The Little Flames

[Beltran Mathews]

About15 minutes later I hear a loud POP and saw little flames dancing at the bottom of the oven. I freak out, turn off the self-cleaning feature, grab the fire extinguisher and try to open the door, which wouldn't open.I later found out this was a safety feature because the temperature inside was close to 480 C (900 F).

So, were these little dancing flames and the resulting smoke safe and normal in the operation of the self-clean cycle? If not, what can I do before running the cycle again to minimize flames and smoke?

In order to start a fire, you either need a spark, or you need to heat something beyond its autoignition temperature (AKA kindling point). You might have had a short - or you might actually be using a gas oven with spark ignition - but I'm guessing your issue was the latter.

Cooking oil or grease being heated beyond its autoignition point is one of the most common causes of kitchen fires (grease fires). Supposedly, some oils have autoignition points as low as 550 F (or 288 C), though I'm not sure which oils those are. Olive oil would be my guess as the lowest, but pepperoni grease could very well have ignited at self-cleaning temperatures (which, as you noticed, go up to nearly 1000 F).

Fortunately for you, all modern ovens have a mechanical interlock which prevents them from being opened during a self-cleaning cycle. If you'd opened it, you would have made the problem a lot worse by (a) supplying the fire with abundant oxygen, and (b) drawing all the hot air and flames out of the oven and into your kitchen, quite possibly setting your whole home on fire. Heat wants to move to where it's cold; that's why you keep your doors and windows closed in the winter.

There are a multitude of oven cleaners available for self-cleaning ovens - you are supposed to use these before you run a self-cleaning cycle. Yes, I know it's odd, but "self-cleaning" doesn't really actually mean that it cleans itself, it just gives you a little extra help. You need to try to clear out all the grease and big chunks of food first using one of these cleaners, then run the self-cleaning cycle to deal with anything you might have missed.

Though electric ovens are not supposed to have fire in there they do a fine job of containing it. Even if you somehow manage to set the heating element aflame (I've done this and still don't know how).

this happened to me yesterday. The flames were so bad, that my entire oven is charred from it...and the inside panel of tempered glass broke. Fortunately, the fire dept came and made sure everything was okay...but I unfortunately had to go out last night and buy a new oven (it was only 2.5 years old). so much for 2 year warranties.

I had a little fire going on in my self-cleaning oven, and I was worried about it too. I called the fire department, and the fire guy was a tad snarky with me. He informed me that that's what happens when you use the self-cleaning feature. No worries.

In 2013, 28 years later, I met this same boy again. He was now a grownup man. He retold his story of working during the night and going to school during the day to fund his education; of completing primary school as one of the top students in the country; of completing high school studying his favourite subject- mathematics; of completing four years of university studying his favourite course- business; of completing a masters degree in management; of being a PhD candidate; of running an organisation that is sponsoring 3,000 children to go to school; of starting three schools that are educating two thousand children. Here he was, 29 years later; 29 years of struggle; 29 years of fighting for a dream. Every semester was a dream; every term was a miracle; a miracle for school fees; a miracle for living expenses. This boy who ignited a little flame to go to school back in 1985, who several times felt like quitting, had kept the little flame burning.

But you are not Jesus you say. You get tired. The leadership disappoints you. You doubt your abilities. And you are simply not willing to start. Or if you start, you are not willing to go on. You are not alone. All the powerful men of the past and present have felt disappointed. They have had doubts. Some were forced to start anything because the consequences of doing nothing were worse than doing something.

What is your dream? What has God called you to do? Does it sound impossible? Is it tiring? Are you discouraged? Is it taking too long? All these are excuses the enemy wants you to have because he knows you are going somewhere big. He tempted Jesus by telling him he can give him the big things now. Jesus said NO and instead chose 12 men.

It is always nice to have a warm feeling in your garden. Little Flames gives that wonderful feeling. In the summer, the autumn and the winter he shows little, red flames. That gives a stunning view and a warm feeling. Little Flames is beautiful on the terrace in a decorative pot and/or in your garden. Can also be applied as a compact hedge. Grows best in full sun or semi shade. Little Flames grows best on an acid soil type. Height is 20" and width 12". Little Flames is maintenance friendly, blooms in May and is an evergreen.

