Mullardman
Moderately extreme...
But hardly news. I thought every interested schoolkid knew what Mica was.
Could you cook on a DIY BBQ made from Fire Bricks?
- Thread starter wulbert
- Start date
But hardly news. I thought every interested schoolkid knew what Mica was.
wulbert
pfm Member
Yeah, I seem to remember Mica being a "thing" when I was a kid. I vaguely remember looking for it in stones in an old quarry. Dunno why.
Barrymagrec
pfm Member
He was also very solid on sins of idolatry and the oppression of the poor by the upper classes.
Banned from storage heaters in 1974 I've read.
You'd look for it as a kid because it's interesting. I've been climbing in the Alps, in certain parts, especially the grantitic parts, you get fine micaceous dust in the air, so much so that when you get up for a pee in the night and you are fumbling about in a torchbeam finding your shoes you can see the stuff glittering in the air. It's very pretty.
Tony Lockhart
Avoiding Stress, at Every Opportunity
And then, for a laugh, drip some mercury onto a freshly scrubbed or scratched area. Maybe set up a time lapse camera too.
I've never done that, but I imagine that it would be a bit of a laugh. I do remember I once had a burnt, greasy oven tray of some description, I wasn't sure whether it was ally or steel. If it's steel, thinks I, I'll chuck it in some caustic and watch the grease dissolve. If it's ally I'll know soon enough. So I did. After about 30 sec the first bubble of hydrogen formed. Bugger. Then others. Bugger, it's ally. Out it came and I had to settle for giving it a cursory scrub and leaving the burnt bits behind.
cubastreet
Espresso Fiend
Some people use flower pots to make a little hibachi.
The ones they use in Japan are quite deep so the marinades, which often contain sugar, don't burn.
The ones they use in Japan are quite deep so the marinades, which often contain sugar, don't burn.
They very much will conduct heat, heating up and holding the heat is their function within a storage heater.
They are very bad at conducting heat, which is why they store it. They do obviously eventually conduct it, everything does, but they do it very slowly. Here's an experiment to prove it. Take a metal rod, say a spanner, screwdriver, spoon, hold one end and put the other in a flame. After a few seconds your end will be too hot to hold because of rapid conduction. Now do it with a bit of brick or ceramics, you can have one end red hot and hold the other. It's a poor conductor. That's why car engines are cast in metal and not ceramics, a ceramic engine would overheat. Likewise a ceramic cup is nice to drink out of, the rim stays cool even when the tea is really hot. Now try an aluminium cup, it burns your lips.
that's a cement based "brick" casting, I think. I doubt that it has been fired like a proper brick. No matter, it's time for a test burn. Make sure that it's not standing on anything you care about in case the bricks fall apart in the heat. Oh, and if you have a gas torch, try that on one corner and see how it holds up. Finally, don't leave them out in the rain. If you do , the next time you light it the bricks may split as the water turns to steam.Storage heater bricks arrived. Not sure what they are made of. Very heavy.
Looks like fun, though.
wulbert
pfm Member
Damn. It rained last night. I'll stick them in a low oven for an hour (when the missus goes out!), then get the fire-raising kit out to play with. I need a new canister for my gas torch, good excuse to buy one.
Thanks for the physics for toddlers lesson.
But I have some materials that don't conduct heat at all. I used them to construct my propane furnace for bronze casting.
Barrymagrec
pfm Member
"ar all" is a bit of a stretch.
At all?
It is indeed.
Meanwhile, back on topic, firebricks of any description are poor conductors of heat. They wouldn't do their job otherwise.
wulbert
pfm Member
A gas BBQ is the last thing I would buy. Up there with the gas patio-heater in my list of resource-wasting, landfill consumer crap.
wulbert
pfm Member
Initial experiment went well. I normally use sustainable Scottish lump-wood charcoal but have run out. Found a mouldy half-bag of briquettes in the shed which may well have been below par.
Heat output felt good. I was going to throw on some snarlers (sausages) but felt there was a lingering "chemical" smell which I'm almost certain was the white spirit that I stupidly used to speed things up (wife's bush got accidentally singed in the resulting large flames). (The sage bush. Stop sniggering. Honestly!).
Bricks got very hot to the touch (obvs) but I could comfortably hold my hand just a couple of millimetres away from the bricks with no scalding, so they are clearly not radiating the heat away quickly like metal would.
I'd like to know exactly what the storage heater bricks are made of before eating off this. Also need to find/make a grill to cover the whole area. I quite like the modular build-you-own nature of this approach. I made the "floor" in one side higher than the other to allow two heat settings. Bricks can be slid to the side to allow more air in.
uploading pictures
Heat output felt good. I was going to throw on some snarlers (sausages) but felt there was a lingering "chemical" smell which I'm almost certain was the white spirit that I stupidly used to speed things up (wife's bush got accidentally singed in the resulting large flames). (The sage bush. Stop sniggering. Honestly!).
Bricks got very hot to the touch (obvs) but I could comfortably hold my hand just a couple of millimetres away from the bricks with no scalding, so they are clearly not radiating the heat away quickly like metal would.
I'd like to know exactly what the storage heater bricks are made of before eating off this. Also need to find/make a grill to cover the whole area. I quite like the modular build-you-own nature of this approach. I made the "floor" in one side higher than the other to allow two heat settings. Bricks can be slid to the side to allow more air in.
uploading pictures
I think you're done. It clearly works. The bricks are clearly fireproof and they aren't food contact. Good work, now get cooking. Without white spirit or sage burning this time. Top tip - get your gas burner sorted and use it to get it going. Add a bit of wood, in fact a nice deep firebox like that lends itself to running on wood. We used to do that all the time as kids, a mate's dad would let us use his field for bbqs in exchange for tidying it up, we would have a bonfire with the clippings, run a huge barbie on dead wood, get some food and beer in and invite the girls round. Happy days.Initial experiment went well. I normally use sustainable Scottish lump-wood charcoal but have run out. Found a mouldy half-bag of briquettes in the shed which may well have been below par.
Heat output felt good. I was going to throw on some snarlers (sausages) but felt there was a lingering "chemical" smell which I'm almost certain was the white spirit that I stupidly used to speed things up (wife's bush got accidentally singed in the resulting large flames). (The sage bush. Stop sniggering. Honestly!).
Bricks got very hot to the touch (obvs) but I could comfortably hold my hand just a couple of millimetres away from the bricks with no scalding, so they are clearly not radiating the heat away quickly like metal would.
I'd like to know exactly what the storage heater bricks are made of before eating off this. Also need to find/make a grill to cover the whole area. I quite like the modular build-you-own nature of this approach. I made the "floor" in one side higher than the other to allow two heat settings. Bricks can be slid to the side to allow more air in.
uploading pictures