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T Burner Illustrated Directions


Frosty

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Yes sir, I think what you are describing is correct.  The further back away from the mix tube, the more air is induced.  I see shades of green in your flame photo, definitely need more air.  How does it run with the jet threaded as far back as it can be?

I measured my burner mix tube and it is 4 1/2" as well.  I use the .023 mig tip and it will stay lit through a good range of pressure, outside of a forge, with a very crudely rolled tapered nozzle.  They do work.  Though I seem to recall that these burners don't do particularly well without the back pressure created by the forge.

I don't have my burner connected so I can't show any flame photos right now but here are a few of the burner if it helps any.

 

t burner 1.jpg

t burner 2.jpg

t burner 3.jpg

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Howling dog: A mig contact tip works better than a drilled jet. The length of the mig tip ID smooths the gas into a laminar stream so it forms a more uniform jet of gas in the mixing tube. Mike call a mig tip an accelerator which as another thing that happens when the gas stream smooths into a laminar flow.

Drilled orifices tend to be much shorter so there is turbulence in the stream and it doesn't induce combustion air as well.

Be aware though that drilling long holes in copper alloys is a real bugger, be ready to break bits. You'll have better luck if you blunt the cutting faces SLIGHTLY on drill bits and lathe cutters you're going to use on copper alloys. It has to do with the way copper alloys work harden and a subject for another thread. Just a touch on a fine stone is plenty, it has to do with the angle of the cutting face.

Frosty The Lucky.

 

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On 9/14/2018 at 1:59 AM, Frosty said:

Be aware though that drilling long holes in copper alloys is a real bugger, be ready to break bits. You'll have better luck if you blunt the cutting faces SLIGHTLY on drill bits and lathe cutters you're going to use on copper alloys. It has to do with the way copper alloys work harden and a subject for another thread. Just a touch on a fine stone is plenty, it has to do with the angle of the cutting face.

I have .25 " of laminar surface  By the time the mig tip is cut down for the 3/4"X1/2"  T I don't think it can be much longer but I think I could get away with  drilling as much as 3/8" without too much problem. I think the free machining brass is half hard so it had no hard spots I could feel, the greatest failure (one bit) was the start into the center drill hole, I guess it grabbed at the different angle. but after I got past that it went pretty smooth. But lets not get sidetracked by methods , The thing that I like most about this burner in that it is so easy to build with a minimum amount of tooling. That is what attracted me to this burner in the first place .

The thing will stay lit as is and when I have a box to put it in we can go full contact on tune up 

 

Another Curtis good looking work I have nothing but admiration for someone that can run a pipe tap straight in the side of a coupling, well done. I am wondering if the taper on your tip is as important as the length of the tube , as in would a 5" nipple work better than the 4 1/2"?and just use a straight coupling on the end? Have you used this one in a forge?? The tip you have does not look like it would last too long. I would like to stick with the SS coupling as it will make it much easier to cast a hole in the refractory. Here are some pictures of my burner and jet  and the only reason they do not look like yours, exactly, is that it is easier for me to do it this way .IMG_0388.JPG.d6189fdc407a3482f4eda948c930048a.JPGIMG_0390.JPG.6e5a0feb163fd5177bef965f2f3fd1d3.JPGIMG_0392.JPG.ddd8b6c339b467a355c823cab261c908.JPG

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If you can get 0.25" depth in the jet it should work fine. You might want to take gauge to 0.023" mig contact tips and see what the dia. really is. Measure different brands at different stores and average them. Not that you should switch your build, just to give you a departure point for orifice size.

The jet mount fittings won't get hot enough to matter but don't most free machining brass and bronzes contain lead? 

Frosty The Lucky.

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you are right 1.2-3% Pb, I did not know that. I am wondering what alloy is used for bullet shells as they are routinely annealed by reloaders 3 or 4 times  before being scrapped. But what the heck MIG tips are made of a beryllium alloy which is easily as toxic as lead. I would have to say that with all the other things that are actively trying to kill me these two are pretty far down the list. 

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If my foggy memory of fluids is correct,  laminar flow is roughly at about 12x the diameter of the flow passage- sometimes shorter if the lead-in geometry is meant for the task.  The bigger problem with drilled orifices is that they tend to get burrs or something other than a nice,  sharp-cornered round hole.  These irregularities can actually cause the gas jet to be pointing in a different direction than the hole was drilled,  or be distorted and turbulent,  thereby affecting the draw of combustion air. . 

