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DIY Static mixer


thematrixiam

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Matrix: Nobody's attacked you, we attempted to answer your questions only to have you claim some sort of professional authority and argue. What do CANADIAN codes and standard terms mean in the USA? Have you lost sight of that or don't you care? This thread  has turned into semantic quibbling which is typically the end of useful information exchange.

I'm done playing your games.

 

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If you have the time and inclination, I would be interested in the combination of performance/fuel efficiency with and without your device in place.  If you end up with a hotter forge with less fuel burned it may be worth the effort.  If the difference is negligible or non-existent then it's probably not worth the time and effort to create such a device.

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13 hours ago, thematrixiam said:

It is my understanding that any connection over 2" has to be welded.

Fitters install many 12 inch water pipes with clamping type connectors (no clue of proper name) I use couplings for all sizes of my pipe

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25 minutes ago, Buzzkill said:

If the difference is negligible or non-existent then it's probably not worth the time and effort to create such a device.

True.
Though it took me about 20 mins.

1 minute ago, Steve Sells said:

Fitters install many 12 inch water pipes with clamping type connectors (no clue of proper name) I use couplings for all sizes of my pipe

Cool.

I have connected pipe that I could sit and have my lunch in.

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On 4/14/2019 at 9:17 PM, thematrixiam said:

as for making these, what about cutting some steel part way through and then twisting? with a blown burner would it matter if these static mixers are super accurate? 

No; as an internal part in a sealed system that wouldn't matter at all. Low pressure oxy/natural torches used by the railroad used  internal twisted ribbons to enusre sufficient mixing. Some very short body torches still do.

 thematrixiam is on to a good idea for s burner system, it should not be dismissed

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It feels as though a conflict of personalities has the potential to stalemate what could be a good idea.

 

This reminds me of another industry of which I've invested a large amount of time and money, the firearms industry, more so specifically, the SUPPRESSOR industry.

 

Before any anti gunner rolls their eyes, hear me out. Suppressors, or silencers as their patent  is actually called, use baffles of various sorts to expand, slow down, and cool off, explosive gases before they're launched into the outside atmosphere, which is part of which makes gunshots non hearing safe. The other being the action of the firearm, and the sonic crack of the projectile breaking the sound barrier, neither of which the silencer can help... But I digress, back to slowing down fast moving gases, and the mixing effect there of, inside of a tube, or pipe, or whatever other semantics you prefer...

 

I'm going to go look at a few of mine now, and while I'm not going to risk destroying something that cost me a lot of money, a $200 tax stamp and registration there of to the BATFE, I actually don't think it would be hard to create a baffle system that would mix the gasses completely, but I do feel this would be best suited for a forced air system, it WILL slow down the velocity of gasses, and a hunch tells me that's counter productive to NA burners.

 

 

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That makes total sense actually, I wasn't even thinking of a ribbon burner when I posted that, much less the NARB. 

Exciting times.

 

K style baffles might work, but I am somewhat concerned about pooling of propane in the tube. Monolith style baffles should alleviate this.

 

 

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20 minutes ago, AdamTheSaint said:

but I am somewhat concerned about pooling of propane in the tube.

What would cause that to happen? We're talking a small diameter tube about 8x as long with a substantial volume of flow. How would anything pool in the tube? Are we using the same definition for "pool?"

Packing the tube with steel wool doesn't work, tried that decades ago. In a gun burner maybe. 

Frosty The Lucky.

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When I said pool, I was speaking of "k style " baffles, which are an older design that Hiram Maxam (the patented inventor of the gun silencer, and the car muffler as it were) used in his original design. I apologize for not specifying that. That baffle system is a series of stacked cones with a hole through the very center which allows the projectile to pass through, and also the gasses to move from one chamber to the other, slowing the explosive gas and mixing it with a colder and contained atmosphere.

 

I now remember reading that you had tried steel wool already, so I'll disregard that idea as useless.

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Suppressors and mixers are two different machines. Instead, try looking into how Lyle at All States designed the oxy prop mixing mechanism in his torch bodies. Harris manufactured them for All States till the patent ran out. Now Harris is marketing it's own oxy propane torch system. Until the patent ran out they were the only ones selling an efficient effective torch. 

They use a swirl strip in about a 5" long tube. And YES, propane likes mixing with oxygen LESS than it does with plain old Earth atmosphere.

Frosty The Lucky.

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Now I'm thinking about making a twisted ribbon to fit in the mixer tube of my NARB. Not sure how I'll be able to tell the difference, but I have to take it out of the forge to plug a couple of holes in the ribbon anyway.

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Well, I whipped up something quick out of thin-gauge sheet steel. 

8D88A611-996F-4DCB-8789-19E6CDFFDF34.jpeg

It was not a success: the burner kept huffing, and I could smell unburnt propane. Pulled it back out again, and everything was fine.

This is not to say that this is a bad idea. My try was very much a quick-and-dirty experiment, and your mileage may vary considerably.

(N.B.: In the interests of “only change one variable at a time”, I had not yet plugged up that additional hole in the ribbon burner,  so that is not a factor in the burner’s performance.)

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On 4/22/2019 at 3:09 PM, AdamTheSaint said:

You're two steps ahead of me Frosty, I came to that exact conclusion, came to post it, and you had just typed your last response. 

I'm gonna go look at my torch pile in the garage now.

Not really, I've just been messing with the things longer. After spending crazy money for an All State oxy. prop. torch set and showing others how much better it worked than oxy. acet. I got a call from Lyle, the inventor and owner of All States, seems I was selling more sets than the guy he hired and we hit it off. That and the boxes of induction device information Cruz gave me gave me a leg up of trying to figure it all out myself.

It's getting pretty exciting in the last couple years. Lots of guys are trying off the wall ideas and coming up with some darned effective burners.

I haven't said anything so far, I've been proven wrong too many times and am gun shy :rolleyes: but I don't think an enhanced mixer will do much if anything in the NARB. The inside of the plenum just screams extreme turbulence and I don't see anything but clean flames. 

Like I said though, I've been wrong so often I'm more surprised when I'm not.

Frosty The Lucky.

 

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