Back to winter

Well, I was sitting outside a few days back, another typical January day in Wisconsin. I was sittin' there in the sun, wearing a t-shirt, drinkin' a beer. I was saying, you know, this winter stuff, it ain't so bad....

Ahh, but I have lived in the north for too long. I just feel like there is going to be hell to pay for all this nice weather. The last couple of nights we have been getting a little bit of that hell. It has cooled down quite a lot. Still though, corn burning wise, it has been a really great winter. The Traeger gets a little behind when we have those really cold days. I can keep it running but it needs more work. I have to keep an eye on it, it runs 100%, it overflows more often, and needs more burn pot changes.

I talked a little bit to one of the folks at Traeger about some changes they made to the TPB-150. I will try to get a few more details and summarize them here. Maybe they will be things I will try to incorporate to my setup.

A word to the techies out there

I apologize in advance to all the computer illiterate corn burners out there. Suffer through, I need to talk technical for a bit. I will try to get to some actual corn burning talk before the post is over. I have seen some of the posts on the forum and heard from a few of you so I know there are some geeks burning corn too. I will let you know something I discovered today.

Today was sort of a wasted eight hours at my day job. I have been working on a technical issue with some ESRI mapping software being incompatible with our hardware and operating systems. I am reminded of why I will do almost anything to put off calling in tech support from a major software company. Well, I had put it off. My boss had asked me how it was coming too many times. I had no solutions myself, so, today was the day. I emailed ESRI tech support. I spent most of the day gathering information and emailing back and forth to a tech support drone. We have now successfully tried all the stuff I had already tried before. Sigh....

However, that being said, in between all that searching, documenting, and emailing, I had some free time. During that free time, I did some work on the database structure of the corn burning web site. Those changes really seemed to speed up how the site works. Much more so than what I expected them to.

Let me give you some back ground. The forum software the www.iburncorn.com site runs is called CF-forum. It is written in a computer language called Cold Fusion. Originally, my wife, who has a computer consulting business bought the CF Forum software for a client of hers. It was written to run on Microsoft Windows and use the Microsoft Access database. She rewrote the code and got it to run on the Linux operating system and talk to the open source, MySQL database. After a couple of years, her client moved on, but the software stayed with our server. Even at it's peak I think that forum only had about fifty users. Nothing like the iburncorn forum has. So, her programming and database changes were never really pressure tested.

Time passes, a couple of years go by. I bought the corn boiler on blind faith because there is no real resource out there on the web. I decided to setup my corn burning site and then setup the forum. The software suddenly has 10x the number of users it had before and more like 100x the number of messages. Things began to drag and I started getting complaints about how the software was running. I will be the first to admit, it was running S L O W.

Today in my spare minutes I had the freetime to take a look at why it was running slow from the data end. MySQL is a very powerful database engine and I assumed it should be able to handle the load just fine. Really, the computer the web site was running on should be able to handle the load as well. So, what was happening? The database tables were not very complex for the cfforum software, just 14 tables. Not even very many fields in those tables. So why did it run so slow? The tables had no indices.

Fourteen very simple tables. Each web page would fire off several queries to the database. Each query would have two or three joins to other tables based on primary keys within the database. The biggest table had less than 6000 records in it. I figured, no worries! MySQL should be able to crunch through that and do the joins, no problem. Wrong!

It made a huge difference in how the forum ran with just adding one index in each of the three largest tables. Suddenly page build time was cut by 1/4th! The index ties together the userID, messageID and topicID into one index. Wow. Amazing!

A second change, not quite so dramatic, but still made some difference. I turned on query caching in MySQL. Actually, more technically correct, I allocated RAM to the query cache. Every since MySQL V.4 query caching has been turned on in the default but since no memory is devoted to it, it does not cache. This was a very simple change, just add the line:
query-cache-size = 20M
in the /etc/my.cnf file. I would say that made some difference in how the site runs. Not as big as the indices, but noticeable.

So, some good came of the day. Now, if I could only get those stupid maps working! :-)

I never did get to any corn talk. My fingers are tired and I need to get to bed because tomorrow is my day to be in the office. I do have a new site feature in testing right now. Mostly for the pellet burners. It will allow people who are burning corn in their pellet stoves to enter some details. It will build up a database for others to see which pellet stoves can burn ratios of corn without troubles. I hope to have the feature online by tomorrow.

Have a good night!
--ja

web site

Sorry folks, the server is crashed out again. I think this will be coming to and end. I have the new machine all setup. Now I just need to do some testing on it and then I will ship it out to my ISP.

