Wow Steve! Such a lot of info…i will have to read it again now, LOL! Thanks for the comments on fully welding, I really didn’t see a big reason to fully weld but you pretty much convinced me in one read! I also take the CO very seriously. I have already planned to only use a vehicle that has a tray-back. Not even a moulded connected tray body, I have done lots of crazy stuff but poison gas is something I don’t want to die from, or spend my life being cautious of. Seeing Gas producers in the boot of a car is a good way to end up in trouble!! Stainless woul be great to work with but I will look at it down the track!
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No not in Victoria. Just lucky cos live in Western Australia. Although maybe WA isn’t that far off the mark in the nanny state races, I think we are beating Queensland now…Then along came gasification…a good little distraction! Ill try and post some photos!!
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Yes you are well in front of me there!! I am wondering how I access various things later. I will build it for now and see what I think. I did have a go at finding the WK book and failed…so I just latched onto the Petersen book.
Gasifiers in the trunk/boot can be done safely, but it must be done diligently. Air vents to let any off gas escape to atmosphere in the lid of the Boot, divorcing the Boot from the cabin of the car with a wall. A lot will have the gasifier peeking out of the Boot by cutting a hole in the lid. Louvers would be a good way to let it vent while going down the road.
No matter what route you go please install Carbon Monoxide detectors. Even if you put it in the bed of a Lorry or in your garage for a generator. They make self contained detectors or ones powered by 12 Volts DC.
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So your intent is to vehicle gasifiy with a Ben’sBook based system?
That’d be doable in the back of an open bed alright. You’d want to copy closely the bigger cooler system DeanL made up. And IF you were far eastern wettish Australia like Dave is you’d want to copy Deans added hot gas wood drying loop too. For on-board dry wood making. West Australia is very, very dry yes?
All woodgasifer are “fuel-hogs” when actually worked; not just flare stunting.
For a BenBook type system (oversized up in mostly SS) in the back of a pick up truck search the topic of Kyle DiMario - Southern Yankee, here on the DOW for his pictures.
To get a Wayne&Chris’s book, only available here on the DOW thru the upper listed STORE page.
As Cody said. Sedan trunk mounted units are valid if your local copstopo’s will allow you to pass.
Look up J.O. Olsen’s Volvo gasifer here on the DOW. His own designed systems. Trunks are tight. The Ben’sBook system will be too physically big imho to do a trunk mounted.
And a rear bumper mounted system must be the lightest construction of all. Joni here on the DOW evolved for that.
In-truck (boot) fully discrete no-see’em must be the most compact and so will be a charcoal only system. BenP. did an old Mustang car in-trunk charcoal system in the second book edition.
Here on the DOW Kristijan L. did his M.B. sedan charcoal very discrete in-trunk. His own design.
Ukrainian Sergey L. has an in-trunk charcoal system his own design too. Pictured here on the DOW.
S.U.
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Thanks Steve, you are a wealth of information! Yes Western Australia is very dry. Although we are down in the southern end, I will look at the wood drier after I have tackled more of the steps of the build. I am not looking at using a big utility (ute). I will use an isuzu with a 3.0 litre motor. Weighs in around 1.5 ton. Not big stuff like I see in many of the pictures of dual wheel machines etc. I hesitate to ask but the easiest wood to get here is a red hardwood called “Jarrah”. It is a very, very low ash wood which I suspect is good. I hear talk of pine, this stuff is opposite of pine! Chunking is not an option (i dont think anyway), I would be cutting it into its pieces. So what happens when using high density, hard wood?
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Cheers Cody, Yes that all sounds good. I will follow what you say and get a gas monitor. Its an easy thing to do! I will stick to utes tho. Even when I need a four-door we have plenty of dual cab utes to choose from. Sounds like in the States to get a trayback you must drive a pretty big machine!? I never thought of vents and louvres before…maybe even with the utility there might be a way to add some to keep the gas away. I remember hearing about gas stoves using this gas after the war killing people in their kitchens!! Not a very fun way to die…
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Due to the EPA and their strange emissions rulings, larger trucks are allowed to have poorer emissions. That started in the 1970s and the grip got tightened every year. A 1500lb capacity Pickup is as big as a 2 Ton Pickup from the 60s.
Crash Ratings also had something to do with the increase in size.
The mini truck/ute has been extinct in the USA since I’d say 2010. I love little trucks, I wish my 1986 Mazda B2000 hadn’t got totalled in a wreck, it’s a farm truck now for moving stuff about.
I think the only true American Utes(Coupe Utility, pickup car chassis) were the Ford Ranchero and the Chevy El Camino/GMC Caballero or Sprint. Still easy to find used but their prices can be inflated due to the cult following behind them.
Ford Ranger was the last holdout for a small pickup truck, I think their design changed in 2010 or around there.
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Hmmm. I was hoping some of the other actual Ben’sBook system builders and users would chime in by now.
But hey Mr Andrzej has contributed now.
Cody the Nissan Frontier hardbodies came out in May 1999 with a four door pickup. These were still compact small. And were made in Tennessee USofA. Yep, then they went larger “mid-sized” by still available as four doors with a bed today. I’ve two relatives love these things.
NeilW. as a new woodgas user strongly favor an inline engine. You woopsie do tar it up and fix-corrections will be so ever much easier.
ANY WOODGASIFIER WILL MAKE AND SENT TARS DOWNSTREAM IF YOU BOTCH YOUR OPERATING. And it will be you, the operators fault. Not the gasifier. Not the wood.
