Hi Handy
Do you know where Max talks about the carburetor to inject water?
I canāt seem to find the reference, but I donāt remember it being an in depth discussion. Just a passing comment that stuck with me.
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Thierry,
This discussion took place at the Seat topic. I think this is by far the neatest way.
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Ok before we get back to theory of egr, a intermezzo. I made a 15mm copper hose connection on the exhaust, before the mufler. Now, problem. As Til sayd, poor pressure was expected with just a T, tryed it anyway. Well, its eaven worse. There is no pressure at the pipe outlet! Eaven a slight vacuum from the pulsateing effect. So indeed a device for catching the pressure is neaded. But exactly how? The pitot tube with a cone on the end is supposed to measure flow accuretly, not draw in as much gas as possible.
Has anyone got any info on the original Kalle exhaust āharvestersā?
I was thinkin flared end instead of a conical one?
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I donāt think you need āpressureā as long as you have it plumbed to the engine vacuum. I have a T before the muffler and a T at the gasifier inlet which uses engine suction to pull air through the nozzle.
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On my truck I simply used a 11/4 inch ID flexible exhaust pipe laid inside of the tailpipe with a 1 inch gate valve and hooked to my air inlet with a T. A couple of turns open on the gate valve delivered the results that Don describes. On my MGB I installed a T in the exhaust pipe where the pipe turns 90 degrees into the muffler. From this T, I adapted down to 1 inch pipe to slip inside the same 1 1/4 inch flex pipe with a T at my air inlet. Again a 1 inch gate valve gives great control for adjusting the EGR. Very simple works flawlessly.
Hi Kristijan, did you make a connection to the tail pipe by using a tube going inside the tail pipe and pointing against the exhaust flow. This will create pressure when the engine rpms increases. And at idle you will have lower pressures. The same if you put a pipe up into the end of the exhaust pipe.
At the other end at the bottom of the cyclone ash orifice or nozzle the nozzle spacing has to be just right, just like in a air injection suction. You have to have pressure to make it work.
Just my 2 cents worth.
Bob
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Thanks for fast responces guys!
The problem here is the soot ejector needs to have sufficisnt exhaust pressure for it to work. If there isnt enough pressure, the engine will draw fresh air back trugh the air intake and in to the cyclone. Wery bad.
I made a pitot tube, things are better but still quite weak at 2500rpm in neutral.
Well l guess l culd tighten the twilpipe a bit, since the exhaust is missing a rear mufler, meaning less backpressure. Thods?
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Iām surprised what happened here in a couple of hours.
Kristijan, I think this should work. Remember, you donāt need much throttle to reach 2500 rpm in neutral. Under load, your engine has to work much harder, thus creating a higher flow of exhaust gasses. Letās give it a try.
Do that if you canāt get enough pressure. The muffler around WW2 had much more restriction than today. But if possible, I would avoid choking the exhaust too much, it will lower the engine output.
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Hi Bruce,
since WW2 there is a discussion about EGR and steam. As you said, EGR is quite simple and self regulating, thus it was used much more often. Other advantages: no freezing water tank in winter, a bit saving on char and easier to develop for the manufacturer.
Adding water/steam was often regarded as too delicate, especially in cold climate.
With us, it is different. We are much more dedicated to our systems than the average driver in WW2 and want to develop them further.
Both CO2 to CO and H2O to H2 consumes heat, so the reduction of one is stealing the heat of each other. If I remember right, reduction of CO2 needs a bit lower temps, so if you have already quite low temps most of the steam will just pass the reaction zone but also carries the heat away.
Adding water creates more powerful gas. Thus, if you want maximum power just add steam, no EGR. As evaporating consumes also a lot of heat, try to feed the water already as hot steam into the reaction.
As Andres mentioned, a kind of āwater carburetorā can be also self regulating according to the flow. Just add as much water as you can convert to hydrogen, as otherwise the superheated steam would just carry away the heat from the reaction. So itās best to start on the āleanā side.
Edit: I have seen the drawing of a setup in the old book from Switzerland:
A little expalantion of the german legend: This is a heat exchanger, preheating the air (Luft) and the water with the hot gases taken from the gasifier. The amount of water is adjustet to the temperature in the heat exchanger by means of a thermostat, which actuates a valve (Ventil). There is also a manual actuated valve (Hahn) for the possibilty of additional water ins some situations like start-up.
This āCalori elementā was actually built and used in a charcoal gasifier in Switzerland.
It is stated that for a good increase of the heat value, the gasifier should have a high thermal efficiency. Otherwise there is not a remarkable increase in the quality of gas.
This means: Using the heat of the gas for preheating air and steam. Also updraft system are good suitable, as the char is preheated by the gases.
It is further written in the book: The variable need for water due to different qualities of charcoal makes the optimal dosage of water very complicated, so there are just a few systems with added water in Switzerland today (1944). The majority of designers favours the simple construction just using air more then the possibility of higher power or saving fuel. In most cases, the reason was to get soon into business, no one wanted to waste valuable time with long development processes. But it is hoped that now, with better rules about quality of charcoal, adding water gets more and more common. Up to the end of 1943, there were only 4 systems using water.
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Ok the pitot is in the exhaust. Silicone is drying, fingers crossed.
