Wood gas?
 

Has anyone built a wood gas system? :turtle:

I've been toying with powering a small tractor with a FEMA-type wood gasifier (with a cyclone and a filter system for the tar)

What did you want to power with it?
Something like a wood stove or boiler or something like a piston engine?

a small piston engine.

That the same idea as the coal-gas engine conversions the brits did back in the war or whenever it was?

not only brits, a lot of countries had wood gas at the time of the war.

the engine would be a 10-something hp engine.

One thing I do remember is people saying that wood gas roughly cuts the engines power output in half.

exactly. That's why I need a 10-something hp engine.

The gearing will be super-low though, as the top speed only needs to be about 9Mph. It will pull a small trailer :)

but I can't make my mind if should build a updraft or a downdraft (or a sidedraft) gasifier. The fuel is going to be very inconsistent in quality and size.

The gasifier system also needs to be small in size.

Well, there's a problem. https://www.google.com/search?q=wood+gas+ca Looking at the Images of presumably successful installations, compactness is not apparent. Most successful seems to be VW, with a 'power bulge' on the hood and the filters underneath the floor.

And if the fuel is 'inconsistent in quality and size' you could add a chipper/shredder render it consistent.

Do you have any utility for the residual tar and the ashes?

Since it's Pyrolysis the 'ashes' should be biochar.

ash can probably be used in the garden, and tar can be used like in the old days (I could also use it as rust-proofing in my car :D)

"If sauna, vodka and tar won't help, the disease is fatal"

-Old finnish saying

Korpiklaani- Vodka https://youtu.be/e7kJRGPgvRQ

Have you seen the wood gasification stoves?
They burn up almost everything.

:)

Biochar is a soil amendment.

Ash is good to decrease the acidity of the soil. An old Jap immigrant once told me he used to do that in order to lead the watermelons he cultivated to become sweetier.

Tar is great for throat infections and respiratory diseases in general.

and it smells gooood :D we have a lot of historical buildings close to my home, love that smell at old machine meetings

but first, i'll build it for tractor use. If the design is good enough, i'll convert a Ram van or a Chevy Astro for wood gas- with automatic gas lambda adjustment, Quick-autostart and pellet-feeding system in the future :D

The engine must be tuned with higher comp and maybe introduce a supercharger, it improves the efficiency

Back when I was more heavily into VWs, I seem to recall reading that the WWII wood gas conversions also has shorter engine life in addition to the reduced power. I can't remember what the root cause was -- no lead for the valves, inconsistent mixture, or what -- but I'll try to dig up a reference before too long.

It's probably the tar. And the missing of lead is a great cause of the wear.

IIRC the lack of lead was not a great concern in those early VW engines, since they can run easily on ethanol and gaseous fuels.


What kind of hardware would you be considering to use to convert an EFI engine to wood gas? Do you think the same systems currently used for those CNG and LPG conversions would be OK?


You could eventually try some variable-compression setup, allowing you to retain some limp-home mode on gasoline/petrol. Unless you would rather use ethanol for that matter :D

I ran into these folks at an event in San Francisco.
 

There were several gasifier powered vehicles at the event and they were road worthy.

Vehicles | Gasifiers

Jim Mason has formed a company that has built gasifiers to power communities around the world. He is easy to talk to and work with.

About Us - ALL Power Labs

Probably just some standard thing like Arduino.

Controlling an engine is "Just" a bunch of inputs and outputs to control it. My coder friend could make a software to make the computer simply adjust the mixture and air inlet according to the lamda sensor.

I could use a SPFI carb system to act as a valve body and/or as a backup.

This is a faraway project. First, i'll make the generator.

If I can find a good design, I think i'll get a GMC sierra instead of a van, saw one of those yesterday :3


(yeah, we Finns liked American vehicles back in the day, nowadays it's the JDM scene that has catched on in the enthusiast side. In the daily traffic, the only americans are just Chrysler Voyagers, Daewoo-Chevrolet and Dodge/Fiat cahooeys. The new Jeep renegade looks nice tho)

This makes the 1/4th-cost-of-diesel and 1/2-the-capital-of-solar sound even better. :thumbup:

I've been actively reading on this particular field. It's interesting.

Why not trying some random Jap van instead of an American full-size rig for that wood gas conversion?

Jap vans are almost exclusively diesel here, and they are all sub-3L engines.

American vans are a lot of gas-equipped, and are rated for greater loads. (the gas generator system will weigh some, after all



And wood gas is so much cheaper than conventional fuels that there's not a great difference in cost. I also want an automatic, for the comfort :D

And I am a jap fan :D

I'll just crank up the compression ratio and add a supercharger.

At least by now it seems like Diesel lost a lot of its previous popularity in the JDM vans. So maybe a 5th-generation Toyota HiAce with the 2.7L 2TR-FE engine could be a good Guinea pig for your wood gas experiences.


You mentioned the Chevrolet Astro. Actually a forward-control Jap van (not just the Toyota HiAce but also similar models from Mitsubishi and Nissan) have higher payloads. They're also surprisingly roomy if you take into account their relatively smaller footprint compared to an American or Euro van.


About 92% of the Jap fleet is automatic nowadays, so that won't be in short supply :thumbup:

Just found out a "problem"


The car must be model year 1987 or be older... :/

Buut Finland is the promised land of old jalopies :D

At least you can still get a wood gas setup into a car there. Here in Brazil only a handful of older vehicles that were converted a long time ago are still granted the right to use a wood gas generator. Anyway, would there be any loophole such as mounting the wood gas generator to a trailer allow you to use it into any newer vehicle there in Finland?

Challenge accepted?
http://ecomodder.com/forum/member-fr...1396746884.jpg

It's not the generator itself, that makes the system "illegal"

Cars 87- and newer here have to comply with emissions, (Which isn't also a problem itself, syngas burns cleanly)

The problem is that here in eyes of the legislation (not sure if it's EU or our own law)
Wood gas isn't an accepted/certified fuel for roadway use.

But I se a crapton of interesting cars I could run on wood gas.


And the wood gas is produced on-demand, so ecomodding is still something I would do a lot :D

reducing consumption is still a important thing, so you can drive further on a X amount of wood, even if it's about 75-80% cheaper fuel than gasoline

Could you use wood gas for diesel intake fumigation?
Only because when the wood gad runs out you can keep going.
But as far as I am aware no one has tried it in this application.

this application exists, but you need the diesel to ignite the mix. 20% must be diesel.

Diesel engines also have a pinchy tax here

Pure wood w/option to run on gasoline would be better, I think.

Out-of-pocket isn't the only cost. There's also fuel management. What do you think about the convenience of split wood, kindling, pellets, or sawdust?

Split wood is something I can buy from family and friends, (a big plus) but it takes space and has less energy per cubic meter .
It also needs further chopping into smaller pieces, about the size of a half banana (bad example, I know :D

Kindling is something used in larger fuel applications (heat power plants, etc)
this is also a cheap alternative. don't know the price, though.

Pellets are a common energy source here, but it's a bit more expensive. But it has a great energy content and takes less room.

Sawdust is also an option, but it's a bit too light. The fire can spread easier through the combustion zone, and into the fuel, burning where it shouldn't.

Did you see the top gear where Clarkson drove a wood gasification powered car with spent coffee grinds?

i don't recall- sounds cool, though.