[permaculture] eco-kalan is a rocket stove

Rain Tenaqiya raincascadia at yahoo.com
Thu Oct 11 14:17:54 EDT 2007


It looks like the eco-kalan was based on Aprovecho Research Center's rocket stove (hence the "rocket elbow").  According to my understanding, the eco-kalan would be less efficient than a similar stove made totally from metal, as the thermal mass, though minimal, absorbs heat that could otherwise be used for cooking, at least in the beginning.  Of course, they took into consideration local cultural factors, which would probably favor local materials and a similar appearance to previous stoves.
   
  I plan on building a Dona Justa Stove (another Aprovecho invention) for my kitchen, which is a rocket stove with two or three cooking openings in a row.  For my situation, a stove with a lot of thermal mass doesn't really make sense.  We have mild Winters and a lot of thermal mass in the house.  We want heat fast and don't want to wait for a bunch of mass in the stove to heat up before we feel it.  We need a low mass stove that can deliver heat to the room and that can heat our water.  So far, the only appropriate stove I've seen is a very expensive one from Europe.
   
  Just for your information, Aprovecho says that an open fire, protected from wind, is about 11% efficient.  The rocket stove is only 12% efficient, but it eliminates smoke.  However, when a metal skirt is added to the cooking pot to direct heat up the sides (as some camping stoves have, to deflect wind), efficiency goes up to 24%!  The version of the Dona Justa I plan on building should be around 36% efficient.  If I were to sink the pots into the fire flow path (making the holes fit to specific pots, the stove would be 40% efficient.  This is all laid out in Capturing Heat Two, available from Aprovecho Research Center.
   
  Rain

       
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