Woodgas' greatest hinderance: Donor vehicles

SteveUnruh · June 20, 2023, 1:33am

Filtering is fine, yes.
I’ve used extensive, expensive stationary systems with four levels of progressive filters.
They catch soots, and ash fine.
Tars will pass through. They are in a vapor gaseous state when warm.
Ideally you burn up tars as fuels inside a warmed up, stabilized gasifier.
Some lab researchers have net energy input gas stream refrigerated and taken them out with enhanced condensate. Then a disposal problem. Requiring a whole separate downstream system added for that.

Operating procedures is how you prevent tars to the engine. Never rush when not fully warmed up. Flare off all until you are up to stable temperatures.
Always keep the system loaded up operating hot enough. Took me 20 minutes today stop and go, crawling along to get though a road construction zone. If I’d been woodgasing good time to just switch to gasoline. Then past have to use reheat up and stabilize the gasifier.
Char beds can and do get burnt out stretching to the next easy pull over re-fuel stop. THEN refueled you Will make tars until you burn in a new char bed.
Any wood fed system can fuel fall down bridge - You Will then make tars.

None of these and many more can be solved by filtering.

Not to steal this topic starters thunder but we all have learned the real set-back to wider use of wood gas-for shaft power is the near constant Operator involettns needed.
Why many here now have switch to pre-made charcoal gasification.
Whole generations been spoiled now by made easy refined, spec grades liquid fuels. Us Boomers aged too.

Coming onto 15 years now seeing new agers thing this can be solved by digital electronifing.
Nope. not unless you grind up powder the wood stocks inputs. Compress and uniforrmize them to be very, very consistent always the same. Like the spec grade liquid fuel were made to be.
Too many pre-steps to that approach.
Too complex. Many, many single post failures then made possible.
Too far from useable DIY systems.
S.U.

racecarrandy · June 20, 2023, 7:19pm

Ok heres my 2 cents. I went with a 93 dakota with 318 for several reasons. #1 most important. I’ve never done a gasifier before and Wayne( plus most everyone else) highly recommends it. #2 if you do what they are doing they have already probably had and have proven remedies for what ever problems you will encounter. #3 get a proven real world system. Work on learning other 75 %. Then start changing things. Its hard to reinvent the wheel. The things on my truck that i did different from what everybody else is doing(throttle bodies instead of Wayne’s dampers, the timing advance and idle control) all bit me at argos. So now instead of driving on wood and making more wood chunks I’m having to fix my bright ideas. I had others but thur reading and research on this forum i figured out why my ideas wouldn’t work. I’m not saying dont try something new i just think it would be better to have a proven setup as a base. Sorry for long winded reply.

NonProfit · June 20, 2023, 10:28pm

I am not against Dakotas and I agree that it is the ideal woodgas donor. I hope to have one of my own before too long. However, the second generation Dakota ended in 2004 and I firmly believe we need to identify a younger, cheaper alternative. That’s going to involve reprogramming the OBD2 system., but if we figure that out, it’s possible both performance and efficiency could be improved.

Until then, I’m wondering about using all those Grand Cherokees. For a vehicle which was more expensive when new, they are far more available (and thus, cheaper) than the Dakota. Could a gasifyer be built in a trailer? Obviously, we’d need some kind of flexible coupling to deliver the gas, but I’m not thinking of anything else that would need to change.

Possible advantages:

It uses the Magnum 5.2 that we’re already familiar with.
All of the cargo capacity remains available.
Seating for five.
Less modifications to the vehicle.
It could dropped of next to a generator (or other stationary engine) or one gasifyer could rotate between two or more vehicles.

Also, imagine you have a quick trip and a cold burn chamber. Or, you know you’ll be traveling where wood resupply is not available, or over mountains where WG struggles, it would be easy to leave the trailer behind and gain a bit of efficiency by not using gasoline to transport the weight of the unused gasifyer.

