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What is a rocket mass heater?

paul wheaton · 508.7K views · 2017-08-13 · 2:27

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Overview

A two-minute explanation of what a rocket mass heater is, starting from how a conventional wood stove works and why creosote and chimney fires occur. It shows how burning hot and storing the heat in thermal mass makes for an efficient heater.

On Hacker News

Linked as the quickest way to grasp the rocket mass heater concept in threads on heating and thermal storage.

Recommended by 2 HN people across 2 months · HN mentions 2018–2022

Topics

Power grid, heating & buildingsHome, DIY & practical skills
Search by tags
rocket mass heaterwood stovethermal masshome heatingpermaculture

What people said

mikeytown2 · 2021-02 · Recommendation

Best fireplace in terms of efficiency is a rocket mass heater. It burns the wood gas in a secondary burn chamber and then routes the exhaust through a lot of thermal mass. One 2 hour fire a day will usually heat 2000 sq feet of house. 3m video explains the concept; longer videos will better explain it [VIDEO]

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mikeytown2 · 2021-02 · Recommendation

You can do a hybrid approach with the hot metal burn chamber for wood gas and earthen materials to slowly radiate the heat. This is called a rocket mass heater. The exhaust temperature is usually below 100C and often smokeless (a complete burn). Using a fan to extract heat from the final vertical stack (pipe around the exhaust with air running by) can give you an exhaust temperature of around 40C. Here's a quick 3 minute video that explains the concept; there's other YouTube videos that go into greater details if you wish to research this topic more. [VIDEO]

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michaelbuckbee · 2018-10 · Recommendation

I wonder what the efficiency is compared to a modern "rocket stove" build [1] Mass rocket stoves are _incredibly_ efficient. So much so that I've always wondered why more similar designs weren't used in times when the primary heat sources were wood, etc. 1 - [VIDEO] (skip to 1:50 if you want to see a full one and not the ms paint diagrams)

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Sources

Video by paul wheaton, played through YouTube.

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