just read a thread about a flame licker that went into depth about wicks and the term (capillary action) this jogged my memory to something i tried many years ago to do and failed and its always been in the back of my mind.
Anyway many moons ago whilst i still had a full head of hair i booked a fishermans cottage on the north coast of britain and in the rear garden there was a bird table it was old and well weather worn but all day it dripped water into a tray that the birds came and drank and bathed in,the gardener said it was capillary action and looking at it ,it had a copper tube with a wick in it and it turned over at the top to face downhill the end of the wick was wrapped with a few turns of copper wire then about 1"coming out of the pipe which the water dripped from ,the copper pipe was then clad between wood and went into the ground.i tried to build one at home i thought that the wick lifted the water over the bend at the top then gavity would take over and the water would condense on to the copper wire on the end of the wick and drip off into the tray the gardener said it take about 3 weeks to start working but thats all he would say about it .Anyway i made it and it didnt work so i tried drilling holes into a plastic drain pipe and packing it with cotton wool and running the wick through that in a barrel of water even though the wick was getting really wet it didnt work,i have searched all over the net for a capillary action bird table and found nothing nearly forgot too whilst on holliday i even got out a metal detecter to see if there was a water pipe under there.just wondered if anyone has seen one or better knows how to make one that does work.
Anyway many moons ago whilst i still had a full head of hair i booked a fishermans cottage on the north coast of britain and in the rear garden there was a bird table it was old and well weather worn but all day it dripped water into a tray that the birds came and drank and bathed in,the gardener said it was capillary action and looking at it ,it had a copper tube with a wick in it and it turned over at the top to face downhill the end of the wick was wrapped with a few turns of copper wire then about 1"coming out of the pipe which the water dripped from ,the copper pipe was then clad between wood and went into the ground.i tried to build one at home i thought that the wick lifted the water over the bend at the top then gavity would take over and the water would condense on to the copper wire on the end of the wick and drip off into the tray the gardener said it take about 3 weeks to start working but thats all he would say about it .Anyway i made it and it didnt work so i tried drilling holes into a plastic drain pipe and packing it with cotton wool and running the wick through that in a barrel of water even though the wick was getting really wet it didnt work,i have searched all over the net for a capillary action bird table and found nothing nearly forgot too whilst on holliday i even got out a metal detecter to see if there was a water pipe under there.just wondered if anyone has seen one or better knows how to make one that does work.