A big disadvantage is that you couldn’t read gauges mounted directly to the unit while driving,

A Grand Cherokee with trailer would be heavier than a Dakota, but not by that much:
Ram 1500 (Regular Cab Long Bed) – 5.2 6400.02 lbs.
94-96 Dakota – 5.2 4043.28 lbs.
Jeep Grand Cherokee (ZJ) – 5.2 3950.68 lbs.

Lastly, I wonder about the advantage of perceived safety. I shared photos from Argos with a coworker and he was convinced it could explode. I tried to explain the gas in inert until it is mixed with O2 and that happens on the other side of the firewall. And, yes it demonstrates a total lack of understanding that he is more afraid of WG than gasoline, but I wonder if placing everything in a trailer if would seem safer (and drive adoption) than having it immediately behind the back window.

Thoughts?

ForbiddenTuna · June 21, 2023, 12:50am

There’s a few trailer builds here on the forum, but then you run into the issue of using a trailer: maneuvering.

You have to account for parking, reversing, etc when you have a trailer. Also a lot of states in the USA require a second title tag and registration so that adds to the expense.

It definitely hinders the people that want to everyday drive on wood. I know I couldn’t park at work with a trailer in tow.

I’ve played around with the idea of a rear mounted luggage rack gasifier but you have to do a lot of weight watching when you have a mass behind the rear axle even moreso with a unibody like the later model Jeep Cherokees. Charcoal would be easiest for that but then you’re making charcoal all the time and don’t have the ability to scrounge in an emergency(burn bans), and for smaller engines one could take notes from Joni and his ultralight raw wood gasifier which he has drawings up here on the forum for free.

Most OBD2 engines will run on woodgas without cheating the computer. I’ve had my 2011 Sierra and it’s 4.3 run on charcoal gas twice now as a test bed and driven them on the road. All I did was tap the fuse block and set up a switch in series with the fuel pump, and made a new intake snorkel to not alter the original for changing back. I kept all the emissions stuff in place. Gary Gilmore ran his relatively new Ford Ranger on charcoal gas as well with a similar fuel shutoff using the airbag inertia switch as a fuel pump kill switch.

I think the main issue with OBD2 is finding a dependable engine design itself. Interference engines are simply a no-go not worth the risk as others have stated. Overhead Valve push rod engines are the safest bet. Some Overhead Cam engines are non interference. I personally think Mopar FoMoCo and GM are still the easiest pickings for woodgas vehicles. Apparently Cadillac Northstar engines take woodgas like a champ. I’d like to see what a Ford 3 valve in a Mustang would do.

SteveUnruh · June 21, 2023, 5:12am

Selecting a vehicle to woodgas is a very multi-faceted set of desisions.

Sure. Will the engine be big enough power downrated on woodgas to be safe and useable in your need-to-drive areas?
Following up on your discovery about Grand Cherokees V-8’s now cheap . . .
I’ve worked side by side on Grand Cherokee’s and Dakota pickup trucks. Why not get a no longer runnable Dakota V-6 and just swap in the Cherokee (Dodge) V-8 engine system, eh?
Same with the 2nd generation Ford Ranger pickups. Why not swap in the V-8 1st Gen Explorer/Mountainere engine system, eh.
Lots of fiddly bitty challenges to overcome as Marcus Norman found, and documented just trying to swap OBD1 and OBDII Dodge full sized V-10 systems.

Before leaping what are your actually annual, local drive on the roads requirements??
Annual, visual required safety inspections??
Annual, Bi-Annual emissions compliance inspections?? That check engine light MUST be off. The computer cannot have any stored trouble codes. 30+ years we had a mix of underhood equipments inspections, and measured tailpipe gasses out.
Will your Insurance company kick about a morphedite mixed vehicle you will create?? They do not like to pay out for problems you’ve created.

From what I’ve regionally experienced; and read from, others most places have too-old-to-have to comply exemptions.
Here one state it is over 25 years old.
The other state it is over 30 years old.
Some places it is a fixed (now very old) calendar date.
O.K. that works here as we’re not yet a kill vehicles with road salts areas.
But we are a required proof of insurance to get annual road licenses. I’ve been insurance inspected now too many damn times for my claimed but real low milage driving on the pickup truck.

