Has anyone every seen or built a Steam Powered FAN?

[Rocket Man]

I heat my work shop with a wood stove in winter. I set my sterling fan on the wood stove to run and circulate the heat all day with no attention at all but a faster more powerful fan will work better.

My idea is to build a water tank that sets right on top of the wood stove then build a 1 cylinder fan on top of the water tank. Give the fan blade a spin it will run like a sterling Fan engine. The fan needs to run a water pump, .125" diameter piston .250" stroke will probably be enough to pump water into the boiler tank. Might need to gear drive or belt drive the pump to a 90% slower speed than the fan, 1 drop of water for about every 10 engine strokes. I want the fan to run all day so it does not need to be turned off to add more water. All the fan needs is a small tank that holds about 1/2 cup water to pump into the boiler tank for about 1 hour.

I already did tests, 1.5" diameter piston 1.5" stroke will turn a 24" fan blade 1000 rpms on 100 psi it produces so much power it is dangerous. 5 to 10 psi runs much better.

1" piston with 1.5" stroke is good it turns the same 24" blade slower, a smaller blade might be better.

I need a way to regulate how much water is pumped into the boiler and a governor to regulate stream pressure so the fan runs a continuous speed all day.

I don't want to be continually screwing with the fan every 5 minutes it needs to run with no attention for at least 1 hour each time, all day long for 8 hours.

I know a larger more powerful 4" bore beta sterling fan is the answer but I think a steam power fan will be more FUN to have.

 

[vederstein]

I've had my engines power all sorts of stupid things, but a fan isn't one of them...

Though I'm not surprised of the power you're seeing. My PMR 5CI is rated for 1/4" hp at 50 psi and had roughly the same bore and stroke as your engine.

...Ved.

 

[mcostello]

Could the steam be vented into a tank to condense back to water thereby increasing run time?

 

[Rocket Man]

Could the steam be vented into a tank to condense back to water thereby increasing run time?

Yes a closed system will work. I did an experiment to see how much copper tubing it takes to cool the steam, it takes 60 feet of 1/4" tubing with natural air cooling, no fan. Maybe tubing can be shortened to 50 ft or 40 ft with the fan running and cooling the copper tubing. Where you going to put 40 or 50 ft of tubing on a fan? Maybe a radiator will make it better.

 

[TimTaylor]

Have you looked at other than a piston driven design? Google coppus cp-20 - this is a 20" turbine drives fan that operates on either air or steam, might give you some ideas for an alternative design....