Can a campus Teach? Yes, We believe a campus can be the very lap of learning. It offers constraints to us which make us think, do, learn, and live differently. Making of hot water at campus using Chulha which is based on rocket stove principle require all of us to understand the working of rocket stove.
Need of hot water, ignorance about fuel and fire, frustration while using rocket chulha to make hot water, desire to use petroleum product to start fire, hurry to use paper or plastic to make fire led to need to know more about it.
The session was about knowing how to use Rocket Chulha but with some understanding of FIRE. We began with
The key question was “What all something need to start fire”?
We explores fuels,-Air (oxygen),and something the minimum heat / temperature required to get the combustion going -We understood what is Kindling temperature and how it is different for different fuels.
Then we wondered how different fuels give different amount of heat – compared paper, dry leaves, diff woods, petrol, etc
Wood we explored in more depth – How to know wood is wet or dry – break it and – smell it, hear the sound of breaking, feel the texture inside, check the colour,feel the weight,etc.
We talked about safety:Why not use petroleum product to start fire – Low kindling and more heat. It burns off your fuel very fast.
Then moved on to Rocket stove design:
Explored issues with current system – heat leaking, water getting cool, wind and so on. The need to re-designor rectify existing system is required.
We realized -Rocket oven is not a fast fire, it is slow fire which generates more heat over time and burns fuel more effectively.