So it is much more than a straightforward mechanical problem. Or even a problem with converting to discover that the factory computer control system kicks your butt about your changes. It will not give you the needed timing advances. WesK. and his 4.9L Dodge SOHC V-8.

My admiration is much for the Swedes, and Slovenian fellows; others; having to build to remove to pass their mandatory inspections.

You new guys will not know about Mike LaRosa. Amazing guy. He wood gassed anything and everything he could get cheap and free. No seeker of purr-fect in him. The duct-tape, aluminum tape and steel wire-it-togather man. That said; he was the very first guy in the US to woodgas his fuel injected four’s and V-6 GMs.
He lived I believe in a non-inspection area. Insurnaces? Donna’. Just do not ask. He lived Rural.
Rural, far-rural, far-farming-rural you can do things never possible to those who are Suburbans and Urbans living.

Ha! Skip right over vehicle agonizing. Go Rural first. Then go-local, blend-in. That gives you the most vehicles possibilities in the US and Canada.
Steve Unruh

tcholton717 · June 21, 2023, 11:38am

We went over a lot of this engine stuff. That was fun.

Not trying to side track this thread but as far as engine characteristics go there are at least three threads devoted to it. I am amazed that the guys in Europe can get their vehicles to pass inspections. I had enough trouble getting the regular junk I drive through when we had inspections. Seems like a lot of guys are wanting to make wood gas vehicle changes invisible. I’m in the Mike LaRossa club. Been a few decent rat rods shown here as well. I like the plug and play idea also. Build it on a platform and slide it in place when you want to and disconnect if you have to get past the vehicle gestapo. I don’t know what inspections in the States are anymore. Been 25 years since I lived in an area they did them. As Steve says. Go Rural. Small towns and counties don’t have the money to dick you around like the urbans do.

SteveUnruh · June 21, 2023, 1:40pm

Yeah. One of the rat-rod woodgas builders: John Stout. He did two at least. Lives far-out Dakota’s? or Minnesota? Iowa?

Then another fellow once-was here on the DOW. Built up a very capable woodgassed GM full-sized 454 towing pickup truck. Realized his publicized pictures and location were Net finable known exposures then. Moved from his Suburb. Pulled down all of his DOW posts. Later sold his truck, with its built in place Gasifier system to Chris Seanz, who by then had moved, Rural too.

Wife and I did 28 years ago move from an old very comfortable place down in the dense south county to up here in north county onto her folks old dairy farm. Into one of the three zip-codes areas Not back then required to have vehicles emissions inspected ever other year. Made life easier for drive-them-until-the-wheels-fall-off, vehicle scoff-law me.

And She was able to leave her creeping, stalker, drunkard Ex behind. Before we met and married he’d vehicle camp out on her street Lurking with the cops only able to get him to move along every 24 hours. “Public street”.
Up here . . . he never followed. He knew I’d bury his body far out disappeared, into the National Forest with help from the Father-in-law.
Well now too many people have moved up out here too. Always with the percentage insisting on regulations, regulators to force those who want to live free and independent “comply” to their standards. Join, they say, the 21st Century.
So we move now father out and up along the mountain river valleys to even crappier soils and weather.
I can accommodate, and deal with that.
People and their Insistence’s; I-DO, so you must DO-Too . . . I no longer can.

True out Rural mostly you are left alone so long as you do not yourself intrude and irritate your want-to-be-left alone neighbors.
The freedom to vehicle do as you may comes at the price of long commutes back down into the Shitty areas. Good.
Don’t need their fiber. Get along on satellite. I am seeing more and more rectangular StarLink dishes now.
And we can make our own damn pizza’s at home. Just the way we want.
Live and die in place in as much peace as you will find in this world.

Not just an American spouting. Fellows here in at least 5 Euro countries and on five continents making the same go Rural choices too. Then they can too woodgas in peace. Got trees - got power.

