this with a sand battery above. Supplying and storing captured heat for immediate and a longer term delivery of that heat.
Some people have made "72 day candles" from tins of shortening, (or "Crisco" ) by pressing a wax candle into the middle for a wick. It will burn up to 72 days for 8 hours per day.
I would never trust burning crisco in the cardboard boxes they come in these days. it's just paper with thin foil inside.
I remember in the old days,crisco came in actual metal cans.
To be safe, melt the crisco,pour into heavy jars,or metal cups,let cool and then put the candle inside.
much safer. If you use the crisco container and the candle gets warm and topples to the side, that entire paper container will catch on fire.
Kingsford Michigan , Home of the Flivver , and Henry Ford , and the largest Cornish Pump in America , plus Giant Pine Mountain , 90 meter slide , International Ski jumping in February , and the land of Trail Missles , snowmobiles !
I may be repeating what others have said- but if a contained wax or oil burner raises the temperature of the wax to flash point then whoosh!
Another factor is if bits of match or any other matters such as crane flies & moths serve as extra wick the temperature can rapidly rise faster than can escape by convecting and radiating away. If the candle is near anything flammable it can rapidly spread. It can also spit globs of fire if encountering drops of water (moth juice).
This is the similar principle as a chip pan fire except a naked flame is already present.
You could deliberately explore this in a safe place in the garden - but either let it burn out or lid/smother it, Dont use water or try to carry extremely hot wax.
Awareness of danger is consciously responsible safety.
But we are not all educated to any practical degree of responsibility - but towards a sealed unit with no user access.
6 inches of fresh wet and heavy snow since last night , in south central Upper Michigan
From Canada here. Cold as it gets frankly. This idea, although useable to heat a confined space can result in suffocation and or carbon monoxide poisoning. Homeless people die every year as a result of using candles in their tents without proper ventilation. So, I think it’s important to mention the safety issues that could arise as a result of using this to heat a confined space. Please ensure you have fresh air coming in and a place for harmful gasses to escape.
If you open a window to vent doesn't it get cold again? Just attach a chimney and run that outside, use a flexible dryer vent pipe.
Bit of curio, those types of candles are actually called "värmeljus" in Swedish, meaning "Heat candle"
could you use a stainless steel waste basket, or would the larger diameter defeat the purpose. I was thinking it would provide a larger surface area.
thank you for sharing this wonderful idea!
I may have missed the necessary lesson at school, but, would seating the candle on a base of sand be a good safety precaution to contain any accidental spillage?
Regarding clay pots shattering - Not sure if this is correct but I believe stoneware pots, like you find in garden centres, could withstand thermal shock; they're used for outdoors so should withstand freezing and thawing at the other end of the scale, but a tin seems better anyway.
Oh - what about an inverted steel bucket with holes round the rim? (normal truncated cone shape)
I need to say the only reason terocota cracks is because they are damp. I would suggest putting a terracotta pot in an airing cupboard for a few weeks to make sure it is really dry before exposing it to a heat source.
If you can't find te steel brush holder, you might use some metal flue pipe, a paint tine, a cooking pot, etc.
Beware of the galvanized pipe, because te galvanized stuff gives off fumes when it gets HOT.
Treuy a lard candle/burner!