Long term engine wear on wood gas

[kyle (Kyle Townsend)]

Hi Joshua.

About 4 months ago, I had a goal similar to yours, and was entirely new to charcoal gasification.

I built a simple fire charcoal gasifier and had a generator running pretty quick (you can build a simple fire in a weekend).

Since we are at similar stages of learning, you might find it interesting to look at my thread.

Charcoal Gasifier for Generator

I am working along on my V-10 project. But it has recently come to my attention that I should also consider building a gasifier to run a generator to charge my battery bank when solar charging is insufficient. I notice that many people build charcoal gasifiers to power smaller engines. Is it practical to use a WK style gasifier to power a medium sized generator (say 5000 watts). Could the same gassifier design be used, simply with a smaller restriction plate? Or would the whole thing need t…

There are people here with decades of experience and knowledge on this subject. You have definitely come to the right place.

I will give you my thoughts on your project to help get you “jump started.”

1. I would strongly consider a charcoal gasifier, such as the simple fire, for your first gasifier. These work well in a “generator” setting, and they are significantly easier to build than a wood gasifier, and you are very unlikely to damage your engine with them.

2. I don’t know how big of a generator you want to build. I just built another one, which you can see near the bottom of my thread. If 7200 watt continuous, 10,000 watt peak sounds sufficient for your needs, then you might want to try something like that. I am very pleased with it. The only change I would make is to go with the larger v-twin 22 hp predator engine, if you want to make full rated power from charcoal gas. You could build such a generator (gasifier and all) for around $1,300.

However, you don’t have to “tear up” your existing generator to try it on charcoal gas. It is pretty easy to adapt it to charcoal gas, then go back to gasoline. You can build a simple fire for probably $200 if you scrounge up some parts, and try it. It is very unlikely to damage your generator in any way.

3 The only problem I have not solved yet is the life of the “nozzle” for the gasifier. You will be reading about that. There is a seperate thread which discusses nozzles for charcoal gasifiers. If you want a quick solution and want to stick with the simple fire design, look at Dave’s nozzle. He basically casts refractory cement around the nozzle. He reports a life of over 100 hours on those nozzles. Which is not bad. If you want to consider significantly changing the design, then I would think about a “hearth” style nozzle, which admits intake air from the bottom. That is probably what I will try when I build my next gasifier.

Good luck with your project!