Ha, not realy, the plan was to run the engine on chargas till night, l managed to do wery litle. I finished repairing our roofs at about 14.00, 2 hours of daylight for some other work and flashlight asemblyng the pitot. Hope tomorow will be better.
Yes, this was exactly what l was thinking! I remembered those squeezed flat ww2 tailpipe ends, they must of been much more restrictive!
Edit l am a fan of water injection. Tryed egron my 50cc char powered moped once, culdnt eaven takeoff. With water injection at a rate of about 2 drops/s the litle mosqito buzzed like a champ!
But as you sayd, practicality!
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Hi Kristijan, Here are my two cents worth. Get rid of the soot injector on the cyclone. It can clog up and is hard to regulate in the real world where there may be excess moisture in the chargas leading to damp/wet dust plugging up the injector. Just put a clean out at the base and any dust you get goes in the garden or back in your char gasifier. Iām thinking about the amount of head aches it will give you in return for the small amount of char you will (hope) to recycle.
Iāve also run the same style nozzle you have and observed the same reaction. The incoming air reaches its greatest volume/velocity at the hole closest to the end. The hole closest to where the air enters is lower velocity and volume. Therefore, the charcoal burns hottest near the end of the pipe. I hope your pipe is stainless steel to make it last longer. Even if it is, you still need engine exhaust and/or a fluid drip to cool things off. Without it, even stainless will soon melt. Regarding exhaust gas, you need to force the gasifier to take it. Place a T at the air inlet to the gasifer. The exhaust goes in one opening of the T while a valve is placed on the other opening. As the char burns, you close down the valve letting oxygen in which forces the gasifier to suck more engine exhaust. As Don notes, you want to be able to see the pieces of charcoal ādancingā. The trouble with your design is this lack of visual regulation so you will have to go by color or thermocouples. If you no longer have the soot injector attached to the air inlet, you could use the wire prod to help clean out the holes. Another issue I had with this design of nozzle was the legnth of time it took to light the charcoal. As ash accumulates over the nozzle, the charcoal moves further from the holes making it harder to light using a torch.
Two cents later,
Gary in PA
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Gary, your cents are worth milions. You are right. For now, this is what l will do. Afterall, l made this part of the gasifier screw on detachable.
There is only one problem thugh, the main reason l decided for a soot reinject system is not better economy, but the fact l have no space for soot container under the cyclone. This means ditching the cyclone with the injector and loads of dust in the cooler/final filter. Somehow, l need to atend to this problem now.
My nozzle is mild steel, as it was on my Seat. Its still good as new after many miles, so l hope this one will too.
As for the nozzles pluging with molten ash, its true. But fortunaly, BruceS has came up with a poking rod that cleans them from underneeth.
As for determining the reaction temperature, l put a sight port above the lighting port, you can see it on the skizz above.
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Haha! The day had come!
Finished late in the night, but it finaly roars! Ditched the cyclone, insulated the hopper, lit and started the engine. What a great feeling after so long!
I havent yet got a final filter so l only did a short drive, and lots of idleing. This made my day. I never had any sistem to idle so well. And takeoff is sharp and without much hasitation!
Not to be too fast on asumptions but this is what has started to show:
The fuel economy surprised me. In a positive manner. More arter some testing.
The EGR seting was a WAG, and its on the low side. However, l think l will leave it as is, since it runs well and l didnt add water to the air yet.
It all runs so cool! I can quite literaly hold my hand anywhere on the hot parts.
Its not gonna beat any speed records 
l had trouble geting the thing up to 70kmh, too soon to say its gonna stay this way, but eaven if it does, l will gladly trade high top speed to such a nice idle and takeoff ability.
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Til, l have just saw your edit above. It seems you stumbled upon some wery interasting literature. We wuld all be gratefull if you wuld share the book with us!
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Hi Kristijan,
congratulations for the first run!
I have to admit that I lurked around this thread the whole evening and waited for your first run 
I guess you have to bite in a lemon now, right?
And now that itās running you can start to tune it. I hope Iām not too daring, but I bet with added steam you should be able to reach 100 kmh in flat terrain.
Oh, Iāve sent the book already some days ago to Chris. I guess he is busy this last days before Christmas.
Regards, Til
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Thank you Til!
I ate a basket of lemons and washed it all down with a nice cool victoryous beer 
I forgot to mention one wery important thing! I decided to try rock wool impregnation with sodium silicate solution. It was a WAG but it worked! I spread one kg of the solution across the surface of the rock wool plates l lined up on the inside of the reactor, and baked the binder in with a shopvac and corse charcoal lit in the reactor. The resault was a hard crust of sodium silicate folowed by a fluffy and insulative rockwool. We will see how long it lasts but for now it realy seems promissing.
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Congrats on the first run of many to come Kristijan, if you add H2O or Steam. You will be able to say that I drive a Hydrogen Carbon Catalyst Reaction Gas Vehicle. Or also known as a HCCRGV. Sounds pretty high tech futuristic doesnāt it?
Bob
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Ha! Now, useing EGR, l can say l ran the car on exhaust gas, reacted with superheated carbon how cool is that???
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Woo Hoo! Thanks for letting us share your fun!
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