Uploaded June 2014 | Updated September 2026, 6 days ago
Testing the used oil burning water heater for free heat off grid and homesteading or prepping applications. The heater burns waste vegetable or engine oil . The waste oils need no preheating. Any waste cooking or engine oil can be burnt. The waste oil burner is one I built previously and uses waste oil simply blow in the airstream into the burner to make the used oil burn by vaporisation. The output of the oil burner can easily be controlled by the amount of oil being fed into it as well as the amount of air.
The original gas Burner from the heater was removed and simply replaced with the waste oil burner. This burner is overly powerful for the size of the heater. The waste oil consumption could be as little as 1 Liter of used cooking oil or used engine oil and still give more heat than the gas burner. As waste oil is free, Used oil burners are much more econimical to run that gas or electric.
The waste oil Burner heats Water to be circulated through the tank with the use of a solar water heater panel pump through hoses and a car radiator. Fans on the radiator will warm the air which will go into the home and the cool water will go back to be reheated.
A dump heat exchange will be put under the house to bleed off excess heat if the fans are shut off or may be circulated through the HE placed in the swimming pool to act as a heat sink.
The original gas burner assembly was removed and a waste oil burner slotted in to replace it. The Oil burner is far more powerful than the gas burner and provides a huge amount of heat that is easily able to overpower the heat sink ability of the tank. A header tank and vent line are installed on the setup so the system runs at nil pressure and any pressure buildup can be vented. the original saftey valve is still present on the tank.
The header tank ensures the water tank stays full at all times and also provides an expantion area. This is the same type of setup used on commercial boilers.
The solar pump may have to be replaced with a bigger pump or another pump added to increase the flow through the rediator core. The radiator has twin electric fans and the first fan in the circulation path is able to extract all the available heat and the second one blows relatively cold air. It would seem that the flow through the radiator needs to be increased to extract the maximum heat available.
The setup is total overkill for a home as it would be easily able output more than 50KW of heat energy into a home. The burner is capeable of 300KW if driven hard enough, the tank would sink 100+ and the radiator also could transfer over 100KW as it does in its native application.
The burner runs totaly clean and free of any smoke output. The haze seen in the vid was burning off of paint and insulation on the initial fire up of the heater with this burner. During the test the burner was fuled randomly through the activation of the fuel pump which caused the burner to burn at low and high outputs. The battery charger was used to power the 12V fan. It's setting of voltage and amperage were used to vary the airflow and heat output. for this test the blower was only run at half speed with occasional short runs to 3/4 speed which provided excessive output on the burner for the heater to cope with. .
During this test with the pump and fans running the heater did boil over even though the waste oil burner itself was running at a very low setting most of the time. The excess steam and pressure vented through the high mounted vert pipe, the header tank and the OEM saftey valve on the heater unit as intended in case of overheat. This ensures there can be no pressure build up in the heater/boiler at any time. When set up, a pulse type fuel pump in conjunction with an on/ off timer will be used to feed a regulated amount of waste motor or Vegetable oil into the burner to maintain a stable output.
A 2nd heat exchanger may also be fitted with a fan on the return line to the boiler to remove any left over heat to warm the area under the house and rise up through the flooring.
Heat output and subsequent consumption of the burner was not measured on the test but consumption should be around 1-2 L an hour for sustained operation once the tank and home have been warmed up to normal temprature. For fast warmups, the burner could be driven to around 10L an hour. Even this would greatly overpower the heat sink abilities of the heater however.
Testing the used oil burning water heater for free heat off grid and homesteading or prepping applications. The heater burns waste vegetable or engine oil . The waste oils need no preheating. Any waste cooking or engine oil can be burnt. The waste oil burner is one I built previously and uses waste oil simply blow in the airstream into the burner to make the used oil burn by vaporisation. The output of the oil burner can easily be controlled by the amount of oil being fed into it as well as the amount of air.
The original gas Burner from the heater was removed and simply replaced with the waste oil burner. This burner is overly powerful for the size of the heater. The waste oil consumption could be as little as 1 Liter of used cooking oil or used engine oil and still give more heat than the gas burner. As waste oil is free, Used oil burners are much more econimical to run that gas or electric.
The waste oil Burner heats Water to be circulated through the tank with the use of a solar water heater panel pump through hoses and a car radiator. Fans on the radiator will warm the air which will go into the home and the cool water will go back to be reheated.
A dump heat exchange will be put under the house to bleed off excess heat if the fans are shut off or may be circulated through the HE placed in the swimming pool to act as a heat sink.
The original gas burner assembly was removed and a waste oil burner slotted in to replace it. The Oil burner is far more powerful than the gas burner and provides a huge amount of heat that is easily able to overpower the heat sink ability of the tank. A header tank and vent line are installed on the setup so the system runs at nil pressure and any pressure buildup can be vented. the original saftey valve is still present on the tank.
The header tank ensures the water tank stays full at all times and also provides an expantion area. This is the same type of setup used on commercial boilers.
The solar pump may have to be replaced with a bigger pump or another pump added to increase the flow through the rediator core. The radiator has twin electric fans and the first fan in the circulation path is able to extract all the available heat and the second one blows relatively cold air. It would seem that the flow through the radiator needs to be increased to extract the maximum heat available.
The setup is total overkill for a home as it would be easily able output more than 50KW of heat energy into a home. The burner is capeable of 300KW if driven hard enough, the tank would sink 100+ and the radiator also could transfer over 100KW as it does in its native application.
The burner runs totaly clean and free of any smoke output. The haze seen in the vid was burning off of paint and insulation on the initial fire up of the heater with this burner. During the test the burner was fuled randomly through the activation of the fuel pump which caused the burner to burn at low and high outputs. The battery charger was used to power the 12V fan. It's setting of voltage and amperage were used to vary the airflow and heat output. for this test the blower was only run at half speed with occasional short runs to 3/4 speed which provided excessive output on the burner for the heater to cope with. .
During this test with the pump and fans running the heater did boil over even though the waste oil burner itself was running at a very low setting most of the time. The excess steam and pressure vented through the high mounted vert pipe, the header tank and the OEM saftey valve on the heater unit as intended in case of overheat. This ensures there can be no pressure build up in the heater/boiler at any time. When set up, a pulse type fuel pump in conjunction with an on/ off timer will be used to feed a regulated amount of waste motor or Vegetable oil into the burner to maintain a stable output.
A 2nd heat exchanger may also be fitted with a fan on the return line to the boiler to remove any left over heat to warm the area under the house and rise up through the flooring.
Heat output and subsequent consumption of the burner was not measured on the test but consumption should be around 1-2 L an hour for sustained operation once the tank and home have been warmed up to normal temprature. For fast warmups, the burner could be driven to around 10L an hour. Even this would greatly overpower the heat sink abilities of the heater however.