It is always nice to have a warm feeling in your garden. Little Flames gives that wonderful feeling. In the summer, the autumn and the winter he shows little, red flames. That gives a stunning view and a warm feeling. Little Flames is beautiful on the terrace in a decorative pot and/or in your garden. Can also be applied as a compact hedge. Grows best in full sun or semi shade. Little Flames grows best on an acid soil type and is hardy to -20 Celsius. Height is 50 cm and width 30 cm. Little Flames is maintenance friendly, blooms in May and is an evergreen.

With Little Flames you get a warm feeling in your garden!

"Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,

the world offers itself to your imagination,

calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting --

over and over announcing your place

in the family of things."

---Wild Geese by Mary Oliver

Following my gege: older brother, and climbing over the tall berm that separated the busy road and the brown ocean of winter grass, I was ready for any mischievous acts. Partially shielded from the big wind by the berm, I hovered over to add another layer of protection as Gege struck a match. "Ssshhhkkk!" A little orange flame was born. It trembled vehemently before the big wind swept it away. My heart sank. Gege struck another match. Another little flame was born and swept away. Then another one. It was a game between the little flame and the big wind. Finally, a little flame took hold, with which Gege gleefully set fire to the grass. Instantly, the little flame came alive dancing with the wind, spreading its orange joy-- just for a moment, but long enough for seven-year-old me to jump and clap.

***

Life went unnoticeably fast while I was riding high with accepted achievements and low with missed goals, and feeling a perpetual shame of inadequacy. I ignored my heart that longed to dance, yet held deep in the ribcage.

Across the Pacific Ocean from China, I landed my expected dream job at a firm that had offices in 114 countries. After three months, each morning, it became harder and harder to drag myself out of bed and put on a proper outfit, in which I could hardly stretch my arms to embrace life fully. In front of the mirror in my San Francisco apartment, I said to myself, "Cherish what I have." But heaviness hooked around my heart. "Disperse, you heaviness!" I cried, lying on the couch every evening after a long day work, lonely and powerless.

***

I stood on the busy road facing where the tall berm used to be in my hometown. It had been made flat by bulldozers for building more factories and the long gone winter grass had forever lost its chance for another spring. But I remembered the little flame that strived to dance with the wind, again and again. My heart called out from the deep cage, "Keep dancing, until you dance me out!" Posted by Xiaojuan Shu on Mar 18, 2016

Their fire whirl investigations in the lab led them to find something that astonished them. The chaotic and dangerous fire whirl transformed into a tame and clean burning flame they call a "blue whirl."

One of its discoverers is now on a science team using supercomputers allocated by the Extreme Science and Engineering Discovery Environment (XSEDE) to reveal the structure of the blue whirl, a new type of flame that consists of four separate flames. The scientists hope blue whirls can one day be used to burn fuels more cleanly.

"The main finding of this new computational study is that we now know the main structure of the blue whirl," said Elaine Oran, professor and O'Donnell Foundation Chair VI, Department of Aerospace Engineering, Texas A&M University. Oran is a co-discoverer of the blue whirl and a co-author of a study on its structure published in PNAS, August 2020. "We know that it's a combination of many types of flames which come together and form themselves into probably the most ideal configuration for burning, which we had seen before."

A blue whirl is akin to a spinning blue flame that looks like a child's toy top. Oran says the top of it has the same shape as the sorting hat from Harry Potter. Most of its burning is along a very bright blue rim which spins.

The researchers used experimental data from the 2016 study that first discovered the blue whirl. The experimental setup consisted of two half-cylinders and a cylindrical stainless steel pan full of water. A liquid fuel, n-heptane, was poured on the surface of still water at the center of the pan and then was ignited. Two quartz half-cylinders were suspended over the pan. Offsetting the half-cylinders created two vertical slits that allowed air to be drawn in tangentially to the flame region, a commonly used to create fire whirls for laboratory study.

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