Find where the cell phone service is poor, and crappy. Has many drop-outs. The GPS signals are weak and hard to get accurate fixes with. The Sheeple Insistant’s hate these areas. It scares them. They move back to the services, diaper security areas.
Places with weekly drive-by shootings; nightly burglaries, like now were the wife and I originally moved away from.
Here just last week outside working on her car I was much annoys by a buzzing, stationary drone, lurking overhead. Hopped into the old Hyundai to find the fingers on its controller and say, desist asshole, or suffer.
Nope. Nope. Too many fellows with badges and guns at a mobile base station. “Doing a multi-agency fugitive training exrecise.” “Are you bother by this Sir?” Yes. “O.K.” “We will stop if you tell us who you are, and exactly where you live.” I did. And so they did. Move the drone to pestering others.
I expect the hairy eyeballs to be watching me now for a time now. So all of my vehicle will stay normal and compliant as long as we still live here. My energy DYIing contained onto my own property.

I’ll say again and again. Invest into yourselves to actaully learning the late model vehicle systems. You want to Hack them and bend them to your own purposes . . . you must understand them. Period.
That’s me. Steve Unruh the owner of a 2017 GMC 3500 6.0L V-8 that I can bend to my own purposes. I ain’t afraid.
Only two moduals on that beast versus the wife’s 2014 Edge with 17 modules. One a factory GPS module. Another a bidirectional squawking digital radio.

Choice. That is freedom.

ccweb1 · June 21, 2023, 6:49pm

Guy i work with loves his dakota pickups. Has 4 or 5 of them now. (3 drivable and 2 parts trucks)
He is always looking for the next one as well.
He looked at a 91 with the 318 in it last week. He said it was ruff but might be salvageable, or maybe just as a parts truck. Anyway they got to talking about me and the gasifier. Long story short he said he would give me the truck. It ran back in 2017 when he parked it do to buying a new truck. Ill pick it up friday morning before work.

Any thoughts on the 91 318? Thats pre-magnum right? So what 170ish hp vs 230ish? thats a big hit in the hp department.

Wayne · June 21, 2023, 7:11pm

Hello Chris .

I drove a 91 a couple years .

They have throttle body injection and the throttle plates are smaller than the port injection models. There are electric wires in the throttle and can’t be burned out to clean . However you can take the throttle body off and clean.

I don’t know anything about timing advance because I had this truck before I learned how to advance like the 92 models up.

SteveUnruh · June 21, 2023, 9:48pm

ChrisW.
That’d be a Throttle Body fuel Injected engine.
V engines have two simple low pressure alternating pulsing fuel releasing injectors in that throttle body. Powered by exposed wires as Wayne said. Simple. Uses a simple low pressure electric fuel pump.
My favorite of all gasoline fuel delivery systems.
Nope, will not make the power or lowest emmisions of the later much more complicated individual to each cylinder FI systems.

But TBI’s will gasoline wash the intake ports Clean!!
Here is a composite video @MikeR made of Mike LaRosa GM 4.3V-6 throttle body woodgassed pickup truck. Listen well to MikeL’s explanation of what he’s learned woodgasing this type of system. (Ignore, overlook his politics) The man did know his woodgas operations shit. He was no afraid of applied electrical power as a HAM radio operator. He taught much to many of us. And as you will hear, willing to learn from others too:

Never judge a book by its cover art. Only it’s info relayed. It’s messaging.
A good heart, is a good heart. MikeL had one. He cared deeply.
Regards
Steve Unruh

MOwoodtruck · June 22, 2023, 12:49am

This guy posted an update^. and Yeah I agree wish there was more info on how it is hooked up to tesla/fault codes etc. They mention the possibility of running it on a smaller/lighter wankel, I think even better than a wankel would be a turboshaft generator and then a 2nd stage(ORC, TEG or steam) to harvest the remaining heat energy. Or a tesla turbine based setup. There are a few manufacturers building campers for electric cars, to eliminate range issues they give the trailer a battery pack and electric motors. I think trailer battery set + gen gas would be the best way to range extend an electric car if you are not using a compact energy dense turbine. Because the motor he is using is so weak he has to stop often, best size motor would be atleast ~100hp so its enough to keep car going indefinitely at highway speeds…

ForbiddenTuna · June 22, 2023, 12:54am

It just doesn’t make sense as far as voltage goes.

