My first small engine run

You’re right, Arvid, I plumb forgot, “fan off”! I’ll add it in, thanks.

Hey Everyone,
This is my new fan project. I like the motor/rotor separation, no mixing here, hopefully.
Gordon Ooghe, from post 275, I’ll have more info for you soon.

I rolled a cone to transition from 2" pipe to the 5 1/4" fan inlet. I used eighteen 20 degree bends. This type of inlet is one of those efficiency tweeks. It’s not totally to the spec 7 degree slope, it would be longer so I compromised a bit.

I caulked the outside and pop riveted it to the front cover from the inside for a minimum clearance fit.

Exterior view of fit.

I needed a T20 secure torx bit to remove the screws.

It has a 4 1/2" X 6 1/2" base for securing to the unit.

Ready to adapt to 1 1/2" piping

Does anyone here know if this motor can be speed controlled?

Thanks, Pepe

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Hi All,
I had to make a clearance adjustment on the fan blades. I ran it and it dinged, so I made the adjustment. Runs fine now.

Pepe

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Hey All,
I used the end of a 4" pvc pipe cap to cut out a flange for a 2" pvc coupling at the fan exhaust port.

I’ll leave this til tomorrow am before I drill the mounting holes. I will drill graduated holes to eliminate cracking the flange by taking too big a bite. I hope this holds up to the test of time.
Pepe

Well, it’s tomorrow and here’s the finished fan ready to fit into the system. At this point in the beta version, it may be a stand alone unit. My bigger picture is a little more compact unified arrangement and I will fabricate a metal adapter for the outlet just to be safe from accidentally breaking the pvc… It’ll fill my winter hours in the shop.

I ended up splitting the housing and putting high temp grease on all the mating surfaces. I had some slight smoke leaks before I did this.

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Pepe,

I have the same fan. I made a plasma cut “exit to 1.5"NPT” fitting if you need one made of metal.

Stephen

Hi Stephen,
Thanks for the comment. What I really need is a plasma cutter, slip roller, etc, etc, etc as Arvid said.
May I ask how you transitioned the intake? Any clearance issues like I had. The fan has relatively close tolerances.
Pepe

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Hi All,
I opened up the hopper this am after a nice evening burn and was surprised to find the bridge across the River Kwai.

I thought, “oh, no”! How far down did it just burn?

A closer look showed why the unit kept running like there was no bridge. The fuel you see in the firetube fell from underneath the bridge and the hearth was fed and continued a good gas producing burn as seen in the last seconds of the vid. I like the gas color. I estimate I would only have had another 20 or so minutes of run time before the fuel was 4" above the nozzles. Much, much longer had the bridge collapsed.

One tap from a stick and the whole bridge collapsed just as you see it. Odd, too in that I ran the vibrator several times during the run. It’s now ready to start over with a new char bed established. I’ll just top off the hopper . I think I will move/rearrange the vibrator mechanism more to the hopper side.

Ambient temperature 65 degrees.
Here are the operating times and temps throughout the burn. I hope they’re dark enough to read.

All in all it was a good burn. The temps were slow to peak which I attribute to the fan being under powered for my particular sizing of gasifier. It certainly works well though as a good starter fan. The scrapping racket you hear from the fan on startup happens when I push on the motor or switch housing. It moves the blade closer to the housing and the tops of the mounting rivets. Just be careful.
Here are a short and long version of some flare action
.
short http://youtu.be/BqnjOxSNEvI

long http://youtu.be/r9mjJT_83IA

Pepe

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Your system and fuels will for sure be different than our systems. But when I set up our vibratro timer is usually off for only 10 to 15 seconds this is with the very light cedar. The on time is very short just a few seconds. I always start out with a close timed interval, this causes a rich condition and then back of the off intervals until I have a satisfactory flare. The Vibrator is as close to the top of the hopper as possible and in our case is very effective and touchy it does not take much. We want the machine to do some bridging to get the results you just experience. We try to get the shaker to shake down just enough to keep the hearth flowing and hot.

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Hi Matt,
Thanks for the response. So your vibrator comes on approx every 15 secs for a couple of secs. This means you continuously run the vibrator thru the burn. Yes, our fuels have a lot to say about this. I haven’t timered mine yet, but I previously ran it manually 15 secs every 10-15 mins. I didn’t this time, only 2-3 at most for the hr+ run. Time to install that timer!
My vibrator will move, also.
Pepe

Yes if you time this your machine will for sure run linear. This is my experience anyways :smile:

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Hi All,
I finally got the flanges and bracket cut out and welded onto my hopper.
I welded one flange to the hopper using the hopper weld seam as a thicker base, shortened the original hanging bracket and bolted it together. I ran some beads on the pulley weight to increase the shake power. This certainly does shake the hopper now.
Now for another burn and hopefully the entire load will be consumed.
Pepe

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I burned approx 30 pounds of fuel last night in 2 hrs and 22 mins. I was looking for a temp spike or point where I could refuel with the existing fuel still approx 4 " above the nozzles. I was about a 1/2 hr late, burned down to the restriction again, but I think I can start to get closer with my next burn. It’s pretty boring just burning wood and probably just as boring watching it. It was, however, informative for me. I ended up vibrating every 15 mins for 15 secs and had no bridging problems. I also shook the grate every 20 to 30 mins.
The vid is long.

This is the log I kept. The only real spike in temp was the hopper temp and (I learned the next morning) that by that time the fire had probably burned too far down towards the restriction. I’m thinking with a weighed load that establishing a time to refuel will be easier than depending on temps which seem to mostly stabilize .
Pepe

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Lol… flaring is boring… running an engine is much better

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I’m hoping to have the 18 hp B&S up soon.

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Put the engine under some kind of load… doesn’t take much woodgas just to make an engine run… just my 2 cents

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You aint messing around with that vibrator!!! Very nice!!

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You are havin way to much fun Pepe, I like that swirl flair! Very cool! Herb H

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Hi All,
The morning after results of burn 3.

@17s note the new lip on the top of my hourglass hearth. There’s some charcoal on it, but it went through the hottest temps of the burn and hasn’t distorted yet. One of my improvements, see reply # 360.

@42s I discover there’s a drain problem.

@57s A quick shot of the cooler condensate. You’ll have to pause the vid to really see it.

@1m06s when I said it’s full, it was only full from the valve up, since the valve remained in the closed position due to a bad handle.

With the moat drain plugged, the cooler did a stand up job of capturing the moisture. This was a good burn n learn.
Pepe

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Put together my new drain. The drain hole is 1 1’2" but the valve is 1 1/4". The main body is 2". A street el brings the shut off to the front. I could turn it a quarter turn to the right if necessary. to get it out of the way. I still have to insulate that heat shield around the hearth area. It sure looks better than the old one.
Pepe

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Hey Everyone,
What a pleasant surprise I got this am when I started stripping a Reliance brand hot water heater. The shell has a plastic coating before the insulation is installed, so it comes off basically in one piece. First time I’ve seen this.
Pepe

This is 2" stuff, top notch. The bare tank is 20" diam.

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