You can use a rheostat also called a dimmer switch to control your blower speed.
Rindert
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Daniel , great news you are now producing a good amount of gas , i suggest you play and play with that old mower of yours the time will not be wasted and you will learn so much from that first build of yours , if you see tar leaking or dripping from anywhere then , before stopping the mower engine maybe run some petrol through the engine for 5 mins or so and that should help burn off any tars around the valves also spray the carb butterfly’s with some type of lubricant while its running on the petrol . Dave
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If using pine wood is your goal, then you’ll want a downdraft gasifier. Making charcoal from pine is pointless, in my experience. I’ve only gotten very light, styrofoam like charcoal from softwoods. But that’s just me. Anyone who has made good charcoal from softwoods can feel free to share their secrets for doing so.
But softwoods seem to have a lot more hydrocarbons (including tar) than hardwood. This is great fuel, IF you have a gasifier that can efficiently crack all that tar. The Imbert is a good place to start for a downdraft gasifier.
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Thank you for the information! Going forward i am probably going to make another gasifier, this time a downdraft as suggested. And an imbert gasifier seems to be what most people recommend so i will probably start there.
Im totally hooked on gasifiers by now,
looking forward to experimenting some more with my current charcoal one, and definitly making a version two in the near future.
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Daniel, definitely look through other member’s posts here on the forum and see how their builds went.
What do you want to power first?
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Yes, i definitly have lots of interesting reading in front of me!
My goal as of right now would be to run my generator, which is a Stanley SIG 2000-1. Preferably on raw pine wood, since i have access lots of that stuff. But as of right now i will use an old lawn mower that i have laying around. Just to take my time and test the gasifier thoroughly before i ruin the generator.
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Just had a thought about how you could salvage your cross draft gasifier to run on wood. There was a design in the early 1900s that was essentially a cross draft wood gasifier fed into an updraft charcoal gasifier.
The unit consumed more wood than charcoal. Secondary air was added between the wood gasifier and the charcoal gasifier. The wood gasses were burned, which heated the charcoal to glowing hot. The hot char would crack any remaining tar as well as combine with the CO2 from the wood gas to form CO. The charcoal also functioned as a filter.
There should be a picture here.
It’s the one in the middle on the right.
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I’ve seen other gasifier designs that incorporate this double burn concept in various embodiments, as a way of dealing with tarry gasses. If you’re going to use pine, it’s probably worth looking into.
I’ve seen a few variations that configure the air nozzles with a venturi that draws tarry gasses from near the top of the hopper. This helps make sure more of the tar is directed into the combustion zone. It’s basically burning the tar to heat the char, instead of burning the char to crack the tar.
Due to the venturi, some hot gasses will be drawn up into the hopper, pre drying the wood and extending the pyrolysis zone up higher.
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that’s cool. Something i will have to look into aswell!
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