I know i am out of the park here, though i have a questain for you dustin, i am building an s10 4cly and caint aford the big heat exchanger weight, and low power too pull. Just not sure as too the ceramic insulating. Liner, is the blanket on outside of fire tube or on inside of the fire tube, thanks.
Hi Kevin
the blanket is used on the inside of the firetube. It’s used to protect the metal firetube from the heat and oxidation that occurs. I have a 16 gauge (steel) firetube that is lined with 1 inch thick ceramic blanket. Also the firetube has stainless steel nozzles that are welded to the steel firetube and extend approx. 1 inch past the ceramic blanket.
Good luck Dustin
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Thanks Dustin Moore is it hard too make the ceramic or any recomendation for ceramic mix, and may i ask how is your exit temps too the cooling rack after the cylone or are you useing two cylones?
Kevin, the ceramic is a blanket that fits inside and protects a thin metal fire tube - not a mix that you trowel on. it looks like this
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Hello Don M Thanks for clearifing, is that same as rock wool or ware too get the material ? It seems like it would peel off like that or dose it build up a tar layer while burning the wood?Or what holds the blanket up too the tube.Thanks
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Hi Kevin, Rock wool won’t work because it won’t hold up. Not tough enough - you can rip it and crumble it with your hands. Ceramic blanket is harder to come by but is tough and dense and stays put if you cut it a little big and force it in. I have not had fire in mine yet but I am told that the intense heat will form sort of a skin on the surface which helps protect it. Just keep your poker in the middle.
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Thanks Don good luck with your new set up trial, i will post my results what ever i end up with useing.
This questian is for don mans or dustin moore, when you say heating the hopper from the hearth, What i have visualized is the heat that goes too the heat exchanger or a cylone, insted first goes through a coulm under the funel too bake the wood, and later goes through the cylone’s, this sounds like would help with heat. Or is this what you two were talking about with hearth heating the hopper.baking wood or an other form of preheat.??
Kevin, I dry my wood in onion bags inside a building and not on board my vehicle or in my hopper aside from the heat that naturally arises from the fire tube and condenses in the monorator. If I remember right Dustin puts wood in a separate barrel and runs waste heat into there to dry wood. Max is a proponent of running hot gas through a “plank” like Chris is experimenting with to dry wood in the hopper. I don’t plan to monkey with that because my wood is dry enough without doing that.
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Thanks Don M i gess i was referring too the coulm as a preheat other than heating the outside hopper as dustin moore, seems it would be light enough for moble gasification and quite hot commi g from the exoust exit, The wood would help cool the exit gas before the cylone.The coulum could be built as the funnel with cleanouts from ash build up over time.
Hi Kevin, sorry for not getting back to you, I was tied up with work. Thanks Don for your reply’s 100% correct with the ceramic wool. I can get it from a local place that works on industrial furnaces, they also sell firebrick but it shouldn’t be to difficult to find it online. It may be marketed under the trade name “Koawool”. People use if all the time for propane forges etc.
As Don has stated the ceramic blanket is dense enough to stay put if sized slightly larger and crammed in. After a few firings the tars etc of the wood seem to “bake” onto the outer surface making it rock hard and no chance of falling into the tube. As a side there are coatings you can buy to parge the surface to add protection and thermal properties to the ceramic blanket. I have no experience with these but have found “virgin” ceramic to be performing and holding up very nicely and these coatings are quite expensive.
my heated hopper is as follows:
gas exiting the grate is run into a cyclone filter which is then channeled into a jacket that surrounds the entire hopper which then is run into traditional cooling rails.
a more ideal setup would have the hot gas run THROUGH not AROUND the hopper fuel but so far the current system is running well. I have not investigated how wet of wood I can use but do see alot of condensate being collected with any wood that I use.
Others have posted “through” heated hopper ideas on this or other threads (like Chris S) but there does not seem to be any “easy/fast” ways to accomplish this. The “around” hopper was fairly easy to make however it was very time consuming (3-4x as much as the firetube) and difficult to check for leaks and I will have no way to make reliable repairs to it once its service life is up. On future gasifiers I will be pursuing a “through” heated hopper.
All the best in your endeavors and I’m happy to answer any questions you have but I don’t want to distract from Dons original thread subject
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Thanks for the explainations Don Manns & Dustin moore i am much smarter than i was.I have the picture of a plan, sounds fab,able.
Something we are doing is the HGRS system on the larger machines. This system purges the gas out of the hopper and directs it to an engine exhaust heat exchanger and then directed back in just above the oxidation zone. Some of this gas is then processed and what is not continues in the loop. The heat generated stays above moisture dropping and the where the heated gas reenters the machine pre prioritizes the fuels. No need for air preheat once this and the gasifier is up to temperature the intake air can be throttled back. Said prolly too much here so zip zip not saying any more haha. 
Hi matt what happens too the moisture in the loop if not running through a cooler,? I was thinking of makeing a small cool rack for the hopper sepetate from hopper, what would i move the hopper gas with?Or is the heated hopper gas just burning better being hotter, i dont think we are crossing any lines studying conceps of varring ways to get clean tar free moble gasification fuel. No i am not trying too steel your design, so zip zip if my questains are pertaining too your specialty design.
lol the original cocept for this was to remove moisture and then heat the gas back in. However after cooling we were not getting moisture to drop for a number of reasons. We found later that we were adding process through this system and it did not function as theorized. It performed better with adding a new process into the mix. In order to drop moisure you blower needs to presurize the gas going into your cooler so restricting it on the way back after cooling should yield higher moisture dropping. We dont want this we want the moisture in the gas but suspended I cant ellaborate further on these processes. For the blower it is a specialized high output blower with a metal impeller.
Thanks Matt Rider on the definision of your model machine, wish you the best of luck with plenty of sales. I been working with sale of appliances, and sales have steady gone down hill since the 2008 crash with all the banks consolidateing, there is about 3 banks in aou little town, and all three have changed names 3 or more times since 08.it seems you are more with the times, internet sales steady on the rise.
Haha, no not the case here, the market is shifting and sales have dramatically declined for us on the smaller machines. You are seeing this here and on other forums, but us regulars are keeping it alive here and new videos are still popping up on youtube as well. Our market is beginning to materialize overseas not so much here in the US. This market is more interested in our larger fully integrated solutions and we are working on advancement like this but much more. So no Im still driving a rusted out S10 surviving on hamburger helper and mac n cheese. 
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I know how it is being self employed,it can have slow times of low sales.It has its benifits of being own boss as well.
Hi dustin Moore i dident see your final latest gasifier, are you useing the wk type cooling pipe arangement on your hopper, and or have you insulated the outside of hopper or burn tube houseing, it seems a lot of waiste heat getting away once warmed up on my big truck square gasifier unit. Are you useing a small choke too go grate’less? Thanks. PS i found the ceramic blanker for around 50 bucks. Have you any miles estamate or gess’tomate on the ceramice burn tube life span.
Hi Kevin
haven’t updated my thread so I will try to do this (thanks for giving me a push to do so) Won’t be able to do so until next week as I’m working and have other obligations. Nothing mind blowing but I will update as you might find something helpful. I will post a link here for you to follow.
thanks Dustin
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