Is it possible to build a small scale electric plant?

Filed Under Engineering | 5 Comments

Heating for next winter-advice needed?

ed asked:

I just got a $724 bill for oil. The way the prices are going, a change needs to be made. My oil furnace is 20 years old, so it needs to go. My current options are:
1)Replace the oil furnace with a new more efficient one.
2)Convert to Natural Gas. The gas company is willing to install service up to the house for free. It would be my responsibility to have a contractor run a line from the house to the furnace and buy a new furnace.
3)Purchase and install a coal stove: I live in Central PA (coal region). 1 ton of coal is about $200. My buddy burned 3 tons this winter in his larger house.
4)Purchase and install a corn/wood pellet stove. Also, cheap in the area.
I would appreciate anyone with experience in this field’s opinion. No way I can afford to heat the house next winter if oil prices continue to rise. Thanks.
webs

Filed Under Maintenance & Repairs | 7 Comments

Should I insulate or buy a outdoor wood stove?

Amsiar asked:

(Eventually I will do both but which should I do first?) I am going to do something about our outrageous heating bills. I just paid $475 for enough fuel to last 3 weeks and it’s still chilly in our house. I live in the country and wood/coal is very cheap (or free sometimes) and I considered getting one of those big outdoor wood/coal furnaces that you only load 2X per day. Our house is also pretty drafty and our only insulation is in the ceilings, some windows need replaced and probably some weather stripping is needed. So, will I be better off to insulate & replace windows or to get the furnace? I also like the idea of being independent from oil! How much will I save by properly insulating?
I don’t have neighbors to be bothered by the smoke and I know for a fact they will not be banned because one of our township supervisors heats his home with one.
Does pharmacy tech needs a formal degree

Filed Under Maintenance & Repairs | 5 Comments

how to you light natural coals?

andrew b asked:


on the box it says no gas fire
and if you dont have a coil stove wat is another way of lighting them??

Filed Under Cooking & Recipes | 2 Comments

should i use this stove or keep it?

ROB F asked:


recently i purchased a coal/wood burning cast iron stove at a garage sale for $14. the elderly gentleman that sold it to me, said he had it in his basement and it had been there when he bought the home in the 1930s. he said he thought he had used it one time, and he burnt charcoal in it. as far as he knew that was the only time it had been used. i cant hardly believe he used it that time, its as clean and in as good shape as if it would have been brand new. all the parts are there down to the tool kit that comes with it. it has “1889 conestoga”, printed on the back of it. on the front it reads “ATLANTA STOVE WORKS NO. 40″. it has a removable cooking plate on its top, a small door on the front, with a damper right above the door. there is a lower trap and door for ash removal. the stove is barely 3 feet tall. i can hardly find any info about it, and am looking for anything. should i keep it or use it? also what i have been able to find about it is that it may have been a covered wagon cook/heat stove, but who knows. thank you.

Filed Under History | 1 Comment

A poem about a place, just a house,but more, Comments?

Fr. Al asked:


DOWN HOME

A simple house of three rooms,
A pantry and enclosed back porch.
Beside the front door Pampas grass
Spider ladies, red salvia,
Black eyed Susans and nasturtiums
Bank the front, on the side
Castor bean and flowering quince.
Behind there is a garden
With sweet corn, tomatoes and kale,
Mustard greens, beets, and turnips
Poke weed that yields both ink
And poke salat in the spring
There is also a place where
The razor back hogs are slopped
That are also allowed to roam
The hickory woods beyond.

A brick lined well was
Twenty feet below the house
With a bucket on a rope
Sitting on the cover of the well.
Fresh water, the sweetest
Ever I drank was in a stainless
Steel bucket on the porch
With a ladle for drinking,
Cooking and washing,
A porcelained basin sat
On a bench with towel
And brown home-made soap
For washing both hands and dishes.
The water with food from plates
And leftovers was thrown
To slop the hogs, from which
We got home cured bacon
And country ham
A sixteen pound slab
Was in the ice box,
Black rind still attached
Next to a glass quart of milk
With standing cream
Bought daily along with
Dozen eggs and Mellow Creme
Donuts and fluffy white bread.

A kerosene three burnered stove
That lit with explosive force
Served to cook, though no meals
Were served, it was simply set out
For any who were hungry
Along with a gallon of iced tea
In the middle of the kitchen table
Sweetened and with lemon slices
For guests who came and went.

In the kitchen clutter there were
Glasses of jams, jellies, and preserves,
A gallon jar of pickles, spiced apples
Pickled pigs’ feet, hard summer sausage
Head cheese and a crock of kraut.
Apple slices and stringed beans
Hung to dry alongside herbs,
Dishes were few and washed frequently
As were pots and pans.
A large coffee pot on the stove
Boiled coffee. grounds settled with
A whole raw egg, shell and all.
It also heated water for washing.

The pantry also served
As a place to shave with basin
And mirror no bigger than a face,
It too held the ten gallon
Galvanized square tub
For Saturday baths in the back yard,
Towels and clothes spread out
On the poke and sassafras.
Pot-bellied coal stove
With isinglass windows
Heated the house, kindled by
Newspaper from the stacks
On the back porch next to
The cases of beer in bottles.

The bedroom held a double bed
And dresser, as well as a walk in closet,
Other sleepers were accommodated on
A couch in the front room, or pallets
Of quilts on the floor, there were
Two overstuffed chairs to sit and chat
A cherry drop leaf table and end table
Both held kerosene lamps for reading

© ALBERT K. JUNGERS FEBRUARY 2, 2008, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

This was my grandmother’s house, one of the places I grew up. Today it is under the Interstate cloverleaf, where I-64 crosses I-57 in the middle of our country.

