Gary Gilmore, My start to building a charcoal gasifier

I hold a 3" pipe up to the outlet of the pump on about a 45 degree angle. The pipe is about 5 or 6" long or shorter. Gets hot to hold so only flare a second or two. This is a small engine setup.

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A ceiling light dimmer switch will only cost a couple of bucks and that allows me to take my Kirby right down to turned off. Tomc

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Good idea, I have an extra one.

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Yeap, that´s the way I do it for my dihidration ovens. A simple dimmer does the work.
Abner

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Start with a light dimmer sure but if you go to buy one buy one rated for a ceiling fan. Light dimmers are best suited to resistive loads… my two cents…

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This is a short clip with an air matrass blower/pwm and a stainles sink tube…

Don’t forget the air passing thru the blowers engine compartiment…

Have quite a few little clips on youtube…

My observations: little air holes do the trick, not to much…
Rule of thumb: keep your airspeed in balance with the flame speed ( more airspeed then flame speed of course :wink: )

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Nice video Koen. Interesting, my air mattress pump does not have air going through the motor. When starting an engine my only interest is how the gas ignites, not really the flare.

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Koen

Am I right?

If the pipe stays cool (= good speed air and no air leaks)

if the heater hose (= too much air or too little)

Thierry

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Hi Jeff,

Yes, i agree. The only reason i mentioned this is to share some might be relevant information, especially if someone is struggling with finding good results.

Observations and learning… never a dull moment…

In this video you can see what happens if my hand seals the back of the engine compartiment.

More even, if the gas speed is to high, mixed with to much air, it will not ignite as easy, but still you would have good gas, only a bad mixture m an unexpected airleak…

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Hi Thierry,

The place where i hold my hand is cooled with the oncoming gas.
The thin wall pipe will not heat up as fast as it will be cooled.

when i start mixing gas with more or less air…

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Koen, nice videos. All your information and videos are good stuff…! :+1:

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Sharing my observations with those who enlightnent me :wink:

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Koen , the feed stock for your charcoal is it always bamboo ? Have you made charcoal from say pallet wood or hardwood/soft wood seasoned wood .
In all the time I have been running my engines on charcoal from pallet wood ect , I have never ever had such a pure blue looking flare like yours , wish we had bamboo here in Victoria so I could give it a try .
On your air mattress fan are you running the gas through it or using an ejector ?

Dave

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I would be curious as to how you make char with bamboo. I am growing bamboo and will increase that if it is easy method.

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As l recall Koen uses steam injection wich gives a lot more powerfull flame. lf you use just air(exhaust) intake the flame is a lot less intense in color and flame speed.

l use regular charcoal and when l was working with steam injection had the more or less same resaults as Koen. lts not so much in what you use its more in how you use it :wink:

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To: KristijanL–
I don’t think I’d equate “just air” and “(exhaust)”. Think of the amount of water vapor in the exhaust; It’s already steam. Then there’s the hot CO2. Both of these compounds can be decomposed endothermically to make a richer fuel, can’t they?
Am I missing something here?

Pete Stanaitis

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Got a good speed control for fan, I am unable to light flame. Pipe getting up to 180 degrees.

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Hi Mart, it looks kind of smoky. Maybe your charcoal is too large. A soup can at the end of the pipe could help with weak gas or too high of velocity gas.

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Hi Mart , I know this is going to sound crazy but … air leaks are not your friend on these systems . Every single joint of the pipes out from the lid of the gasifier need to be sealed onto the fittings with hose clamps or silicone or even sticky tape , air being sucked into the gas pipe will make lighting the outgoing gas real hard , I would also punch a hole in the bottom centre of a tin can surrounded by smaller holes around the edge to aid in mixing the air and gas at the end of the pipe .

Dave

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Mart , I just had another thought are you using the single nozzle you posted a picture of on 22 April or something different now ? might be an idea to have a quick look at it once its cooled down , also do you have a full load of charcoal on top of it before starting ?

Dave.

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