True I can’t run a gasifier 24/7. But I could probably run one 50% of the time and have 2 available where 1 is always down to be cleaned or for maintenance. Is this all practical? Maybe, maybe not. But it sure sounds like a neat idea. I calculated it out a couple weeks ago, but I believe it was about 50,000 pounds of wood needed at 15% moisture to handle my electricity requirements only for a year. I might be close to that already with my current wood stove just for heating in winter. Thanks for the link. I will double check my requirements.
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Forgot to mention, I have probably $5000 a year to play with for my energy costs. If I need to rebuild my genset over the course of 2 years I probably could do that myself. I know it sounds good in my mind right now. But things never work as good as they sound. And there is a reason why there are not many people doing this. If nothing else its still a neat experiment and could find some practical use for powering a vehicle or tractor.
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Ultimately we each have to do what works for us in our unique circumstances. We offer suggestions etc, but you do what works for you.
It has often been recommended here that you don’t really start learning woodgas until you do it. Start small and build from your experience to where you want to be. I started with an old junk lawn tractor which I already had out in the weeds. Some start with a small used generator. There is a pretty good chance you will gum it up with tar while learning so start out with an engine you don’t mind sacrificing.
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I fully agree. Would be foolish to build a large elaborate system that may or may not work. Need to build my experience level and see where it takes me.
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God morning Mr. Kilsdonk and welcome to the DOW site .
I Agree with Andy , your first gasifier my be a learning experience . Also each will have different needs from the gasifier and our availability of wood will be different.
Sure wish you were in or close to Alabama . I could show you what we have going on and take you for a ride but from hearing your heating needs sounds like you may be to my north .
Mother Earth News are some good folks . On a 1700 mile trip several years back the senior editor for MEN ( John Rockhold ) run us down in Kansas ( where I first met some good people that are regulars on the DOW, Doug D and Doug B, Billy, Mike B , Jim and many others ) I showed the truck and took him for a ride . Later that year Mother Earth ask if they could sponsor me for a run at the Salt Flat.
Below is a link from Mother Earth News . They have put 9 videos together . The videos are old and there have be several improvements over the years .
Thanks
Wayne
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Good morning Mr. Keith. It looks like you and many others have built a good community here. I see there are MANY years of combined experience here, valuable for anyone building a gasifier.
You are right I do live in the chilly north. I actually live in east central Wisconsin in a rural area. I am surrounded by farms and woods. I have a pretty good supply of dry wood scraps from a local paper factory that builds their own skids. These pieces I believe are ideal for gasification. They also have scrap OSB board that I find gives off quite a bit of heat. Anyways thanks for the message. I have enjoyed watching your videos, they are an inspiration to me.
You might look into a gas well engine, they rack up the hours. Not sure how well they would power a generator.
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I think the key to long life on those engines is that they are slow speed engines that are probably not pushed to the limits. I believe thats key to long life on any engine. If I do this I might choose to oversize the engine to my generator somewhat and have it direct drive to run 1800 RPM only. Something similar to what MEN did in the early 80’s. May even be able to take a diesel engine and convert it to gas by lowering the compression some. Of course I will loose some efficiency though from the heavy mass of internals in the engine. All about finding that balance between longevity and efficiency. I know from my research that compression can be higher to improve performance. Or how about turbocharging? Anyone try that on a wood gas engine?
Both diesel conversion and turbo’s have been thoroughly discussed on this forum. Use the search function to find them.
Since you are a student of old mother earth news, you might remember a fellow who ran a 4 cyl pinto? engine for a couple hours every other day to pump water into an overhead tank and charge a few batteries, and that supplied all their power. At that time (early 80s?) he figured a dollars worth of gas each time he ran it. Now imaging running that on wood.
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Hi Curt welcome to DOW. You are probably at a much better starting point then most so getting to your goal will be more likely. With that in mind I thought I would respond. I don’t want to be preachy or try to portray my self as experty but I think that The trick to off grid that most people never seem to talk much about is you must alter your demands to match what you can make as opposed to trying to hammer the system into the life you have now. That is anathema to much of us here but Ignore that rule and expenses will drive you out of it eventually. Yes you can run a wood gas genny 24/7 that will match your peak load but designing a system large enough for starting a 5 hp compressor and running the steady loads of house and shop without batteries or inverter locks you in to a size that will idle most of the time wasting wood and possible causing high Temp, low temp conditions in the hearth. All my opinions of course.
Good luck, David Baillie
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You will be amazed at what little power you can live with off grid and amazed how much power you have used when you were on grid and just left the lights on. When I get to fire my gasifier up to run my generator, rather than gasoline, then I will be even more aware. This is my ultimate goal. Drive on wood, power and heat with wood and run my tractor on wood. It all will happen in due time.
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You bring very good points to this discussion. Perhaps I can do away with some larger motors like my air compressor. In the MEN article I believe they talked like they were going to belt a smaller compressor to run directly off the engine and run an air line. Perhaps I could get another compressed air storage tank for more capacity if I need it. There are always different solutions to these problems. Keep the genny smaller and averaging 50% load would probably be the best I am guessing. Trying to do laundry at night during off peak times for example might help even out the load on the genny.
