Friend sent me the link. Who buys this?
http://i81597.wix.com/sprucestove#
I wanted to do something like that, only vertical. You would lower 20' logs down the chimney and just let them burn their way down to the firebox. :D
I saw an article in an old Mother Earth News that profiled a furnace that was quite large and used a geared down winch to slowly pull a whole trunk into the firebox. It was a one off and looked safe enough but not very efficient. There was also an article on a vertically fed furnace. Long pieces were put in an almost vertical tube with a burn chamber at the bottom.
Someone would buy who has lots of time to be standing there feeding that log further into the stove, and adjusting the lever to open/close the draft curtain. Clever idea, but a hands-on full time stove as I see it.
Vertical, have seen a trial run that made for an interesting torch in the chimney. Adjusting the draft was really tough to do and keep the fire going just at the bottom of the standing log.
I spoke to an old fellow who's plan was to take the door off the stove he had in his basement, face it towards a window and feed the wood in from outside. He figured that the angle from the window to the stove was steep enough to have the wood slide in with gravity pulling it down. I don't think (I hope) he wasn't serious.
Mother earth news had some interesting ideas when they first started out .As things progressed it became nothing but advertising .
If they did have an interesting project they only told you enough to whet your appetite and for a fee would send the plans .I dropped them like a bad habit .
I used to have access to veneer cores, basically huge hardwood dowels. That would have been my choice for a vertical feeding woodstove fuel. Smooth to the point of slippery, cores would slide off trucks in front of my house more than once in any given year. I knew an older fellow who drove about 50 miles to haul them home in a half ton truck. He was a retired trucker who liked the drive and could process the cores easier than regular wood.
Is hauling 16 ft trees into your house and babysitting that really easier than a conventional woodstove?
My skidder would look good on that white rug and I could be nice and warm while fixing the beast. Nice concept, but not for me.
David l
I like the "log rack" in one of the photos. Forget having to stay close to feed it, I'd hate to try and find enough "right size" logs for it. lol
And the cost is??