BIDJANGA 09 / 23 / 2021 UPDATE

1) Nine ISECs designed and tested !

Till date, ISEC Cameroon team has designed ISEC cookers as follows :
- five ISECs of 3 ohms wire, installed in 10 households in Yaounde Cameroon, between july and august 2021, in a two round dissemination program ( we've installed 5 ISECs in 5 homes ; de-installed them after a two weeks testing , and installed them in 5 new homes ) ;
-one  ISEC of 3 ohms wire, designed for testing on site, in our workshop ;
-two  ISEC  of 3 ohms wire ,designed , following the join worskhop with Mr Raphael Hoffman ; we used his heater model named Kanthal D wire ( 0.7mm and 3.84 ohms per meter ) and successfully built and tested two new ISECs.
-one ISEC of 6.4 ohms wire / 400 watts , designed and to be tested for a restaurant manager ( Mr Ayaba )  in Yaounde Cameroon ; we tested that new ISEc with 4 panels hooked in series and parallel and we've succesfully cooked spaghetti with it, on September 19,2021.All our ISEC cookers are insulated with wool.
Now, we are preparing to launch the design of 80 ISECs for the Cameroon market and CEMAC sub region.

2) ABOUT THE ISEC CONTAINER

We have two ISEC models : one with a plastic bucket, another with the steel bucket.
We met some prospects who asked us if we could not design a fixed ISEC in a kitchen ( see attached picture )  , using cement blocks or soil bricks . We are submitting this question to the ISEC Team , for reflexion and comments.
in Cameroon, to design an ISEC container of 50 cms height and 35 cms of diamter, with aluminium is expensive ( about 20 USD ).As we plan to design ISECs for the market, we think our concern is to design low cost ISECs ; if the cement blocks or soil bricks could insulate well and be cheaper to build ISECs, why not try it ?

3) 400W ISEC testing

This week , we are testing our new model of ISEC that is connected to 4 panels of 100W in series and parallel and we plan to install it for testing in a local restaurant for 30 days, as from october 8,2021.

Best Regards

Bidjanga Biloa
ISEC Cameroon Team Coordinator
Tel / Whatsapp : +237 670708728 Yaounde Cameroon
www.gerpad.mozello.com

Bidjanga,

This is great news. Congratulations.

I have always been interested in using earth to make a permanent, or "fixed" cooker... This is the kind of cookers we have in the USA: heavy, permanent. I think earth blocks are great. However, earth will not provide sufficient insulation. The area you show in your picture is likely big enough to allow you to put in sufficient insulation as well as the cooking chamber. The challenge is finding a way to support the cooking chamber inside of the insulation, because if you use wool, the ISEC will compress the wool over time and sink inside it. We use thin metal supports (in the insulation) or Perlite, rockwool insulation, or vermiculite under the ISEC.

Ok Pete.
You know, in Africa, we don't usually find the listed insulating materials ( Perlite, rockwool insulation, or vermiculite ) ; but as we are in the research fields, we may try something like clay and make bricks with it ; and check if it could insulate the ISEC ; because clay in Africa , is used to make cooking pots which retain heat during cooking .
Regards
Bidjanga