Dear Crispin and all,
First, the quote:
Designed by Paul Anderson, the top light upward draught (tlud)
gasifying cook stove works o
This statement can be correct if referring to a specific TLUD stove that
I designed, which I think is the case of the author who is quoted.
However, it should NOT be taken that I originated the TLUD stoves.
The originators are Thomas Reed and Paal Wendelbo, working independently
in the 1980s and 1990s. Note that we do not credit the Norwegian
resistance fighters who influenced Wendelbo as originators of TLUD
stoves. Those men were doing top-lighting of open fires, that is,
fires that were NOT contained inside the walls of stoves. We needed
Wendelbo to accomplish that!!!
Second, Crispin wrote:
The TLUD was invented centuries ago as a way to burning with little
smoke. The Romans used TLUD fires.
Until Crispin or others can produce hard evidence to support such a
statement, please consider the above to be utterly false and should NOT
be quoted.
Crispin, let's have the documentation or a retraction or at least stop
writing such nonsense. Maybe the Romans did. Maybe cavemen did. But
no proof, no credit. Forty years ago I observed a "TLUD-like" fire in
the top of a burn barrel on an windless day. But I did not understand
it, and I did not develop the concept/technique, and I do not take any
credit for the original work about TLUDs. If some Roman or caveman
ignited some pile of brush or wood on the top, that does not constitute
inventing TLUD gasifier cookstoves.
By the way, I did coin the term "top-lit updraft" and the acronym "TLUD"
back in 2004 and 2005 respectively, but that is not the same as
originating it or initially identifying it. Wendelbo had no name for
what was happening. (Peko Pe is the stove name.) And Tom Reed called it
"inverted down-draft" or IDD, which actually it is not, because
down-draft gasifiers have their hot zones at the bottom all of the
time. Actually, with hindsight, I should have called it something
like "Top-Lit, Downward Migrating Pyrolysis Zone" (maybe " TLDMPZ")
because the MIGRATING PYROLYSIS FRONT is by far the most distinctive
feature of TLUD gasifiers. The real important feature is that the hot
spot does not stay in one position, but migrates downward. In that way
it is unlike any other up-draft or down-draft or cross-draft gasifiers,
in which the fuel moves and the hot spot stays in one position (which is
at the bottom on up-draft AND down-draft gasifiers.)
I hope this helps clarify some of the background about TLUD stoves.
Paul
Paul S. Anderson, PhD aka "Dr TLUD"
Email: [email protected] Skype: paultlud Phone: +1-309-452-7072
Website: www.drtlud.com
On 9/18/2012 11:24 AM, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott wrote:
Dear Steve
That was an interesting excursion. To be brief, there are a great
number of technical misconceptions contained in the document
http://www.soil-carbon-regeneration.co.uk/biochar/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/Biochar-Rocket-Stove-building-instructions.pdf
so my advice is to try to gain some knowledge from the general
approach and from the unusual layout of the product but not take it
all as literally true.
It is interesting that anything with a side feed is being termed a
Rocket Stove. That rather undermines the actual Rocket Stove as a
unique design, in my view. I guess people will call it what they want.
I have copied here a paragraph from a the document:
*The tlud*
Designed by Paul Anderson, the top light upward draught (tlud)
gasifying cook stove works on more than just one level. It is a very
efficient cook stove, producing a lot of heat from a small amount of
wood. It is smokeless and it produces biochar. Paul Anderson has also
been instrumental in getting these stoves distributed and used in
developing countries where wood or charcoal is otherwise used in
conventional fires for cooking. By being more efficient, less wood is
needed. By being smokeless, diseases and deaths caused by smoke in
living spaces are reduced. By producing biochar, subsistence growers
are able to [maintain] soil fertility and improve soil structure,
biological activity and moisture holding capacity. Atmospheric carbon
is also being sequestered by the use of these stoves.
So, I have some issues with some of this and because the whole list
was referred to it there is merit in correcting some of the
impressions given.
The TLUD was invented centuries ago as a way to burning with little
smoke. The Romans used TLUD fires. A TLUD cooking stove may or may not
be 'efficient' depending entirely on how well it transfers heat from
the flame to the pot and whether or not the remaining char( if any) is
counted as 'consumed by the stove' or not.
The heat produced by a TLUD is no greater than the heat released by
burning the same amount of fuel to the same extent in any other stove.
That is, if you gasify wood in some other device the heat is exactly
the same. TLUD's are renowned for making lots of smoke when things are
not working properly, like in the beginning and at the end of a burn
there can be lots of smoke. Mitigation of this involves timely
intervention by the cook. They are, after all, smoke producing devices
that then burn the smoke.
You have no doubt seen Paul Anderson throwing a lit match into a smoke
bomb of a stove re-lighting the fire when it has blown out. I have
done it myself dozens of times. When they are running well, especially
during the main part of the burn, they are amazingly smokeless, like
any other really good biomass stove. I hope that the products evolve
to the extent that they really are smokeless.
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