--ja

One of the really great things about running this web site is some of the great email I get. On any given day I get somewhere between five and ten emails from corn burners, or wanna-be corn burners. I get a lot of questions, I get a few suggestions, and I get alot of good general information. Here is one of the good information ones.

Don writes:

In October of '05 I decided enough was enough. Natural gas prices were expected
to skyrocket and I decided to "fight back" I ordered an Amaizablaze 7100 with all the trimmings in mid October '05. finally, on Dec 17, after a 2 month wait, I was on my way to pick it up. I had to drive all the way across the state of IA to get it, but it was worth the
savings in shipping, plus I got to meet the Gentlman I had been calling on a
regular basis to get answers to all the questions I had. One of the nicest guys
you will ever meet, Jerry Jackson. On the evening of Dec 19, A local dealer
arrived and installed the outside vent system, and by 8:30pm, it was ready to
fire. I was at this point still wondering if this stove was really going to heat
my house. All 2400 sq ft of it with only 6" of insulation in the attic and none
in the walls.
I couldn't sleep that night. I was afraid that it wasn't going to work and I was
going to have to turn my furnace back up.

Well it is now Jan '06 and all my worries are gone! This is the best thing since
sliced bread!!! The first night it run, it was 8 degrees outside and the stove
kept my house at a comfortable 72 degrees all night. Amazing!!!
The only real problem I had was relighting the stove after the first cleaning. I
got it started and thought that I needed to add a little more corn to get it
going untill the auger kicked in. Well, I snuffed the fire out. Just chalk it up
to the learning curve of owning one of these amazing stoves.
I pop the clinker out and fill the 115lb corn bin twice a day. The stove burns
about 2bu a day, which costs me about $4. I shut the stove down and clean out
the ash and heat exchanger tubes about once every 2 weeks. I have learned a real
good formula to restarting the stove. I would like to share it with you and all
the other people of the corn burning community.

This requires a glass pyrex cup, a microwave, a bottle of 91% alcohol, which you
can purchase at any drug store, wood pellets, and some plastic containers.

pour some wood pellets in a plastic container, and add some alcohol. make sure
you put in enough so that the pellets soak it up, and make sure to keep a lid on
it.take about 1/2 to 1 cup of corn (depending on the size of your burn pot) and
microwave it on high for about 1 1/2 to 2 minutes. This dries the corn out
further. Dump the hot corn in your burn pot. Fill it about1/3 full. Then, take
some of your alcohol soaked wood pellets and shake in a light layer on top of
the corn, just enough to lightly cover the top of the corn in the burn pot.
Throw in a match and it will instantly ignite. Close the burn chamber door and
thats it. The pellets will burn and ignite the corn in the burn pot. It should
be enought of a burn to kick on the auger. I learned this from the local dealer.
To date I am 110% satisfied with my stove and the way it performs. I would
encourage anyone to try this form of heating. It is the way to go!!!

He has not been burning for very long but it seems like he is happy to be here.

I have not tried his method of stove lighting. I have been real happy using the charcoal lighter fluid. Just a little sprayed over a chili can of wood pellets sitting in the burn pot. Put fire to them and it seem like it starts great every time. Much cheaper and better than gelled alcohol. The only trouble is (and I really can't believe I am making a product endorsement :-) I had been using Kingsford charcoal lighter fluid in the metal can. I switched to some off brand lighter fluid that I picked up at Menards. It was half the price of the Kingsford. It is in a plastic squeeze bottle. For one thing the bottle is very thin walled, so it is hard to not squeeze out a lot. Second, the nozzle holes are very large so that contributes to putting on a lot. It also seems like it is a touch more evaporant than Kingsford. I have only used it twice and both times I have gotten a POOF! when I put fire to the wood pellets. Not good. Damn shame I bought two bottles of the stuff. I guess I can always save it for the grilling season....

So much for under the radar...

Ah well. I am being outted this morning. I was one of the topics in the company newsletter that came out on Friday. With the holiday Monday, it is hitting everyone's inbox Tuesday morning. Remember Walker, paybacks are hell.... :-)

Every time MPCA webmaster John Abbott opened his heating bills last winter, it was a painful hit to his pocket book. With a monthly natural gas bill approaching the four-figure mark, he began investigating alternative sources of energy for his 100-year-old, Craftsman-style home.

John started looking at corn as a fuel source after seeing a corn-burning stove at a relative's house. Locating companies that sold corn-burning furnaces was relatively easy, but he needed advice on more practical questions. How much corn will I need? How do I store it? Do I buy it in bags or in bulk, and from a co-op or directly from a farmer?

