Test drive last fall on petrol. Engine donor in background.
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This is sort of how things look today. Still waiting for snow to melt to fasten everything in place.
I don’t dare weld in the wood shed! You can see the gas mixer and the fancy copper cooler. Both are untested. One thing you can’t see is the gasbag…
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John,
Now that is so cool, it hurts. I want to build one. I have friends that have them, but they are not Gasified. I have to show them this, for sure.
Keep on Gasifiing.
Bob
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John that is just to cool. That truck has many story’s to tell and thanks to you more to come. They just keep getting better and better. My rat is a car butreally want to do a truck, with a gasifire of course.
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Jim I believe I got that old Chevy somewhere not far from Sandstone Minnesota. Underneath the cream colored paint it’s olive drab paint. It was still running in 1972.
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Another first in wood gas, that looks like TOO much fun!!
Also looks like something out of a “Mad Max” movie. Thanks for sharing.
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Nice! When I retire, something like that will be my daily driver. That’s living large in my book.
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I wanna here more about that gas bag John.
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O.K. Jim, here’s the schematic. In the main line running from the Gasifier to the 350 there is a T. At the T there is a Kirby. ( I suppose a bilge pump would work). The Kirby sucks some woodgas from the main line, sucking time depending on either the valve or a dimmer on the Kirby. The Kirby sends the woodgas into the gasbag which is inside a big tank- one and two thirds 55gal. drum. The gasgag is able to inflate because there is a vent in the drum (not in the gasbag). When bag is full, valve is shut and Kirby swithed off.
When screaming away from the hypothetical starting line, the valve is opened to allow the engine to suck the stored woodgas into the stream of woodgas coming from the gasifier, hopefully providing about a two second long kick in the ass, enough to get moving.
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Hey that’s cool John. What is the bag made from?
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Hi John, that´s realy cool. I have a question: what tipe of valve did you use? Is it a check valve? Can you give details of the valve and where did you located it? THANKS
Hi, Abner.
The valve is not a check valve. As you can see in the schematic drawing, there is a “thing” on top of the cab. That thing is a Kirby vacuum sweeper motor+vacuum pump, labeled “K”. In this photo you can see the actual kirby with the valve attached. The valve is a “blade valve” often used in swimming pool plumbing. The valve handle will pass through the cab roof into the cockpit. Abner, this is a build project, and I am stepping into places new for me. However, I am hoping to know within a month of good weather how this gasbag works. Stay tuned.
Are you running a woodgas vehicle? Or planning?
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Ahh! A good old Kirby. Love them. I was afraid of the plastic in the valve you used so I spent a lot of time lapping in a slide valve. I see now I wasted a lot of time Youes works better. What are you going to use for electricity for the Kirby. I have a 25 ft elect cord real for when I am at home. I have a HF 800 generator when I’m away. I think in retrospect an inverter would have been better, but it takes a lot of cranking to get the engine running on wood. TomC
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Hey, Tom. I have a Kirby under the hood, well I guess there’s no hood on the hotrod. I have a Kirby that I use for starting and I’ve been using The same one on all my previous builds. And yes I do use an inverter. I find it works very well and it is very reliable. I generally run two batteries which seems to provide plenty of stamina for getting the fire going. Also I have been able to run the engine on gasoline to power up the inverter while idling in the morning.
This woodrat Rod build will not have a gasoline tank. Same as my first build in the Mitsubishi pick up, I took the gasoline tank out of that one too. I love Kirbys! Of course, in this application I will only be running one Kirby at a time. As I mentioned I put a dimmer switch on the Kirby so when the inverter starts to whistle I can turn down the amps. The Kirby keeps running at a little slower speed and it works fine.
I have carried a small generator along for security in the past, but two batteries with the inverter is more elegant.
Hopefully, if my untested cooling system works, the valve will hold up. I have used other plastic valves very successfuly in the past. I belive Mike LaRosa uses these blade valves as well.
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Hello John, thanks for answering; …this the thing: when I saw your gas bag project I inmediatly took back my project of building an Al Frick´s tipe of gasifier (portable), by that meaning makeing it portable, that will give me the chance of using it in our ceramic and fruit concentrate artesanial shop we have in the farm. At the same time it would work as the gasifier for a 1978 CJ-10 Jeep 4x4 truck to witch I adapted a Cherokee 2010 motor. At the moment I´m in the city of Valencia (Venezuela, South America) where I work as a Phisician MD In a Hiperbaric Oxigen treatment unit, but next weekI´ll be back in my farm in Mérida and I´ll take pictures of what I´ve been gadering in junk yards for my project. Your gas bag desgine will solve the problem of starting the ovens of both shops and I can also use it in a trailer on my 1995 Bronco. Those are the reasons for me being interested in your projects; It´ll be a hybrid between Al Frick´s portable and yourg Gas Bag system. Forgive my English grammar errors, alldo I speak it very well, I´ve lost lots of my grammar. Have a nice day.
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Hey no fair! John stole my idea!!! LOL I was going to make something or parades, county fair and things like that. But I don’t have a place to store it out of sight, and I live in a semi nice neighborhood. So my stuff just can’t look that gnarly. But Longmont, Colo has a yearly ‘cruisin night’. ALL the local rods come out, even a willies jeep. The whole town stinks like back in the 1970s. I can still go to that. 
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Funny, If you had a Rat Rod with a famous hot rod builder label on it, And you could boast how much you paid for it, and what it will be worth someday, and it had “patina” instead of rust, you could park it in your front yard! (with an armed guard)!
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hey, thanks for the holler! although it doesn’t seem like it I am still a wood gasser! And I’ve got my 46 Chevy wood rat licensed and insured and ready for spring. I will post a new pick if I can figure out how…
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