Hello people
I cant get flare on my gasifier. my gasifier base on simple fire.
My blower is use as suction mode on top of gasifier and air intake hole size is 1 " at bottom
chacoal size is about 1 " and less
i tried to reduce air flow of blower but cant get flare also.
a lot of tube show on my gasifier is not use I close it.
I am sure that their is no invisible flare because I have hold paper to block outlet of blower but not thing happen. from my inspect is blower suction is to high and charbed is not packed enought.
I’m with Goran. I try and keep my simple fire char right around half inch and that blower would just disperse what ever gas you are producing. Start out with dry char in your reactor area.
When I had some problems with flaring, I had some air leaks. Are you absolutely sure there is no air getting sucked in by the blower? If the blower can’t get enough flow from the gasifier because of the valve restriction, it may be pulling in air from somewhere else. If air is getting in at the blower it can make the gas too lean to burn. If you shut the valve completely and still have flow at the blower outlet, you’ve got a leak.
What Martin sayd. Those blowers usualy suck part of the air trugh the motor to cool it. Usualy those air ports are well visable. You can tape them down but even better, just put the fan on the intake side and push air in instead of pull the gas
maybee in your gasifier you have not enough heat in the reaction and reduction area because of small diameter…in my indoor cooking thread i have written about this…you need at least 600 degree celsius in the reduction area for produce gas…i resolved the problem with insulation around the reaction-reduction area…
thank you every one for your solution. @KristijanL have tried to push air in intake instead of pull.same output cant flare
I will wrap it up and fix it.
1.Air leak
2. blower size and Will check blower to make sure it doesnt pull air around it to make gas less dense
3. not hot enough reaction zone
4. too small diameter but in this case is 6 " already
5. char size
If blowing instead of sucking doesn’t get a flare, it is something other than a leak. But that doesn’t mean you don’t have a leak when it is sucking as Kristijan explains. I would keep it in blowing mode as you attend to the other variables.
I think that blower is way too big for such a small setup. Look for the 12 Volt electric mattress blowers on eBay or in the camping section of a store.
My gasifier is similar to yours. I didn’t have a blower. But I could tell it was making good gas because a little bit of natural draft would occur, so I could light the the gas at the outlet. The main pipe would act as a chimney. Also I could see if there were any leaks this way, because smoke would come out of them.
Rindert
Hi CK , you have a problem and you have many answers as to what may be the cause so maybe best start all over again , if this was my set up these are the steps i would take before changing anything .
Place fan blower into nozzle and blow , does not have to be full power even just blow and spray soapy water over every joint every flange , until you see not 1 single bubble anywhere .
Try reduce the size of your charcoal down from 1 inch to 3/4 / half inch all the way down to around 3/16.
Now the tricky part , i am just guessing here by looking at your photo you may be trying to flare off right at the end of your fan , that may not work too well you must be able to mix air in with the gas to get a burnable flare , slowing the fan pulling or pushing after a min or two of heating up will allow you to see if anything burns even for a second or two , so try using a tin can with holes around the bottom see if that helps getting it to flare .
Good luck .
Dave
Regarding an earlier comment about using a smaller blower:
—Or simply choke down the input or the output of the existing blower. In many cases, choking the blower input is as simple as sticking a piece of duct tape on it.
Hello everyone
I can not get flare after fix following thing
1.check leak >> no leak
2. change blower >> smaller one . same as use in air mattress.
Next thing I gonna fix
1.smaller size of chacoal
My observation is after I ignite air intake port at bottom and turn on blower at the top about 3 minute.
When I turn off blower it has fire comming out from air intake port that show in this pic.
Is it normal or it is sign of anything wrong ?
Thank you
what comes out is burning gas, i will say…try to fix the blower with a pipe to the nozzle, in way that the blower not melts…so that the blower pushes air inside…
what diameter has your gasifier? maybee the coal non flows down…(because of rusty inner surface of the pipe)
try to ignite the coal through the nozzle , when it glows, screw fhe pipe with the blower on the nozzle hole - must not be completely airthigt- and than gas should come, not overpull the system with air, otherwise you get a hollow burn easily…
when the heat inside is not enough, gas cannot be produced, try a provisoric insulation around nozzle area and reduction area…easily made by a piece of rockwool.
what temperature you have actually outdoors?
Well, if you have no air leaks and your gas isn’t being polluted by the blower then fuel size is just about all that remains. It helps if you have a video showing what’s happening. When I started with a simple fire I was having the same issue you are and I did a video of showing my fuel and filling the hopper and MattR pointed out that my fuel was much too dirty because I didn’t take the time to sift all the char dust out. Once I did that, problem solved. Don’t pay any attention to Dr Ruth. Size does matter. Also I thought I had everything sealed up but on the bilge blower I was using, the wires for the motor come out of the plastic casing and there is just the slightest opening. That was enough to stop flare as well. The smallest amount of air bleeding in will screw up the gas.
Thank you all for information @giorgio my outdoor temp is 35 celcius
Today I decide to mix wood and chacoal together and test again.
fisrt layer is chacoal to make it easy to ignite after that is wood chip.
/////Start up process.//////
I ignite chacoal and blow air into bottom port.
first 15 min it come out a lot of smoke.After smoke is a lot less. And finally it can flare but not stable and very little fire. As I attached second pic.
I think my main problem is chacoal and wood chip size and quality.
What do you think ?
read a bit around in my thread about cooking gasifier, more down is described a small diameter gasifier and his difficulties, till it works fine…
in the begin try only with charcoal,because your gasifier design is not good for wood-woodchips. charcoal : right size and all dust sieved out…
blower speed not to strong, otherwise hollow burn…no gas
try a insulation around the gasifier from the bottom up to 50 cm high…described in my thread…i think your inner temperature is too low…
my gasifier in this design needs 7 minutes to deliver burnable gas, after 10 minutes gas is constant good…at least i constructed my gasifier with 4 nozzles for not having problems with fuel flow…will say the fuel-coal- not flows down and creates a hollow space and than, of course, gas cannot be produced more…iron pipes inside ofen are rusty and the fuel cannot flow down…
what diameter your gasifier has?
what will you do with the gasifier?
is your charcoal umid or dry?
Here you can see the size of my charcoal. I quenched it with water so it was damp. But now I do not quench with water, just stop the air flow. My pipe is 4.75 inches inside diameter. It should be at least 6 inches inside diameter. @k_vanlooken told me this. But it works. My pipe gets very hot on the outside, 850°F.
Here is all of the information about my project. Charcoal Gasifier for Generator - #486 by r_wesseling
hello rindert, your small diameter gasifier has one nozzle, right?
with one nozzle i have had though fuel hang ups and therefore interruption of flow of good gas…
i think, when - for example -a one cylinder engine runs with the gasifier,(connected only with a rubber hose) because of pulsating negative pressure created from the motor, the fuel falls easier down , also when the motor is not connected by frames or so to the gasifier (vibrations of the motor help against fuel hang up)…
a still-standing gasifier how mine for cooking for example is from my sight more exposed to fuel hang ups, so at least the solution with 4 nozzles (like stephen abadessa´s) works reliable.