Filed Under Poetry | 4 Comments

All Electric Home?

asked:


If a certain amount of fuel (oil, gas or coal) is burned in your house stove it would produce X amount of heat. Now, if that same amount of fuel is burned in an electric generating plant, and all the electricity so generated is used to heat your house by means of an electric stove, the electric stove would:

a) produce more than X amount of heat, because electricity is more efficient than gas.

b) produce exactly X amount of heat, because of conservation of energy.

c) produce much less than X amount of heat, because heat can never be completely converted to electricity.
The answer is: c. Near most elecric power generating plants you see coolng towers or warm water being discharged into a river, lake or bay. The reason for this is that heat energy cannot be competely converted to electric energy. Some of the heat energy must go to waste. (At hydroelectric power generating plants, however, there is negligible waste because except for small friction losses the mechanical energy of falling water is completely converted into electric energy.) Why cannot the heat that is discharged in the towers or rivers by recycled and put back into the power plant’s boiler? Because heat, by itself, will not flow from a cool place to a hot place — and the boiler is always much hotter than the waste heat. Well, why not use a heat pump to force the wase heat back into theboiler? Because the pump requires energy to operate. How much energy? At least as much energy as the power generatng plant produced while making the waste heat!
So, there would be absolutely no electric power left to sell.

Well, why does there have to be waste heat in the first place? Because in a steam engine or turbine the gas must expand as it pushes on the engine’s piston or turbine’s blades. As it expands it cools. If it could be expanded until its temperature dropped to absolute zero all the heat energy could be converted to work. But in reality, it can get no cooler than the rest of the outside world, which is about 300 degrees above absolute zero. So, you cannot get all of the energy out of the heat.

Well, how about this idea? You can expand the steam until it turns to water and then just put the hot water back into the boiler. How can there be any waste doing that? You may think there is no waste because you think you have a closed cycle, but you don’t. First, some energy comes out as the steam does work pushing on the piston as it expands, but that is just what you want, so that is okay. Now comes the waste.
The steam expands until its temperature drps to 100 degrees C — then the pressure inside the engine is the same as the external atmospheric pressure. It can expand no more, but it is not water yet. It is still 100 degrees C steam and you cannot simply put a large volume of low pressure steam back into a high pressure boiler. You must first reduce te volme of the steam by turning it into water. But to condense the 100 degree C steam into 100 degree C water you must remove its latent heat of condensation. As steam turns into water its temperature does not change, but heat — a lot of heat — must come out of it. That heat cannot be returned to the boiler because the temperature of that heat is only 100 degrees C and the temperature of the boiler is much higher. The latent heat of condensation becomes waste heat. Too bad.
Why must the temperature of the boiler be above 100 degrees C? Because the pressure of 100 degree C steam does not exceed atmospheric pressure.

When you pay for all electric heating you pay both to heat your house and the rivers, sea and sky.

Filed Under Physics | 1 Comment

HELP ENGLISH HOMEWORK -Word Associations?

bluffdad11 asked:


-fill in words that are associated with the word aboveand that begin with the letter listed. Make an unbroken chain of word associations.

1. Hammer
N-
F-
H-
B-
Basket

2. Bird
N-
E-
B-
K-
Stove

3.Summer
W-
S-
W-
B-
Coal

4.Tooth
D-
D
M-
G-
Ring

5.S-
T-
B-
S-
Bubbles

APPRECIATE HELP AND GE LOTTS OF POINTS THANKS YOUS!

Filed Under Words & Wordplay | 1 Comment

Best place to get the most information on wood stoves?

dude0116 asked:


I am planning on installing a wood or wood pellet stove in the spring of 2009. I want to research as much as passable before I go shopping for my stove. My house is not to to big but I want the stove to heat the downstairs and as much as the up stairs as passable. What is better a wood stove or pellet stove I really don’t want to use coal but is that more cost efficient than wood or wood pellets? How much of a factor does the location of the stove play a role in proper distribution of heat How can I make the are “kid friendly” so my children do not get hurt. Any advice website personal stories would be helpful. Thank you

Filed Under Decorating & Remodeling | 4 Comments

Hookah coals burn too hot. What to do?

Yeaux asked:


Everytime i use my hookah ( 14in Mya brand )
the coals seem to be burning a little too hot.

Ive tried Golden Coals (natural quick light),
SIlver Coals (quick light)
King Coal (Large quick lights)
and 3 Kings (quick light)

and they all burn too hot, and end up burning the tobacco within 5 minutes of the bowl starting.
i dont overfill and i make around 15-25 holes in the foil.

what else can i do to keep the tobacco from burning?
and i dont have a gas stove, its electric so non-quick lights probably wont work for me

knowledgeful hookah smokers please answer.

and fuck you if youre going to rant about smoking.
youre ignorant and the type of person that drives this country to hell.

Filed Under Beer, Wine & Spirits | 2 Comments

sizing flue pipe?

michaelkelly12132003 asked:


prizere coal kitchen cook stove

Filed Under Do It Yourself (DIY) | 2 Comments

how do u light natural coals (hookah)?

andrew b asked:


on the box it says no gas fire
and if you dont have a coil stove wat is another way of lighting them??

sorry i mean hookah coals

Filed Under Beer, Wine & Spirits | 6 Comments

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