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Waste Oil Stove Heats Oil, Then Burns Vapors
"I recently sold one to a guy who said he would have had to spend $4,000 for a factory unit. He saw mine and he bought it on the spot," says Kirk Deardorff, Hale, Mo., about his waste oil stove that uses an innovative burner design that burns oil vapors rather than the oil itself. In addition to dirty waste oil, the stove also bums hydraulic oil, fuel oil, cutting oil, and diesel fuel.
Deardorff got the idea by accident several years ago when a bucket with a little bit of oil in it got too close to a trash fire. When flames "whooshed up out of the bucket", he realized the bucket had heated up and turned the oil to vapor. He spent the next several years experimenting until he came up with a design that allows the oil to vaporize before it's ignited.
The vapor burner is mounted inside a 55 gal. drum. The oil supply tank is mounted separately outside the stove but close enough so the stove keeps the sup-ply of oil warm. The oil feed line that runs from the supply tank to the burner runs through the flames to preheat the oil be-fore it's fed to the burner. Because the feed line is always full of oil, the pipe doesn't get red hot even though it's in the middle of the fire.
The burner looks like the drum inside a washing machine. Oil drips onto the bottom of the burner and flames come up out of the center of it. Both the burner and the feed pipe can be easily removed for cleaning. All waste oil gets filtered through a window screen as it's poured it into the supply tank.
Deardorff has sold a number of stoves to neighbors and also sells plans. Be-cause the stove is not UL-approved, he says it may not be compatible with insurance policies in an insured shop.
"Everyone's amazed at the heat it produces. Fuel consumption is about 1/2 to 1 gal. per hour. It bums so clean almost no smoke comes out of the chimney," says Deardorff, who sells the stove for $100 with a 10-in. burner. Do-it-yourself plans sell for $5 ($6 Canadian).
For more information, self-addressed stamped envelope to: FARM SHOW Followup, Kirk Deardorff, Box 164, Hale, Mo. 64643 (ph 816 565-2924).


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1990 - Volume #14, Issue #1