This is the second DIY space heater I am going to try. It is something I saw on Youtube a while back. The claim is that you can heat a small room in your home with this little homemade device. You put a clay pot inside of a slightly larger clay pot and raise them up over a candle, thus magnifying the candle's heat. Okay. Low expense and worth a shot. Here is how I did it.
I performed my experiment on ceramic tile in my bathroom to reduce risk of an uncontrolled, accidental fire.
First, I brought 3 bricks in from my back yard and set them up in a U-shape around a tea light.
I plugged up the hole in the bottom of the small pot and placed it over the tea light, being sure to leave space around the front and back of the pot for heat to escape upwards into the larger pot.
Then I placed the larger pot, with hole not plugged, over the small pot. I made sure all sides but one were covered to restrict air flow.
I lit the candle and waited. It took a little bit for the pots to warm up and I was not happy with the airflow of the heat being generated by the pot. But I could tell there was heat, which was good.
So I covered the top of the exposed bricks with aluminum foil. This restricted the amount of air available to the candle, forcing the candle to create a draw of air. In other words, the pot started to blow air harder out of its hole. This pleased me but there was not much heat being generated, certainly not enough to heat a small room (or bathroom).
I removed the small pot and replaced it with a can, both ends cut off. This also produced heat because of the reflective heat of the inside of the can. But it did not produce more heat that with the little pot.
So I replaced the both-ends-off can with a one-end-on can. The result was LESS hot air being blown out the top of the larger clay pot. (Interesting.) However, when I went to replace that inside can with my original small clay pot, I nearly burned my fingers. It was VERY hot!
I thought about this and decided that the reason the heat produced by my last modification was so little is because of the shape of the can. If the sides were sloped like with the small pot, the hot air could get out of the can. But can sides are straight up and down.
So I went into my kitchen and pulled out the marvelous device that allows me to punch holes into cans of condensed milk. (It is part of my can opener.) I punched a hole into the side of the 1-end-on can, then put the contraption back together.
The result was a marginal increase in air flow of the hotter air. Would it be enough to heat my bathroom if my central heat was not working? No. Enough to warm up my bathroom before a shower? No. Enough to warm the insides of a small igloo? That has yet to be tested. But I hear we are supposed to get quite a bit of snow by me this winter, so maybe I will test it out later on... Or maybe I will just stay in my nice, warm house with the now-working furnace and skip the igloo test.
First, I brought 3 bricks in from my back yard and set them up in a U-shape around a tea light.
I plugged up the hole in the bottom of the small pot and placed it over the tea light, being sure to leave space around the front and back of the pot for heat to escape upwards into the larger pot.
I lit the candle and waited. It took a little bit for the pots to warm up and I was not happy with the airflow of the heat being generated by the pot. But I could tell there was heat, which was good.
I removed the small pot and replaced it with a can, both ends cut off. This also produced heat because of the reflective heat of the inside of the can. But it did not produce more heat that with the little pot.
So I replaced the both-ends-off can with a one-end-on can. The result was LESS hot air being blown out the top of the larger clay pot. (Interesting.) However, when I went to replace that inside can with my original small clay pot, I nearly burned my fingers. It was VERY hot!
I thought about this and decided that the reason the heat produced by my last modification was so little is because of the shape of the can. If the sides were sloped like with the small pot, the hot air could get out of the can. But can sides are straight up and down.
The result was a marginal increase in air flow of the hotter air. Would it be enough to heat my bathroom if my central heat was not working? No. Enough to warm up my bathroom before a shower? No. Enough to warm the insides of a small igloo? That has yet to be tested. But I hear we are supposed to get quite a bit of snow by me this winter, so maybe I will test it out later on... Or maybe I will just stay in my nice, warm house with the now-working furnace and skip the igloo test.
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