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Making charcoal

Started by Don P, November 22, 2017, 07:52:01 AM

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Don P

While the guys were fussing and shimming the last rows of skip sheathing on the barn roof I started cleaning up the pasture we've been sawing in. Some minor mountains of slabs and edgings and a heap of docked tops. We had been talking about charcoal and there were a couple of old drums in the windrow so I decided to 'speriment at being a collier. I lit it through a 4" bung hole in the bottom and then plugged that after it got going good. Then I fed it all day, definitely not the fast way to get rid of a pile! You can barely see the edge of the lid with a chain in the foreground, I lowered that onto the fire at 5 o'clock yesterday and scooped a couple of scoops of dirt from around our charcoal hearth on top then packed it into the crack around the edge well. We're supposed to let it cool for 2 days, I'll tip it onto a wire mesh screen and bag anything that looks like good cowboy charcoal. The rest will leave that black stain in the soil from a coaling that I've discovered in the woods several times. Kind of neat to happen upon one.
That's a Thansksgiving stumpkin in the background  ;D

69bronco

I find there's a fine line between charcoal and ashes :D. Last batch I had some company show up and didn't cap it off on time, probably 20 minutes past usual. Poof!

Bert

I love making my own charcoal! Never did it on that scale though. Usually a metal 5 gal bucket at a time. Good Luck!
Saw you tomorrow!

samandothers

Look forward to your picture of your creation!

gww

I have been looking for a good 30 gal barrel to fill and turn up side down in a 50 gal barrel.  I have found one of two but they always have a rust hole of some other defect.  I have not gone out of my way or wanted to spend any money getting one but will keep looking and when I finally get one, it will be time to try it.  Interested to hear your final out come.
Cheers
gww

TKehl

GWW, if you get around Sedalia, I'll give you a 50 gallon barrel.  Closed head, but good shape, still have paint on them.  They throw them out at work and I often have more than I need.

FYI, there is a good article about firing a LARGE charcoal kiln in one of the Foxfire books.  Can't recall which one...
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

gww

TKehl
Thanks for the offer.  I took the 50 gal barrel I had and cut the top out for storing chicken feed mouse proof.  I do have another one that I can get at moms house and so I am good.  If a guy could only see into the future.  I had a thirty gal barrel with a spicket on it that I had kerosine in and gave to my brother in law who ended up giving it to some one else.  I had another one in my shed full of trash but the bottom rusted out and another one at moms used as a trash can with the same results.  Now when I want one, I have ruined them all or already given them away.  I can't see spending much untill I try it myself and see if it really works for me. 

That was a great offer but I think I am good there and sooner or later I will come up with something.  I saw one guy making it in gal paint cans and oven roasting pans in his wood stove.  I have a wood stove but don't feel like making such small amounts.  Them guys make fire works and filters and such.  Me, I just want to use some of the stuff I am just burning now to cook with.  super small batches don't have much appeal to me. 

Again, your offer was nice.
Thanks
gww

thecfarm

I was looking for one to burn stumps. I heard someone say they have a $50 deposit on them.   :o  Maybe that is why I can't found any. I've been watching one at a woods landing. I got one from the dump,but I would like to have another one,since they are hard to find.
Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

69bronco

Quote from: thecfarm on November 22, 2017, 02:37:10 PM
I was looking for one to burn stumps. I heard someone say they have a $50 deposit on them.   :o  Maybe that is why I can't found any. I've been watching one at a woods landing. I got one from the dump,but I would like to have another one,since they are hard to find.
I've got 15 or 20 55gal drums, if you get over my way I'll load you up.

thecfarm

Model 6020-20hp Manual Thomas bandsaw,TC40A 4wd 40 hp New Holland tractor, 450 Norse Winch, Heatmor 400 OWB,YCC 1978-79

Don P

Probably only if Sam needs one, this is the old road parallel to I-77 running up the escarpment between NC and VA. Highway 52 through Cana, VA has the removable lid kind at the apple/honey roadside stands. That is really a nothing bigger than a pickup truck with good brakes hiway , there's country songs about that hill, several ;)

