I saw a Merc like this at some guys private litle museum a while back, but without the gasifier. Rather “small” car but it weights 2500kg! The metal and frame are insanely heavy dut, interior all masive oak. Even had swasticas all over the inside.
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Hi Kristijan
do you know the amount of water that enters the gasifier per kg of charcoal consumed?
[quote=“KristijanL, post:760, topic:3604”]
I think what happens is when the hopper lid is opened the high moisture gas from the hopper gets sucked trugh the hot charbed, making wery rich gas. But you may have noticed, when l finished refueling, the engine barely idles. Charbed cools so much from all the steam. But without air preheat and the flywheel effect, idle ability wuld be as miserable as every of my previous systems.
Do you think that all this steam condenses on the cold walls of the hopper when you roll?
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Hmmm. This makes me think there could be a way to quickly, and temporarily convert your gasifier to downdraft operation. You might even be able to make it switchable during operation. Perhaps make a second entry point for air at the top of the hopper, and have two valves linked together to control airflow to allow airflow to one, the other or both nozzles. Just an idea.
Rindert
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Kristijan; I was just poking a little fun at your country. In reading about it, they said that from one mountain top, you could see 1/3 of the country of Slovenia. I realize you are next to the Swiss Alps so that one mountain could be much higher than anything we have in Wisconsin. I really am appreciating learning about Slovenia through your posts. TomC
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Kristijan, what Tom has said. I Love the videos of your country and your Family. Oh yes and your gasifier too.
Bob
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Rindert, l actualy planed for something similar. The goal was smoke/heat free hopper. I thod of leting a bit of air in the hopper and having a restriction between the hopper and the firetube so that the upriseing smoke/heat gets pulled down with incomeing air. But it seems the restriction does its job well at retaining heat, so l havent yet tryed it. Plus JO pointed out the fact leting air in the hopper increases danger of hopper puffs. Not good in the trunk.
Tom, its true. Althugh l wuld say you can see more thain 1/3 of the country from mount Triglav. On a nice day l can see the mountain from our place, well beond 1/3 the country by distance.
Althugh l wuldnt exactly say the Alpes are Swiss 
5 countrys share the Alpes. But perhaps they are most known for them yes.
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I am sooo not surprised that you were planning this. 
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Thierry, unfortunaly not. I mix a cup of water on every 10l bucket of char. Thats roughly 10-15%.
I am sure a few droplets do but mainly the exess moisture gets soaked in the char in ths hopper.
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Kristijan, Thanks for sharing the celebration of your local culture and customs—very interesting. “Variety is the spice of life.” I, too, enjoy the scenery from your driving videos.
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Kristijan, do you have any way of draining any moisture accumulation from your metal gas pipe and cooling chambers up front? Also, have you checked to see if there is much dust accumulation in those parts?
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Sorry Steve, l missed your question. Yes, l do but l have found a ideal ratio of char to wood and there seems to be no water escapeing in the gas. I get nothing but dry dust on the front cooler.
Yes l am sure there iss loads of dust in the cooler. I shuld take it off and empty it…
This is a video l forgot to upload. I wanted to see what the gasifier looked like inside afrer tortureing it on the highway the other day. My oh my what a surprice!
This tells me l shuld either put more wood to it if l plan on highway drive, or not push it so much.
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Just a quick thought probably covered already buried deep in other charcoal forum pages, but can you burn the remaining biochar from a WK gasifier in an updraft char gasifier? Isn’t the biochar just charcoal? Thanks, Tyler.
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If l remember right Wayne sometimes dumps the char right back in the gasifier. But yes, ofcorse! You have to sift out the ashes and you have premium engine grade fuel for your charcoal gasifier.
Biochar. I personaly dont like the name. Its a marketing thing, in todays world everything that has BIO or ORGANIC or ECO in the name sells three time the price. Biochar is just charcoal. Period.
The only situation l wuld use the word BIOCHAR is for gardening charcoal inoculated with live bacteria/funghy. Everything else is just charcoal.
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I agree that biochar is just charcoal. Here on DOW we talk about “engine grade” charcoal. The word “charcoal” is widely used for cooking fuel that has unwanted volatiles or binders. C
That kind of cooking charcoal is not very good for engines or gardens. The fines resulting from classifying the size of engine grade charcoal make good biochar. BTW, urine is a universally available, high nitrogen inoculant for biochar when bacteria/fungy are unavailable. Also my friend who has a barbeque business prefers my engine grade charcoal because it allows him to control flavors better.
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Exactly. I do the same. Fuel my BBQ with pure high temp charcoal, then l add flavour to it. Usualy l throw on a couple of sticks of wine wrape wood. It gives wery rrich aroma.
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Thanks, I was not very informed on the process of the remanants that come out of the wk gasifier. I guess I thought it was already burned and mostly ashes but now I know. I agree, every marketing tactic is just to make it sound like it is better than every other alternative fuel or environmentally friendly product. When in reality, if it is non-polluting and produced without the use of non-renewable resources, it is all great. I guess that’s why we have the DOW. Thanks Kristijan and Bruce for your help. Much appreciated.
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Kristijan , Bruce i wondered when someone would say something about the so called bio char , i did not want say anything before for fear of being shot down , but from my understanding of it bio char must be very very porous to do its job correctly there are a few ways of doing that most involve using chemicals , but the everyday no fuss way is to dump the charcoal while still glowing hot into water and the sudden temp drop allows fractures through out the charcoal aiding in allowing more pores to be opened ,if you then reheat the charcoal and dump it again while glowing hot then even more fractures will open up .
Dave
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Some of the charcoal pieces from my high temp retort are electrically conductive. A research scientist working on charcoal electrodes for supercapacitors told me that these electrically conductive pieces were probably as porous as activated charcoal. Somewhere I posted a picture of me producing a carbon arc with two pieces of charcoal in jumper cables hooked to two car batteries in series.
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Yes i remember those photo’s Bruce and i also tried doing the very same experiment with charcoal from my indoor wood heater with limited success so would create a ark and other bits would’t
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We had our share of snow today, about 6", but its mainly melted by now. Doesent matter, we need the water not the white curse anyway, l had nothing better to do in the bad weather, so l decided l make some progress on the Mercedes.
I installed a new component, final safety filter
For now, this is just a empty vessel. I havent yet decided on what kind of a filter media l will put in. I am weighing a few options. Oil filter, paper/canvas filter, open cell foam… any ideas? The container is roughly 5" dia 1 foot long.
Second, l found a good place for the automixer. It will be screwed on the primary filter.
I found this 2 sturdy plastic pipe caps that fit one in to other tightly with space for a thin film between, for the membrane. Easy to fix if rips or something.
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