Hi Striperoo,
For small engines, 20hp and below, charcoal is usually best. I think Tone Šuštarič’s ‘Fergi’ tractor project in Tractor with gas? is the most interesting. If you are going to make charcoal there seem to be three basic methods: flame cap, TLUD, and closed vessel. @Chuckw has a tipped barrel basically a flame cap. I use a tank from an old 50gal water heater as a TLUD (Top Lit Up Draft). And @KristijanL uses a closed vessel to make charcoal for restaurants. The fines he can’t sell he uses to power his Skoda pickup (similar to rabbit pickup).
I haven’t gotten to the point, yet, where I will use a bunch of sensors. But Design of Experiments was very interesting to me too and I plan to start doing that kind of thing soon.
Fuel prep is time consuming so depending on how much you do this you will probably want a chunker. There are two basic types that I’m aware of one is the rotating guillotine that @Wayne uses, the other is the screw type.
Best of luck and welcome to us.
Rindert
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