Bill, I’m anxious to see how it all turns out with your system. I know the questions I will be asking myself is, will these systems pay for themselves in time. I know part of the deal is the interest we share in these projects so to me my time is free (well somewhat, lol) It would simply be a bonus if considerable money was saved.
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Hi Curt you get the idea. No need to loose electric compressor just size it for something modest that an inverter can start. I have a magnum energy unit that will run continuously 4800 watts, 7000 Peak my main compressor is a 1/2 horse I could do bigger though. I feed a larger tank if I want to use air tools. I have thought if I used the air more off the inverter I would hook up a second small compressor adjusted to come on at a slightly different pressure. Anything to shave that peak starting draw. Lots of tricks lots of forums out there.
David Baillie
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Get a truck compressor. It’ll need engine oil plumbed in. Next a 1000 gallon propane tank. Could also build a wind mill with an air compressor.
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Grid electricity is cheap when it’s available. For me it was the satisfaction of being able to make electricity. In that case, it isn’t a monetary thing. In my case now not having the grid available and needing a generator, now I have to pay per gallon, I believe it will pay for itself.
I can’t wait to get it all set up. I’ve been preparing for this for a while now.
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For a wood gas generator one should expect the engine to be a consumable part of the system. Its better to replace an inexpensive engine vs a very expensive engine. I don’t care how industrial or good an engine is, its going to break and if any mistakes are made and tar gets in it, the damage is done.
If you set up a DC inverter charger, you can get away with more power. Its all a matter of what the inverter is capable of, and your storage capacity. This way you can pull direct from your genset or your battery bank. You can get your heavy loads from the inverter as these will most likely be peak power requirements. Then loading the generator is not so much a big deal and the battery bank will absorb this instead of the generator. This also allows you to only run long enough to create the power needed and you can then give the machine some down time and run off your bank. Another plus to this is you will have the infrastructure for wind and solar. We have had very good luck with the Aims inverters and they can be had in 12 kW with pure sign for relatively low cost. It all boils down to how much practicality you can afford to put into the system. The more you spend the more practical it will become to use.
If you are into Arduino some of us are already developing these advanced systems. I have a tutorial for an arduino air fuel mixture system on here. This little system works quite well and I would highly recommend this on a stationary system. Our machines run as stable as if they are running on gasoline with this and it also handles the heavy loading very nicely. I have some video of the Predator with this system under very heavy loading and that thing hardly skipped a beat welding on it.
Getting CHP is a great idea and a good way to make your efficiencies go up. But until you know for sure I would only plan on this to supplement a primary heating system. You’re only going to get maybe a third of the available btus from your fuel and that’s without all the conversion losses.
Ive been down many roads with this stationary systems. We love the DC set ups but unfortunately we could not market them. The better solution is to go with the AC system and tie the charger inverters into them. You then get the best of both worlds. 
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Good morning Mr Ryder,
First of all I have seen your Vulcan gasifiers and your website and I think you have a neat business going. Its neat to be talking to guys that have experience with simply what works and what does not. From what I am reading these systems sound like they can be somewhat finicky because there can be so many variables. Hopefully with the use of modern electronics like Arduino like you said using an oxygen sensor and a mixing valve to provide the optimum mixture to the engine is a great idea to take some of the variability out of the equation when it comes to the mixture the engine is getting.
Now onto the subject of the engine/generator and appropriate sizing. When I initially dreamed up my system I was thinking of trying to keep it simpler. I was not thinking of battery banks or inverters. Yes it sounds like a neat idea to store power to be able to help a smaller genny run more optimally. I just dont like the added expense of battery banks and inverters. What if there was a way to put more variability into the gasifier? Forgive me if I sound ignorant on this as I havent built a gasifier yet. One could think of it along the same lines as a variable geometry turbocharger. Your typical gasifier could be thought of as your standard turbocharger. The engine with a standard turbocharger is probably not optimized in its efficiency untill 75 % load or more when the turbo is at or near peak boost. With a variable turbocharger the engine could be optimized at maybe 25% load already because the turbo is able to adjust itself to produce good boost at much smaller engine loads. It may sound silly but I wonder with the use of electronics if it would be possible to vary things inside the gasifier to always be at optimal gas production and cracking the tars well. You could have nozzles that could be shut off or turned on with solenoid valves. You could somehow vary the size of the hearth ( I know sounds impossible with temperatures that these see). Perhaps a sliding plate to cover part of the hearth…
Anyways unfortuneatly I am cut short on time. I will try to elaborate on this later. Thanks
I agree with David’s post. I have an 18kW Diesel for the farm’s back up. Most of the time it is burning .75gallons/hr to put out 1500W of electricity. Not very efficient, but it’s a domestic tranquility matter. For this reason I have settled on doing most of my wood gassing around the 6.5hp Predator/Honda GX200 generally in a 4kW. It’s a $99 engine that can heat and light my house 99% of the year.
Stephen
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