Yes I found a big roll of steel wool on the side walk in front of my house and am making lots of new and exciting stove discoveries with it. It really can make a stove more efficient. Even my cyclone stove has been tamed but it still cyclones..

Pest,
What are these exciting discoveries? Inquiring minds want to know!!

I think crackheads or meth heads use steel wool as some sort of filter in their crack/meth pipes.

LOL... Well my neighbors are tweakers so maybe that's where it came from. :)

It makes an open top stove more efficient that's all. It's better to find some steel wool on the street then to crawl under your house and steal insulation from it.

Once steel wool has been heated like that, it'll rust really, really fast.

Steel wool can be made to burn as well. Actually all it takes is some boiled linseed oil. As the oil cures it generates heat. The steel wool , when enclosed, acts as insulation and traps the heat so it builds up and bang, spontaneous combustion.

Be careful with putting steel wool in a stove.

Isn't insulation usually fiberglass, rather than steel wool? If you hold this stuff across the terminals of a 9V battery does it burn? If it does it may be steel wool, if not its something else.

a neat fire starting trip is steel wool and a 9v battery. Jurt rub the 2 ends of the battery on the steel wool and poof. it kills the battery after one use though.

I teach firebuilding and I use the big square 6volt batteries. These seem to last a LONG time when using the battery/steel wool method.

Seems like it would be easier to carry a Boy Scout Hot-Spark and use the wool for tinder.

Apparently Doritos burn very well, don't remember where I heard that so it might not be true, its been a while and I've never tried it.
Hand sanitizer burns pretty well too.

On topic though, normally people put fiberglass insulation (the yellow or pink stuff in your attic) in their stoves to help the efficiency, not steel wool (the stuff used to scrub pots/polish soda can stoves:)). Steel wool doesn't seem like it would work too well in that department.

Adam

Cheese puffs work great too, like little candles....

Apparently Doritos burn very well, don't remember where I heard that so it might not be true, its been a while and I've never tried it.
Hand sanitizer burns pretty well too.

On topic though, normally people put fiberglass insulation (the yellow or pink stuff in your attic) in their stoves to help the efficiency, not steel wool (the stuff used to scrub pots/polish soda can stoves:)). Steel wool doesn't seem like it would work too well in that department.

Adam

As I stated in one of my first posts steel wool is working quite well to make the stoves more efficient. Any type of wicking material will.

Hopefully I am not too off topic here.... Has anyone added steel wool or fiberglass insulation to a trangia burner? I am wondering if it would boost performance.

Take a little wad of the steel wool (if it is one of the finer grades) and vigorously rub the stove with it. If the stove was made from aluminum cans it will remove the coloring agent from the can and polish it to a nice shine.

As I stated in one of my first posts steel wool is working quite well to make the stoves more efficient. Any type of wicking material will.

I am confused... Steel wool wicks?

I'm not sure that metal is all that good at wicking...
Here's some pics of both steel wool and fiberglass insultaion, respectively.
I'm just having a hard time believing that steel wool has wicking properties but I've never really experimented with it before so I could be entirely wrong.

Adam

I know steel wool (or iron shavings) burns hot, but doesn't a property have to "absorb" in order to wick?

Vary fine steel wool might provide capillary action to some extent but it also burns really hot. The finer it is the better it burns.:cool:

Vary fine steel wool might provide capillary action to some extent but it also burns really hot. The finer it is the better it burns.:cool:

It is very fine and it is making my stoves run more efficiently.

I don't understand why people are questioning what my experiments have proved. I don't know how long it will last but that is not important for my kitchen experiments. I put steel wool around the edge of one of my 10 home-made cyclone stoves and it tamed it down nicley while still providing the cycloning action.

I've tried it in several different stove types. I make several stoves everyday. Maybe it's time for me to change to a male avatar??

It is very fine and it is making my stoves run more efficiently.

I don't understand why people are questioning what my experiments have proved. I don't know how long it will last but that is not important for my kitchen experiments. I put steel wool around the edge of one of my 10 home-made cyclone stoves and it tamed it down nicley while still providing the cycloning action.

I've tried it in several different stove types. I make several stoves everyday. Maybe it's time for me to change to a male avatar??

I agree that it has a taming ability.

I like your avatar, hair blowing in the breeze, on top of the world but you're making way too many stoves per day. Soon you'll be making more than Skids;)

I have made tests of 3 different materials, fiberglass cloth, pink home insulation and very fine steel wool (0000).

These are my findings with photos. (http://www.whiteblaze.net/forum/showpost.php?p=238507&postcount=13)


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I agree that it has a taming ability.

I like your avatar, hair blowing in the breeze, on top of the world but you're making way too many stoves per day. Soon you'll be making more than Skids;)


I put one stove in a geocache this week. At least with geocaching I have an easy way to get rid of them.. :)