claypot heaters

[nzbred]

Has anyone ever tried these? (look at vids on youtube) Ive made and used a few of these in the past and they are fantastic for keeping a small/medium sized room warm if there is a powercut in winter.be warned tho,dont leave unattended, if the wax leaks out into the container that the candles are sitting in,it can ignite and cause a fire.but apart from that,really good cheap way to keep warm in emergencies.

[Blue407]

Has anyone ever tried these? (look at vids on youtube) Ive made and used a few of these in the past and they are fantastic for keeping a small/medium sized room warm if there is a powercut in winter.be warned tho,dont leave unattended, if the wax leaks out into the container that the candles are sitting in,it can ignite and cause a fire.but apart from that,really good cheap way to keep warm in emergencies.

No I haven't, do you have some links?

[Plymtom]

I have seen a thread about this before though tea light candles may have been the theme, but yes some here have tried it with success.
We use candles rather than fire up the central heating more often in inbetween weather, part of our lifestyle means the house is never unoccupied plus the weather in these parts is quite mild.

[nzbred]

Just have a look on youtube for your basic design. I do find tho,with the inner pot,pack it with as much metal as possible.I drilled 4 holes and put 4 bolts in the holes,then threaded nuts and metal washers on to them.Dont get me wrong,this isnt going to be like a ''roaring fire'' heat being pumped out but you will definitely notice a temperature difference in a small room. just remember,this is for emergency heating situations and in my experience,these have worked for me.

[nickdutch]

An average regular candle gives about 80 watts of heat, so you have to realise that 10 candles total will give about (or up to) 800 watts. Tea lights probably have smaller flames so that figure probably isn't totally accurate for tea light systems. If you need 1 X KW (ish) of heat you need 12 or 13, but if you use many candles you will suffer with air quality issues, and also the flower pots get hot and the heat radiates down to the candles melting them and vaporizing the wax, so you get vaporised wax in the air you breathe.

If you can build a reflector around an "array" of three flowerpot heaters each with 4 candles under them, you can get a bit more heat into the living area which you can feel, but again be wary of the whole air quality issue.

I don't think you actually need many flowerpots stacked together, just one large one for each unit will do the trick so long as the hole is blocked up with a plug of tin foil to collect the convecting heat.

[hobo]

I had a tealight one going this evening. Needed a fleece blanket too but kept snuggly reading and iPadding quite happily the whole time!

[rik_uk3]

Nick is right, these type of heaters are not up to much. Your better off with the likes of a Vapalux or Coleman lantern which as well as light give off a good amount of heat.

[tigs]

they look like they work

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nzKbFzUEWkA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ancrNsJHkGw

[Malthouse]

If you need 1 X KW (ish) of heat you need 12 or 13, but if you use many candles you will suffer with air quality issues, and also the flower pots get hot and the heat radiates down to the candles melting them and vaporizing the wax, so you get vaporised wax in the air you breathe.

Excellent points, there are easier and safer ways to warm a small room.

For short periods, to warm up a room to start with for example, I like the bio-ethanol table top fires.