So I pull in to one of the stands to buy a drum, he really wants to sell 2, the second for half price, I should have done it, a man always needs another drum. So we walk by the pile of drums marked honey, some south American stamp, and I go inside to pay, stacks of jars of mountain honey inside. Now ... I had walked by this stack of foreign honey drums on the way in to the store  :D

LeeB

They have mountains in South America.  :D
'98 LT40HDD/Lombardini, Case 580L, Cat D4C, JD 3032 tractor, JD 5410 tractor, Husky 346, 372 and 562XP's. Stihl MS180 and MS361, 1998 and 2006 3/4 Ton 5.9 Cummins 4x4's, 1989 Dodge D100 w/ 318, and a 1966 Chevy C60 w/ dump bed.

Don P

I realized if folks were going to be milling around I didn't want to dump out 500 gallons of charcoal. I need to load Christmas trees tomorrow so might not be able to see if we made charcoal for a few days.

We did light the stumpkin around dusk tonight though.


This one was a little later, it was kind of a neat abstract;

samandothers

I have been up and down that road a time or two going from Winston Salem to the Blue Ridge Parkway particularly before the connector was put in between I77 and 52 south of Mt Airy.  It is an interesting drive.  We would usually hit the Parkway at the top of the 52 climb and go North.

By the way the Stumpkin is neat!

Don P

Yeah, those stumpkins are a neat use for a hollow log. This one didn't get up and go that good. I've had it stood on its end for... years. It should have had a piece of tin over the top. It seemed to be a little too damp for quite awhile. Five year old Matthew built and ran that little bonfire at the bottom intake. Tending that and the fire coming through a crack in the back kept him entertained all evening.

I shoveled out and bagged 16 30 gallon trash bags of charcoal today. With a better burn it should make about 20 bags worth BUT I need to screen out a lot more. This screen is leaving too small pieces still, I think I'll try some chicken wire which will dump probably 50% into the next grade, which would be good blacksmith or metalwork size I think, then what drops out of the screen in the pic is good bio-char for soil. I got 2 bags worth of it. I did some reading, it looks like the soil would be happy with 10-20 tons/ac, so no worries about a spill  :D.

I forgot to take a pic when I tipped it over, I'm about halfway into it. You can see we didn't do a good job separating sizes so there are a lot of "brands", unburned chunks, that got pulled out and will go back in next time.


Then the screen and into bags. This all needs to be a stand that I can bobcat around that grades 3 ways and it shakes down into the sacks. I need to get some of those double wall paper sacks. Anyhow, there's the charcoal empire, low startup costs   ;D



drobertson

Never done it on purpose, but have noticed larger slab burn piles contained nice charcoal when the burn settled.  I know for a fact the makers of it use dried wood, light , burn then choke,(damp) off the O2, making lump, doing your own makes sense to me, the timing of the water quench is a key component,
only have a few chain saws I'm not suppose to use, but will at times, one dog Dolly, pretty good dog, just not sure what for yet,  working on getting the gardening back in order, and kinda thinking on maybe a small bbq bizz,  thinking about it,

Don P

There's no water quench here. I stick a fork, darn, I just looked back at the pic I posted, the lid is upside down. You can about see the bolts that hold the 4' or so of chain on the other, top, side. I bump the barrel and drop everything below the rim, slip a fork under the chain and drop the lid in the burning barrel. Get it punched down level and then scoop dirt on top till it seals all the smoke out. It's amazing, that 500 gallon barrel was cooling rapidly in a half hour.

So today's burn started with the barrel on its side shoved over right beside the slab pile, duh huh. I stuck in slabs, nicely lined up, no big gaps from tossing them in over the top of an upright 7' barrel. Chainsawed the pile somewhat close to the top and tipped it up. Shoved it back over to the burn area and stuck the torch in the hole. It really needs 3 or 4 bottom ports to get going, oxygen never gets to that bottom back corner. I let it get going longer before I plugged the bottom hole. from then on it burns up top but no oxygen gets to the bottom and it begins cooling. I opened it for about a half hour around 2 hours into the burn and warmed the bottom back up, who knows  :D.

