Watching an episode of Barnwood Builders, and a homeowner was showing his Kachelofen to the host, who has seen a lot of things , but was unfamiliar with it. Apparently it will heat a long time with a single fire with a small amount of wood. There is a little info on Youtube about them. I find it fascinating and it certainly should have been more popular in the US- to reduce the amount of work to store in a winter worth of wood supply. I know the Franklin stove reduced the amount of wood by a huge percent of the traditional fireplace.
Interesting.. Looks like the top opens for a cook area.. dunno. Basically a lot of thermal mass to absorb the heat.
I saw some cook stove types as well. The tile boxes capture warm air and will heat for hours. Another burn for over the night. Neat video of a German woman living in Canada who has created a business from hand making the components. Found a immigrant from Austria who knows how to build them.
I realize it’s old and supposedly valid technology. Never used one myself. Toyed around with the idea of building one in a barn that I never started. Still as a lifelong Mason I don’t really get the possibility. Masonry mass takes a long time to heat up and doesn’t really hold a lot of heat for long periods. I have a soapstone stove. Takes hours to bring that entire stove up to temp. Soapstone being one of the best materials for the job. Now it does retain heat a long time. But how much heat? Not enough to heat my house on a cold day. Gotta refire. That’s 700lbs of mass. These ovens are much heavier larger masses. I just can’t wrap my head around how it’s possible to heat all that mass with one small fast fire. watched a little video years ago on one in Scandinavia or some such place. Owner was testifying how well they work. Went out to get the wood in a cold house, came in made a fire. Supposedly hours later he was commenting how warm it was in the house. I noticed he was still wearing the same clothes he had gone out in the cold tho LOL I just don’t know.
The article linked below suggests that the main heating mechanism is radiant (IR) rather than convection. Sounds odd that green ceramic tiles would emit IR. The article also suggests that a small amount of wood can run the stove for a year. I would like to visit somewhere that has one of these stoves, just to see how good or bad it works. Sunbathing in the living room: oven stoves and heat walls
I don’t know about this stove but some similar stoves have elaborate exhaust paths. So much to the point they have pilot doors above the main burn chamber that you have to build a small fire in to get the chimney to draft. They extract heat in to the masonry and it stores the heat and releases it slowly. They usually burn small hot fires a few times a day. Kind of a thermal battery.
there has been a ton of research into thermal mass over past few decades. old and new exotic materials , but good old water seems to still be the bench mark
Reminds me of the Stove/Ovens found in Russia. Some of those have 'sleeping lofts' above them. I would, for sure trust someone in Siberia to know how to construct of the most efficient stoves possible. Something about Necessity and Moms.
Rumford type fire places- thermal mass units- then there are variations on this theme. as was mention various rocket stove designs. another area -saw dust stove/heaters, bit of an takeoff on rocket heaters but predate same. look to Europe for more definitive information- they are way ahead of the US in terms of alternative heat sources. Thermal mass storage- man that is a rabbit hole -one can spend many hours delving into that subject.
