Now that might be a possibility too..the raku kiln idea with a gas burner. The stove is insulated with fire brick on the bottom and sides, but the top just has a heavier chunk of steel -- as is typical with most downdraft woodstoves. The door is cast iron with a chunk of insulating cord around it. I was thinking that it might be possible to have a second chamber made up by a friend who has a welding shop..and have it made so that it sits on top of the stove top..which, if you have one of these stoves, you know it can get damned hot when you switch the draft forward into the downdraft position.. but have the vent hole go right into the 2nd chamber and then have the heat exit through an insulated pipe. I could easily set this whole thing up out in the yard where I wouldn't have to be concerned about burning anything up if something went wrong. The only things I can see being a problem are that I think the second chamber would need to be made with a baffle to force the heated air across the chamber before allowing them to exit up the chimney. All would have to be insulated with something...firebrick or the fibre insulation I would think..or as you say, there could be damage to the metal parts. I'm going to take a look at another stove that I have out in the studio..not today, but soon. It's a wood cookstove.. not a super valuable kind though. Some of the metal on it is shot to hell, so I don't know if it can be repaired in a normal way... It's full of piles of firebrick that could be salvaged for other purposes.. I just don't know what kinds of temperatures they could withstand. Uh...and yeah... what am I doing with all of these stoves, eh?? Welllll.. it's a bit of a long story, but we ended up with the big cookstove for 5 bucks when some friends had an auction at their farm before moving out west. Mr. Croc went over to help out with things and put in the odd bid to get things rolling when nobody else was bidding... Ended up coming home with a lawn tractor, the wood cookstove, a rather ratty-looking old propane barbecue, and 2 HUGE wicker chairs...those big fancy things... one of which blew off the truck and smashed all to pieces on the highway on the way home. When he pulled in the yard that evening with all of this "STUFF" heaped up in the back of the pick-up, I thought maybe nobody showed up at the auction and he had bought everything our friends owned!! <gg>
Anyhow, yep..so I have these stoves sitting around here doing nothing.. and I'm looking at them and thinking... "I wonder..."
And yeah..isn't that Bridge of Glass going to be something else. I have seen the other installations by Chihuly that are in the court building that is in the background and they are really neat. That "ceiling" looks like it is going to be cool. Gotta go see that once it's all together!! |
