I know a guy who electrofiltrates his woodgas. He says the separator does eliminate 100% of anything not gas, so dust, soot, ash, tar, water… but! The contraption is big, potentialy dangerous and a big power consumer. Power consumption increases with gas flow.
To what extent “a lot of energy”? If this filter can clean the gas of a gas generator updraf to wood that can be potential?
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in the book i posted, biomass,pdf, page 34 to 39
filters used and their efficiency + energy costs
electrostatic, 0,2 to 0,4 kw per 1000 cbm
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There is also something written about electric gas filtration in the Swiss book. One filter is introduced. Power consumption 120 to 140 Watt. Cleaning interval 8 to 50 hours, meaning dismantle it and brush the electrodes. Used 15.000 Volt direct current, so problems with too moist gas could lead to electric short circuit. They said that this filter designed by Lurgi company seems promising, but two other companies stopped their developments because of too many problems.
Long story short: Doable and filters well, if it works. But more delicate. Better suited for stationary applications than for mobile use.
A bit comparable to a diesel conversion with ignition by a small amount of injected diesel. It works, but in the end installing a spark plug is easier.
Well, all depends if you want to use your gasifier more as an object to study or for every-days work.
If you are dependent on it, I totally second @SteveUnruh. Keep it simple but sturdy, able to withstand some abusive use etc.
This is why steam locomotives in the end of the steam age where in principle the same design as Robert Stephenson built his Rocket in 1829. Many different designs were tried. Different boilers with much higher pressures, steam turbines, steam-diesel hybrids or steam-electric versions.
All were superior in theory, but much more complicated, thus required more maintenance or were unreliable. The simple but robust direct drive piston steam engine and the Stephenson boiler survived them all, because it succeeded in the rough every-days life of railroading under all weather conditions.
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This is how the Ukrainian guy Nikolai Oksenyuk made and used an electrostatic precipitator.
Electrofilter device
https://youtu.be/fRRrMKQXHWE
Power plant with electrostatic precipitator
https://youtu.be/wDjR0s3fb1Y
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greetings to Ukraine, every honor for good work
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Fantastic work by the young fella , loved seeing the instant results when powering on and off just shows you what can be done cleaning up the gas
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Looks like a lot of Ben Peterson design there.
Here, according to this scheme, I assembled myself a voltage converter for an electrostatic precipitator. On the recommendation of Nikolai Oksenyuk.
Works very reliably.
I plan to make insulators for the plate electrostatic precipitator from old spark plugs without threads.
The high voltage rectifier is built into the transformer from the old monitor.
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I hope this interesting article about electrostatic precipitators can be translated into English using a browser.
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Google Translate выполнит эту работу, если вы используете браузер Google Chrome. Спасибо, Марат!
Google Translate will do the job if you use the Google Chrome browser. Thanks, Marat!
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I suppose Tar is one of the biggest headache (especially when your wife smells it and yells at you)
I’m in touch with a manufacturer in Alibaba
And here is one of the ESP that I am looking into buying
Some demonstration here
KINYO ESP High voltage electrostatic generator for air filter - YouTube
They can customize a casing so you don’t have to worry about fabricating something or messing with cables. It’s plug and play.
I hope the information helps and I will keep you updated about the results
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I have wondered a few times about how well your no-weld gasifier worked. It was an interesting set up. Glad to see you are still active.
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Hello Tom,
(I know I am going out of topic but…)
I had to stop for a while. Below are two models I made initially 2 years ago.
Here is the new design. We found the parts and we assembled it partially but then we left it
I am planning to start again this winter.
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Thanks for the update. Sometimes the site is like fishing. Someone casts a bait and you bite and then they never reel you in. 
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I would like to see how they will clean the filters after wood gas. Only water and ash will turn into hard-to-wash dirt in it.
And the formation of resin in general is better to prevent than to try to clean wood gas from it.
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If you manage to reach 1000 degrees celcium in the reactor then we can talk about prevention-tar crackling. In any case , the esp filter should be the last resource. Of course there should be the classic setup with cyclone,cooler,bag filter,saw dust etc. So that you get rid of the heavy stuff, before passing through the ESP. However, I can’t say 100% about cleaning until I test it.
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