About 11 years ago I got a used Taylor water stove. It has served me very well, but it started leaking about a year ago, I added some "liquid stop leak" and bought some more time, but I think I'm going to have to drain it before the end of this winter, maybe even this week. If I can find someone to repair it after I drain it, I'll try to do that and use it however much longer I can, but I've been asking around, and it's looking my stove may just be at the end of its useful life. So what I want to ask about here are my ideas for a replacement.
I've thought about just buying a new water stove like the one I have now, but one major issue with that for me is that I'd really rather not use the anti-corrosion chemicals -- I'd be willing to make significant sacrifices, including extra cost, to avoid them, basically for organic kind of reasons, even though I've added some chemicals to my current stove (although not as much/often as recommended) -- and it seems foolish to buy a brand new stove and then not use the chemicals. (Sacrificial anode rods aren't at all a reasonable substitute for the liquid chemicals, are they?)
My leading idea right now is to build (have build) an outdoor masonry stove , I guess with firebrick and red brick, but build one with a large firebox like I have now, design it with a very simple flue system (not like for quick, high intensity burns but more like a common water stove, just out of masonry instead of steel), and then install a very small boiler over the firebox in my masonry -- I'm imagining something just the depth and width of my firebox and probably less than a foot tall -- and use the steam/hot water from that boiler to heat a large (multiple hundred gallon) water tank that wouldn't be exposed to direct heat from the fire, and then insulate all of the masonry and the tank together, so that whatever heat the masonry absorbed would gradually get transferred to the water tank as much as possible. I'm hoping I can get a tank, thinking stainless steel like maybe an old dairy tank, that I'm hoping would last for several decades even without any chemicals if used in this way. I figure the boiler is the only part likely to rust out anytime soon, but I'm hoping I can replace it for a lot less money than a new water stove if it ever does rust out.
Is anything like this feasible and reasonable? I figure I'll sacrifice some efficiency compared to my current stove (poorer heat transfer and therefore more heat going up the chimney), but I'm hoping not too much, and it could be worth it to me if I could have a stove that would function basically like the stove I have now but with parts that would mostly stand a good chance of lasting for a very long time without chemicals and could be replaced piecemeal as necessary.
Any other ideas for outdoor wood-fired hydronic heating besides the common water stoves?
The only other idea I have is to buy the smallest water stove I can find and then add a separate water tank to hold extra thermal mass.
I've thought about just buying a new water stove like the one I have now, but one major issue with that for me is that I'd really rather not use the anti-corrosion chemicals -- I'd be willing to make significant sacrifices, including extra cost, to avoid them, basically for organic kind of reasons, even though I've added some chemicals to my current stove (although not as much/often as recommended) -- and it seems foolish to buy a brand new stove and then not use the chemicals. (Sacrificial anode rods aren't at all a reasonable substitute for the liquid chemicals, are they?)
My leading idea right now is to build (have build) an outdoor masonry stove , I guess with firebrick and red brick, but build one with a large firebox like I have now, design it with a very simple flue system (not like for quick, high intensity burns but more like a common water stove, just out of masonry instead of steel), and then install a very small boiler over the firebox in my masonry -- I'm imagining something just the depth and width of my firebox and probably less than a foot tall -- and use the steam/hot water from that boiler to heat a large (multiple hundred gallon) water tank that wouldn't be exposed to direct heat from the fire, and then insulate all of the masonry and the tank together, so that whatever heat the masonry absorbed would gradually get transferred to the water tank as much as possible. I'm hoping I can get a tank, thinking stainless steel like maybe an old dairy tank, that I'm hoping would last for several decades even without any chemicals if used in this way. I figure the boiler is the only part likely to rust out anytime soon, but I'm hoping I can replace it for a lot less money than a new water stove if it ever does rust out.
Is anything like this feasible and reasonable? I figure I'll sacrifice some efficiency compared to my current stove (poorer heat transfer and therefore more heat going up the chimney), but I'm hoping not too much, and it could be worth it to me if I could have a stove that would function basically like the stove I have now but with parts that would mostly stand a good chance of lasting for a very long time without chemicals and could be replaced piecemeal as necessary.
Any other ideas for outdoor wood-fired hydronic heating besides the common water stoves?
The only other idea I have is to buy the smallest water stove I can find and then add a separate water tank to hold extra thermal mass.
Actually I didn't know something like that would burn. Quite interesting.
