Experiments With Air Preheating in Gasifiers

Woodgas Science
#1

Hey guys, I figured I’d post this in the Woodgas Science thread because it seems to fit here best.

Have any of you conducted experiments on air preheating to see if it changed anything in the gas output?

What are you thoughts and inputs on it?

I’m curious if air preheating for a gasifier would lessen soot and carbon production, I’m seeing limited degrees of this in some academic papers on it, not much, but I do see tidbits here and there.

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#2

Hi Wes, if anything, air preheat shuld increase the soot content. But thats a good thing. Explanation: soot is a byproduct of tary pyrolisis gas cracking in the heat of the charbed, without oxigen. This gives us wery potent gas. It is the goal of a good design to use as litle air as possible (less air-less nitrogen) while still maintaining enaugh heat for clean operation.

Soot is not a problem, its easy to filter and harmless to motors.

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#3

Thanks for the reply.

I was reading into Chris Saenz’s “Why I chose Multiport Injection” page and he was talking about the issues with carburetors and throttle body injection accumulating soot and carbon.

I concede to your assessment about the soot being produced by tar reduction (which is ABSOLUTELY necessary), but factoring in my intentions to get a carbureted truck in the future, I figured I’d take on the challenge to look further into it.

I was looking through academic papers as well as this website’s libraries and forum pages so I could figure out possible solutions or things that can be done about it.

It seems inlet air preheating does work to some extent.

Combining that with steam can contribute to further reducing both tar and soot.

Apparently there is, if you guys don’t mind me linking the articles I found here, I’ll post them.

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#4

Here are the papers I was looking at if anyone wants to see them.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0961953404000984

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0016236112008587

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2095495613600935

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/30482359_High_temperature_air_and_steam_gasification_of_wood_pellets

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15567036.2013.783657

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2772782322000808

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/281423908_Modeling_of_Biomass_Gasification_with_Preheated_Air_at_High_Temperatures

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