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I didn't know mig tips are beryllium bronze, never thought to check. I shorten them on my belt grinder too. 

I wouldn't worry about using free machining brass/bronze for the jet mounts, that part of the burner doesn't get hot enough to be a factor. Lots of guys have rubber hoses connected directly to the burner so it can't be getting hot enough to make lead vapor.

I believe cartridge brass is extruded not machined. I'm years from reading about anything extrusion but I don't think the alloy contains much if any lead. I sure could be wrong though.

Frosty The Lucky.

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Howling dog forge: I used a lathe to drill and tap the Tee which made easy work of it.

The flare in the images was a very temporary (read impatient) nozzle to see it running.  I cast the outlet nozzle in the kastolite hot face so I don't have a metal nozzle at all. 

As to mix tube length, Mikey has information in burners 101 about that.  IIRC, longer softens but lengthens the flame, shorter gives a shorter bushier faster flame.  He recommended longer for hand torch type use and shorter if trying to prevent impingement on your work.  But for general forge use, it's sounds like a happy middle ground.  I was happy with the burner at 4 1/2 inches.

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In my case, I used an oversized piece of PVC pipe.  I went with dimensions that closely match Mikey's stepped nozzle which left a tolerance between the mix tube and the kastolite.  I varied the depth of the mix tube into the nozzle area (control over hang) but it didn't seem to make much difference, maybe because of the tolerance.   It stays lit and I have been checking the mix tube for oxidation.   So far so good but it hasn't been used much yet. 

I believe it was in Forges 101, someone talked about turning a wooden plug with a taper to ram a tapered nozzle in the kastolite.  I'm not sure if that would be a better idea. 

I am also going to play with partially blocking the area between the burner mix tube and the burner mount tube to vary the amount of secondary air that might be drawn in to see if it changes anything within the forge. 

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On 9/15/2018 at 7:57 PM, HojPoj said:

laminar flow is roughly at about 12x the diameter of the flow passage

Not sure where you are getting this, or if it is only for a specific system configuration or type of fluid.  Not to get too deep into it here, but classically the difference between laminar and turbulent flow has to do with the fluid stream's Reynolds number (Laminar flow at Re < 2,100 and turbulent flow above Re 4,000, with the Reynolds number being the proportion between inertial forces and viscous forces in the fluid stream).  Of course this is only for fully developed flow, so perhaps this is where you are getting your flow passage length info from.  Initially for even very rough pipe fluid flow will start out laminar until it reaches a critical distance.  I'm not 100% certain why this is important in a gas orifice, as the friction coefficient is often lower for turbulent flow for a given average fluid velocity, and the entry and exit conditions probably impose more significant losses then the relatively short orifice barrel.

I'm sure the free air jet dynamics and the induction process for the high velocity gas pulling in the combustion air differ depending on whether the gas jet flow is laminar or turbulent.  However, I will bet anything that once the gas exits the orifice into the induction section it goes turbulent in any case, and the average velocity of the gas jet, relative geometry of that jet and the mixing tube and air inlets has a lot more to do with a burner's function then whether the jet is turbulent or laminar inside the orifice.  Still I could certainly be wrong and am happy to be better educated.

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Hello

Short time lurker , first time poster.

Just asking a question here as I live down under in Australia, finding parts online is a bit difficult. What I could find in our version of 'home depot' was all galvanised pipe.   Most shops that sell this stuff are trade only stores that don't want to bother selling 1 or 2 pieces to the public. Plus getting to the stores is impossible as they are only open Mon-Fridays and shut weekends.

I found this which looks the goods for the reducing tee.

1"x 3/4" black iron plumbing T

 https://www.blackwoods.com.au/part/03200001/tee-steel-steam-reducing-25-x-20-nb

However all I could find for ¾" x 6" black iron nipple was impossible to find online they were all too short.

Could I use a the following 316 Stainless extended barrel nipples instead of a black steel.

 https://stattinstainlessshop.com/collections/all/products/grade-316-stainless-steel-bsp-extended-barrel-nipples?variant=12867079241771

 

Kind Regards

 

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We probably need another member from the UK, Australia or other former colony (more recent than the US) to weigh in.

Other than being more money 316 SS is fine for the mixing tube. 

However, I don’t see what we call Schedule here in the USA listed, it’s the wall thickness.

Pipes generally keep outside diameters consistent and the ID varies: that changes volume, fuel to air ratios and velocities.

