We have fire, and a lot of it!

Burner running at 20 psi

First off a giant THANK YOU to everyone before me who has tinkered with these propane burners. I pretty much assembled this off others work and it goes. My only contribution is the compression clamp for the gas jet. I'm not even sure someone hasn't done that. I don't know of anyone, but, that's not saying it hasn't been done. 

With the .30 tip I'm able to have a stable flame up to 30 psi of propane. I'm happy with it. I'm not going to try the .35 right now.

At first I did not want to go higher with it clamped in the vice shooting out the front of the garage. Once it got a little darker and I could see the flame, I got a little more aggressive with the pressure. The adjusting clamp for the jet position is working nicely. I can get it snug, tune the flame with it running and then clamp it down after that.

There IS a sweet spot. I was able to go from rich to good to rich again. The sound of the flame is the give away. A big crackly flame is too rich. The quiet smooth flame is just about right.

Quiet is a relative term with this propane burner. It's not like a propane torch or a gas furnace or a propane BBQ. It has that unmistakeable gas torch sound. You can talk around it, but it's not silent at all.

DANGER - Gotta be careful! If I pull the jet too far back it flares at the air ports. At 5 psi it was a damn big flame! Fortunately it did not flare at 20 or higher.

Air slots after being opened up, rounded a bit,
having the edges filed off & sanded

This is good for now. I thought it was running a little rich until it got a little darker out and I could get the pictures. I did open up the slots more, rounded them, smoothed a few things out and that helped. It helped a lot. So, I want to see how it behaves in the forge before I go crazy with any more modifications. Having a little back pressure will create all kinds of new dynamics.

Staying on track - I've been looking at the recuperative forge designs like the Sandia Labs forge. Ya know what? I'm gonna wait until I get this one working before I start taking it up a notch. My experience tells me there is a lot to learn here. I should get to a stable base line at as little cost possible, and then go from there. 

I feel better proceeding with the furnace build now that I know I can make enough fire. I've got a lot of pictures. Hopefully I will be able to document this build in a very detailed way later. Right now I need to get this thing going.