Fired it up today and mowed about 1/2 acre that was mostly dandelions.
With the mower running could not get over about an estimated 1500 rpm so really slow mowing.
The mower could run in high gear when not mowing.
The next issue is that it would only run with the choke fully on. This seems strange because the gasoline valve was closed?
I will check for air leaks and tear the filter apart after things cool off
It ran for over 1/2 hour and the tempretures gauge at the top of the 6” column never moved off ambient temp 75 deg.
If you are connecting the wg to the air inlet as most do, closing the gasoline carb choke would only serve to restrict the wg/air mix. Just like closing the throttle. That wouldfor sure explin the low rpm. Why it wont run without choke is another diiscussion.
What Andy sayd. This makes no sence. Yes there is always some power reduction but not that much. I am sure there is a bug somewhere that will make you hold your head once you figure it out. Happens to all of us
Mystery solved but lack of a blower for startup is still causing the most issues.
When I checked the charcoal used I found it had only used about 4” in 45 min and based on other runs should have used about 24”.
I am not getting the charcoal ignited! It seems to be smoldering so maybe too wet? Or nozzles are plugged?
So apparently I was running on gasoline and by having it on full choke, high vacuum it can pull some gas past the fuel solenoid valve on the carburetor.
So I need to add a blower and flare to be sure it is ready to go. I have been just using the engine for suction and when it gets to chugging badly just shut off the gasoline.
Decided to go back to Basics and so got rid of the filter. Noted that although there was a little bit of black soot it was not plugged, but I had mad a tricky sliding pipe that had slid nearly closed.
So started it up using a 120v blower, got the motor running on gasoline and using the fuel shutoff solenoid weaned it onto wood gas.
YEA!!! It works and can mow almost as well as on gasoline.
What a moment, I have worked way harder on this thing than the initial startup of my truck. SWEM
now I still have some heat damaged Flex tube and need to redo the filter so it FLOWS.
Thanks Mike, I like the gasifier set up you have built. The water cooled nozzle sure seems to be working great, making water vapor for the intake air for more hydrogen out put of the gasifier. It is also seems to controling the gasifier temperatures around the lower part of the gasifier. I like how you can see it percolate through the clear tube. The mounting of the whole unit is nice. A Great build you have shown us. Thanks for the walk around and the ride with you.
Bob
Great job of converting to char=gas. I would be curious how much lawn you can actually do with one fillup. I could save A LOT of money if I did that. I mow every 4/5 days and it takes 5 gal. each time at least. I use the high priced gas with out ethanol which yesterday cost me $3.79 a gallon. I would have to get another mower though, because my wife will not tolerate me playing with our new one. Some times she takes it out and re-mows parts she doesn’t like how I did. TomC
Good evening Mike Gibb thanks for the vidio walk arounds and drives, looks like the water cooled nosel is working good, i got too recheck how you made that nosel cooler now. I want too learn the charco varios design ideas before long. keep them charco design ideas posted thanks the excellent postings.
I mowed a square area of 0.12 acres of 3 to 4” tall grass and including startup burned 2.1 lb (1.7 gallons) of Douglas fir charcoal.
Then the mower started surging, and died?. It still had at least another 2 lbs of charcoal so not sure why the thing quit, the temp gauge was still under 140 degrees at the top of the 6” column
TomC