Lastly, that TEE is listed in metric, I don’t know if they are direct conversions or not (25 and 20 are close to 1” and 3/4” NUMERICALLY, doesn’t mean they interchange tho). Tubing, pipe, process piping use their own measurement systems that do not interchange. 

Also, that TEE has the side 20mm boss welded in place. We generally use cast and forged fittings for this, they have radiused and tapered transitions that help flow change directions, this welded fitting makes the entrained air make a full rapid 90* turn.

Frostycan best speak to whether this last design difference will be an issue : I’m just pointing out it is different and will behave different, not that it won’t work.

Best

Steve

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17 hours ago, spookendorf said:

I live down under in Australia,

Welcome to IFI... I suggest reading this to get the best out of the forum.

https://www.iforgeiron.com/topic/53873-read-this-first/

We won't remember your location after leaving this thread.  There is a thread called OZ Roll Call a lot of "Down Under smiths here.

https://www.iforgeiron.com/topic/7176-oz-roll-call/

 

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  • 1 month later...

Quick question, I made my first T burner today straight from the instruction pdf. The only difference is that I used Lincoln   035 tips instead of the tweeco since I already had them on hand. When I went to tune it outside of the forge it runs great but everything is lost once I place it in. I don't have any video atm ran out of time. Here is my forge setup with a Reil burner running just to give an idea of what I'm trying to use it in. I will try to get video but it will not be until tomorrow. Thanks for any help 

IMG_20180314_002653_693.jpg

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Welcome aboard Spookendorf, glad to have you. If you'll put your general location in the header you might be surprised how many of the gang (mob?) live within visiting distance.

If all you can get for reasonable is galvy then strip the galvy by soaking it in vinegar, rinse, neutralize with baking soda, rinse again and you're good to go. 

I'm thinking 25x25 Ts are closer to what I'm used to. 25x15 would be closer to a 1" x 5/8" T. Doable for sure but you'll have to experiment to find out the best jet diameter, tuning distance, etc. 

S. Wright: The brand mig tip only makes a difference in tap size to mount them. 

And THAT my friend is why I keep telling folks to tune the burner WHERE it's going to be used. It's much trickier to get a T burner made and tuned that will run in or out of a forge where it's considerably easier to make one burn in one place or the other.

Frosty The Lucky.

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Not bad, still looks a LITTLE rich to me but not bad at all. Maybe trim the jet back another 1/16" or less increments. Try lower psi. and see if it stays on the burner tip. You have a lot of dragon's breath even if it's a nice blue. Flame velocity is nice and slow which means the fire stays IN the forge longer to transfer more heat to the liner.

Bear in mind the heavy fire brick will suck heat out of the flame at a considerable rate and conduct it to the room. Hard fire brick is a major heat sink requiring significant fuel to bring to temperature. It has an insulating rating only SLIGHTLY better than limestone. Specifically, 1 FOOT of hard fire brick is a couple % better than R-1. R-1 = 1' of limestone.

Check out Forges 101 for discussions of: materials, construction, treatments, the hows and whys, pros and cons. There is even information about forge using hard fire brick and where they're appropriate.

Frosty The Lucky.

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Thanks frosty. I thought that the large amount of dragons breath was overkill which is why I made sure to get video tonight. I made my final adjustments by just filling so I'll keep that approach and knock it back a hair. I'm aware of the hard bricks poor performance. I actually just got my hands on and cut today the ends from a freon tank. I'll ordering my wool and coatings and all very soon to make that. Thanks a lot for the help!

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Frosty, how many of these 3/4" burners can you reasonably run off a BBQ tank before it just freezes solid?  I browsed through the thread, and may have missed a nugget somewhere, so I apologize if that's the case.  I'd like to build a bank of 5 burners with a spreader plate or a shroud to make a wheeled weed-killer, like this one: 

2115593206_50017.JPG.7911a7884729d3c6a0f828dfdad1b869.JPG

These things retail for a gazillion bucks for what they are, and I figure I can fabricate something just about as good, and your T-burner seems like just the ticket.

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  • 4 weeks later...

Hello Frosty...or other interested folks. :)

Just looking for your thoughts. Thinking I might need to extend the mig tip further toward the main pipe....it's still full length and at 1/2D currently. Started with the mig tip drilled to #54, and horribly lean.

1 1/4" pipe, 12.5" loa, standard 1 1/14" tee with one inlet plugged, mig tip drilled out to 1/16" and still full length. 5-20Psi propane

On the bench;

 

In the furnace;

 

Thank you for any advice you have,

Al

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