He quickly discovered that there wasn't much info available about this technology. To fill the void, John started up a Web site chronicling his experiences working through problems that have cropped up since installing his burner, and offering advice for others considering a switch to this renewable fuel source. Up and running since last August, his site presently draws about 800 unique visitors every day. Even if corn burner isn't for you, some of John's narrative makes good reading. Check it out at : www.iburncorn.com.

Other items of interest

A small project that I did is to wire in two lights into my zone pumps. I did that during the time we were running our boiler to do our domestic hot water 100%. Our electric hot water heater was shut off. Currently we are using the boiler as a pre heater to the electric hot water heater. More about that later.

My trouble was the pumps run so quiet, you really can't tell which one is running. Putting in the lights so they turn on when the pump is running lets me see which one is pumping water to what zone. So, for instance, if I want to take a bath, if I am using the corn boiler for 100% of my domestic hot water as well, I have to check the boiler temp before I can take a bath. For unlimited hot water the boiler must be 180-200 degrees. If the boiler temp is low, and the closest pump is running, that's the main part of the house. The boiler temp isn't going to be coming up any time real soon. You have to wait, and take your bath later, sometimes much later. But, on the other hand, if the farther pump is running, that is just the office. A smaller, better insulated space that warms up pretty quick. Stop back and check in half an hour and there might be hot water aplenty. ...Unless of course the close pump kicks in just at that time. Do I need to cover, going down and seeing both pumps running? You see why we have the electric hot water heater on during the holidays.

Another thing that just got wrapped up tonight. I talked to my neighbor down the street. He is the guy on the block who knows people with skills. I asked him if he knew anyone who welds stainless. He told me he did, and took my cracked burn pot away with him. He brought it back tonight, two nights later, with a really great weld. It looks so much stronger now than what it did before. I know this burn pot has a short life ahead because I feel like the sidewalls are getting warped and brittle. At some point in the not too distant future this pot will need to be replaced. I have just exactly one season on this pot now. I think doing this weld will get me through the rest of the season. So, that is something to consider as an expense on the corn burning project.


What I had been doing is using High Temperature Furnace Cement, or sometimes called Boiler Cement. I picked up a jug of it at my local True Value Hardware. It can fill a heck of a crack. You fill it in with a putty knife. It is black and very sticky. It sticks bad to your hands if you touch it. Put it on, throw this burn pot up on top of the smokebox on the Traeger, patch side up, for a few days. This will buy you two burning/cleaning cycles. The cement will be burned away and you have to do it again. I was able to do this three times with this pot. Then the hole got too big, it had to be welded or replaced.

January at last!

Christmas is over. The Rellies have all gone home. Life is coming back to normal. Gosh, what all has been happening on the corn burning front? Well, the Traeger pulled a little trick on me a couple of times. The way my corn burner works is to have two motors to move the corn. It has a cup motor on the top, which is a geared down motor that attaches to a shaft via a couple of allen-set screws. The cups rotate into the corn hopper, fills, and then dumps down into the feed auger which is driven by the second motor.

Well, a little Traeger trick, is for those allen-sets to loosen up. It did it to me once last year as well. So, it's not quite often enough to be the first thing you think of when you are problem solving. You go down into the basement and the fire is out. Huh? Check the hopper. Plenty of corn. Huh? Check the burn pot. No fresh corn waiting to feed into the pot. Huh? So the first thing you think of is that some stalk of corn has lodged in the feed system. (Well, OK, you guys burning clean corn don't think this first. I have to though!) So if the feed system is jammed up, the first thing you do is empty the hopper. A few buckets and some cursing and promising to build a corn screener later, the hopper is empty only to find the feed system is just fine, not stuffed up. Well, it fooled me twice. Last year and this. I never claimed to be a quick learner.

All it takes to fix it, is to run the feed motor and stop at a particular spot. The two couplings in the photo above have a shaft in the middle of them. The allen screw tightens down against this flat spot. The trick for you is to figure out where the flat spot is on the center shaft. The problem is with the allen-set on the black part of the shaft. It has come loose. The silver part of the shaft has two of these allen-sets. More than likely the flat spot on the shaft will be underneath one of these two allen-sets. If you look really close, with a bright light behind the shaft, on the front side of the Traeger, and you, on the back side, with the feed running, will be able to spot the flat spot by looking real close at the narrow gap between the silver and black part of the shaft. Once you have done it once, you will see it sounds tougher than it is. The tricky part, if you are working alone, is shutting the feed off at the right moment. If you miss it, just let it run around again.

So, what I did is tightened the allen-set, on the black block, when it was stopped, directly over the top of the flat part on the inner shaft.

What I plan to do is pickup another allen-set of exactly the same size. I will run that allen-set in behind the one that is in there. The outer one will then lock the inner one from turning itself out.