Played around with some Ethanol today. Like I had mentioned earlier the engine in this tractor is a bit small for this application. I can run the tractor and drive on the producer gas but running the mower deck really bogs it down. Ive wanted to play with ethanol any ways so I got some E-85 and put it in the tractor to supliment the Wood Fuel. I have the gas jet turned all the way in and the air all the way out to make the carb as lean as possilble and I just crack the peck valve on the tank.
The tractor will not run on the ethanol alone, But with the wood fuel the motor is very stronge. I think it even has more power than on gas alone. If I were to do a car conversion I would definatly put a system in place to suplimant the wood fuel for hard excelleration and hills. It doesnt need very much to do the job. I ran the tractor for about 5 hrs experimenting today and only burned an 1" down on the 1 Gallon fuel tank.
Also did some test with mixing tar with it vs gas. Gasoline does not like the tar as well as the Ethanol, So I think running just a little will help keep things a bit cleaner too.
Nice setup! Looks like you did some thinking before welding. Do bolt the reduction cone. You do not want it have some movement when you are riding a bumpy lawn (mine is bumpyâŚ) Even a bit of movement will allow a bypass. Use tiny bolts and unwelded nuts that easily break on loosening when they are baked together. Or use fat welded nuts and very short and copper greased bolts. I like the thick insulation around the redcution cone. I am now trying calcium silicate as insulation material. Expect it to be better than ash/char.
Canât you use the engine cooling fan to suck air through the condensor? It will save you power. Wonât affect the cooling of the engine.
Wow talk about a trip down memory lane. So fast forward, well I think my power to weight ratio will improve on this build. haha.
Ok so this is the Micro Series II prototype. If it works it will be offered with a stand like the smaller one and the ammo box filter will come as an add on. The larger Utility machines are going to get a mid year redesign with some major updates. They will follow this machines format. The micros are modeled after the Utility series but with a few things simplified. So now I will be revising the Utility to have these revisions as well. The filter barrels will go away and they will also get our standard 4" cyclone and a larger version of the cooler on this build. The media filter will then again be an ad on and most likely will be built out of the small barres we are using. They will get a forced air system that Im working on as well. This will have the ability to run in reverse to light the machine
Ok so on my tractor;I have the gasifier mounted up,just need to plumb it up and create a carb adaptor. I need to build something to stiffen up the bottom plate and also a bracket to stabilize the ammo box filter. This will complete phase one of this build. The next portion is to add on the 50 amp alternator and set up the 2 kW inverter on it. Then I will be working on installing a turbo charger to boost the gasifier. This is for proof of concept. Theory, is this should address a few things, one being condensing in a vacuum is not efficient, so I should see more condensate dropping and also if tars are made I should see them drop earlier making the media filter more effective. The other is we will simply be relieving the engine of the vacuum load, so I should see some efficiency gains there as well. This wil also play a part in next generation development but thatâs for another day.
At this point I hope it works as good as it looks and if it does it will be down at Argos next week
Ok I got this thing fired up tonight. I really like this new blower set up, Im using a GM smog pump and have this set up so it can both pull and push on the gasifier. So I basically can pull on the machine to suck a flame in to get it lit and then switch it over to a pressurizing mode. I works quite well and will surely extend the life of this blower. I think this is how we are going to set up all machines in the future. This pump way more than enough, Im going to install a bypass valve to tone it down a bit ( A LOT!!) After I got the tractor fired up I had an idea to simply boost it with the smog pump and it has well enough power to do this. Another thing about this blower it is not passive, it will create a lot of pressure. I do think my theory is correct, at half throttle I could get a 25% increase in my air intake valve position and with the engine a wide open I can open the air intake all the way!!! Even running full bore I still had to back of the smog pump to keep it from over pressurizing the gasifier. It would be interesting to see if this could boost a V8 set up, it actually might be able too!!
So I think with turbo set up it will be automatic as it should run linear with the engine, I think Ill just need to find the sweet spot on valving to bypass and keep from over pressurizing the gasifier.
So yeah, I got to drive it around tonight and did this while I had it boosted. Drove just like on gasoline, cant wait to try the mower deck. I will know for sure then, the last machine I had set up on this I had to boost with gas to run the mower deck.
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This is the intake hose of the pump
Here is the port where I would hook this up to put it into lighting mode
This the inlet into the hearth from the pump, the top is the bypass and where I will install valving later
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