Is he using step up converters? Do Tesla charge controllers make-do with whatever DC is coming in? Modifying the generator to output proper voltage levels at the sacrifice of lower amps?

madflower69 · June 22, 2023, 4:50am

Tesla and most cars have an onboard charger that accepts ac then does the voltage conversion. Apparently in the EU, you can use 3 phase input as well because they have a different charge plug and onboard charger. The charger goes through a negotiation protocol to determine what both sides can handle. It is similar to what ethernet uses to determine link speed.

I think all he did was take the output from the generator and put it into a home charger to make the connection, then that takes care of everything BUT the caveat is the onboard charger itself has a limit to how much power it can take.

The onboard charger does the step up to a higher voltage then probably some smoothing, and then does the pulsed dc to charge the batteries.
I think this is the limit he is supposedly hitting, otherwise, he would be taxing the engine the entire time. provided he wasn’t already. he was saying it was overheating and such. If the people on the forum were correct some of the onboard chargers can take 22kw, and it looked like he was using a 23hp kohler engine which with the turbo and the right gen head it might get 22kw.

I think it will be a while for his next video on the subject.

ccweb1 · June 24, 2023, 6:41pm

Well i picked up the 91 before work on friday. Here are a few pics before and then this morning my mom gave it a quick rince with the pressure washer while i was working on the 97… maybe the next one we find will be a 92-96.

Drivers side front fender skirt was full of pine needles and is rusted threw under the skirt. Otherwise i am actuall really inpressed. Cab corners are solid. Havent looked at the frame yet for scaling.
Ill have to throw a battery in it and see if it will run.
Im told it ran when he parked it in 2017.

Norman89 · June 24, 2023, 7:02pm

Very curious I know that was the cut off year to switch to the magnum engine, by the valve covers and air filter that looks to be a standard la engine. Depends what you want to do but there is a plethora of aftermarket bolt on power making goodies for those engines, very minimal work to have it up to the factory hp numbers of the magnums

ccweb1 · June 24, 2023, 9:09pm

Thanks marcus for that insight. Thats good to know and good to hear. I knew this, being pre-magnum was going to be short on HP. But if there are relatively simple ways to give it a boost in that department, makes me feel better. Especially since the body is looking solid.

kmrland · June 24, 2023, 9:26pm

HI wayne are you saying you drove a 3.9 dakota on wood gas a few years before running the v8 dakotas.HOW IS the weather way down south- it sure feels hot up here in michigan this year.?? THANKS

kmrland · June 24, 2023, 9:40pm

LOOKS good Chris- a bought a 1999 dakota 3 years ago ,just before coved flue went around and before used car prices went sky high- for 400 bucks, ran good though the rear frame was rusted bad so i welded my own rear frame section and spliced it in. The 99 dakotas seem to have a extra thin looking frame.Maybe the 1996 and back dakotas had a little thicker frames.

ccweb1 · June 24, 2023, 11:19pm

Been following your 99 build Kevin.

Looking very good!

kmrland · June 25, 2023, 3:44am

Thanks ya its a bit different- i lowered the reactor housing about 4 " below the original frame rails- i think i should have stayed closer to even with the frame- though i have air shocks to install to raise it up a little- i also need some skid plateing so my lowered frame rail caint snag a pot hole— and all my exterier plumming is a bit extra weight around or between the reactor and the heat exchanger-- the way WK the book design is much better really-- I just have thinking problem lately- I am sure it will work-- hopefully not to many plugging ishues with my compact reactor housing. I may have to add one more pipe plug clean port at top of my C iron reactor gas exit channel. I should have plenty of space between burn tube housing and inner burn tube for the incoming air–see how it pans out i gess. REALLY THOUGH WE CAINT BEAT HAVING THE WAYNE KEITH___ HAVE WOOD WILL TRAVEL__ BOOK PLANS__ SO MANY LITTLE TRICKS TOO MENCHEN—in that book-NICE BOOK PLAN TOO BUILD WITH.