On your Jarrah red hardwood there was back in the 80’s a travel around the whole of Australia Preacher who did his missionizing driving him and his wife on wood. He had a PTO? belt? driven front bumper saw he used for roadside woods chunking up. I am certain on your side of it he would have used your wood. He only complainded about some sand filled ant holed wood making too much silica melted slag.
Wayne Keith himself on a cross country SW America race had a portable electrical generator he’d woodgas from his heated-up, producing truck system and then with a small table top electric saw chunk up roadside found desert hard dry woods. Race rules said only found, made, and scrounged fuels allowed.
You can shear chunk soft woods and sap wet hardwoods. Dry hardwood you’d best just saw.
I like to see the charcoal lover guys make-more-charcoal fuel alongside the road. Talk about “range anxiety”.
Operating in a woodgasifier the general rule of thumb is you can 2X size the quicker energy releasing soft woods. True hardwoods although energy denser by volume, release that energy slower so have to be chunked smaller to get more active surface areas and flow though gaps.
Low ash, high ash you control by the Ben’sBook system unique sifter grate. Less activation for low-ash. More frequent activation for high ash. No more having to just rely on just gas-flow-velocity to grate clear.
Same with why no cyclone. Gas flow dependent to work at all effectively. Nogood at all at engine idle. And Zaps a percentage of engine power just to get the gas flow up to spin it up to at all effectively. Not good for 500cc electrical generator engines already down half power on woodgas with no good way to ignition timing advance.
You’ve the book. That vertical side chamber is multipurpose. Slow down the gas&ash out for settling and collection. Using virtually no additional engine energy to do this. Do some gas heating of the gasifier primary intake air. Moderate “Pre-heating”. Transfer the still hot gases up to the annular heat around the gooey tars hopper zone to heat melt these to flowing down for incineration. “Pyrolysis Accelerator”. One of three patent worthy design features he gives away with a book purchase.
S.U.
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This is so true Steve, all gasifier operators can make tar if they do not know the other 75% of operating a gasifier. If it is a true proven gasifier build, built correctly it is not the gasifier’s fault. It is the operators fault.
Bob
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What would all the Experianced wood gas folks say the biggest over looked mistake is might be? my only thought would be useing wood with more moisture than capable.of makeing good clean replacement charco below the air feed tubes- or not watching the gauges to make sure not running in heater mode.ANY OTHER overlooked THOUGHTS.? THANKS. I must have missed a half dozen or so over looked thoughts.?
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Hi Kevin, i would say the biggest tar-mistake would be, burn down the charbed to low, below nozzle level, then fill up with wood, start-up and go… this often gives enormous amounts of tarry gas, but beware, it can give perfectly good gas at start-up and flaring, to release the tar some delayed, when chunks are making their way lower in the charbed.
I believe the WK gasifier are’nt all this sensitive due to it’s big charbed, but an Imbert can produce thick, yellowish, smoke gas for a long time before charbed has settled.
Trucks/cars run excellent on tar-gas, almost like on gasoline… but one will be dissapointed next start-up.
Same thing can happen if one parks a car with Imbert, where a fuel hang-up (bridging) is going on.
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Good morning Kevin
I think not having the proper job or tasks for the gasified machine.
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Well said Mr Wayne. And in your direct said way.
Me, as is well known, cannot just not use too many words.
Here I said compliments: you did work load your made up woodgas system from the very beginning with an engine:
Two years later experienced gasifier man Giorgio P gave the same advice. Use an engine to create the real working conditions. Using the engine will give benefits:
So Kevin the biggest mistake beginner gasifer operators make imho is to become flare-stare’ers. A mistake I made for too long. It was two DOW guys; Mike LaRosa and Wayne Keith back around 2011 who finally broke me of that bad habit.
Wanna’ learn how not to tar-up engines? Tar up engines and then have to fix them. Just use in the beginning easy engines like flathead valve-in-block and pushrod overhead valve engines.
S.U.
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You hit the nail on the head there Wayne. I love the concept of wood for energy and I love building stuff but I just am not in the stage of life where I can use the stuff I build like I should. Even when I was working 3 miles from home, it just was not worth it for me to light up every time.
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Hi Kevin , as a (not) “experienced” wood burning machine operator , I can say that the biggest mistake you can make is to do nothing and occupy a comfortable recliner . The World Wide Web offers unlimited “entertainment” that steals our time and so we miss out on the real “fun” offered by nature, work and a life of freedom.
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Hello Tone!! Love it. Yes the internet can waste so much time! During the 1960s they predicted that thanks to modern technology a mans working week would be reduced to only 25 hours per week and the biggest problem facing our world would be what to do with all our time. What a joke!! Technology makes us available every minute of the day and complicates our life so much we are endlessly learning and updating. The best years are behind us, the world is becoming very entertainment (self) focussed and the weeks seem to fly by like never before. I enjoy the quiet of my shed and fruits of my labor!
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HI wayne i take it you mean pulling too big of a trailer load like behind a dakota instead of a full size truck.I gess that would indeed put the gasifier in heater mode-GOOD POINT.
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Good point GORAN- that is probley the most common check at start up,charbed up near the noxels on a wk machine would work.
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I got a extra 360 and 318 off craigs list-if i do tar my 99 dakota 318 up to tight- i run my other two gasifier trucks- probley few hundred miles-i dont remember exactly miles- i had sticky throtle plate one morning- no missing valves though, I got a nice big WK heat exchanger on my dakota build-see how cool this one runs.after the heat exchanger and after cooling rails.
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