With it pretty well packed it dawned on me charcoal really isn't that much smaller than shrunken wood. I thumped the barrel several more times and did add a good bit more but I dropped the top on it after about 4 hours.

This is lighting it with a weedburner torch stuck in the single 4" hole.


And the action shot, I've bumped it once and piled more on, I capped the bottom inlet soon after this;

Don P

I need to get more uniform bottom air, it's just not getting a good burn in the bottom of that big drum. The top of that last burn was great charcoal but in that tight stuff down below not enough air in the early burn to get it going, the bottom half of the barrel will need reburning but not before I cut another hole or two around the bottom that will get it going then I'll block and dirt pack those shut once its rolling and smoke free.

I screened into 3 sizes this time by using a chicken wire screen first blocked up over a 1/4" mesh expanded metal screen. 1" and larger pieces of charcoal on top of the chicken wire goes into lump charcoal sacks. Sitting on the next screen is 3/8 to 1" foundry grade, then everything that drops through is biochar... the greatest interest right now is in biochar, I could grind and sell every bit.

We were under wind warnings today. I went down to work in the shop but had a squirrel attack.  My first charcoal melt, this chunk of aluminum is about 6" across and 1/2" thick, the mold was the bottom of a large coffee can.

I just nestled a cut off empty propane little camping cylinder into a 5 gallon metal pail full of charcoal, popped a 2" hole in the bottom edge and hooked an old vacuum blower to it. This was as crude as it gets, an uninsulated furnace, winds to 50 blowing blizzard at times and it melted metal, neat! On the second batch I had a good bit more in the crucible, enough where I was starting to be able to just push scrap down into the pool and it would melt. I skimmed the dross off the top, got my stuff ready to pour, opened the top back up... and the metal was gone! It's all in the bottom of the pail, I had probably too much air and really had a torch going on that thin little tank. I'll rig it up better but I had a... blast  ;D

btulloh

What are you using for your crucible?

HM126

Don P

It was on old empty camping propane cylinder with the top hacksawed off. So much too thin but it was sitting there  :D. I'll be in town tomorrow and will pick up a nipple of 4" sch 40 black pipe and an end cap and try that. I'll also see if I can get a bag or two of fireclay and some sand.

I've been emailing around with some interested local folks thoughts as I've been playing, it might be of interest;

Well I couldn't screen in the wind yesterday so I played with some of the mid sized charcoal, between grilling size and biochar sized. I slapped together a furnace in a 5 gallon metal pail and put a blower on it for forced draft, basically a deep bed of charcoal and a blacksmiths forge. Nestled in the charcoal was an old camping propane bottle with the top cut off for a crucible. In the crucible I put scrap aluminum. Attached is a pic of the first pour, I just poured it into a 2 lb coffee can and made about a 1 lb disc.

The furnace was still working so I melted a good bit more the second time, I increased the charcoal and draft and got the pool hot enough I could just feed metal into the hot pool and it would melt immediately, pretty cool! I had just skimmed the dross off the top and was getting ready to pour and my metal disappeared from the crucible... I burned a hole in the thin steel propane cylinder :D However this is another use for our charcoal, we can release that carbon back to the atmosphere... and cast metal.

I now had a problem in the bottom of my "furnace" I had a slaggy mix of aluminum and charcoal. To clean that up and recover the aluminum for another melt I kept blowing air on the charcoal bed until it was gone leaving me with mostly aluminum that I'll remelt in another pour.

Sooo, where did that charcoal go? I combined the charcoal, pure carbon that the tree had created by pulling CO2 out of the air, with oxygen, and released it back to the atmosphere as CO2 and CO. Making and using charcoal while explaining this would be a real hands on teaching moment. There is the other lesson... if you smell burning fur, its you! All this stuff is wickedly hot.

In the screening from Monday I got a couple more bags of biochar. This would be the equivalent of "extra virgin" biochar by which I mean everything that drops through the screen is in those bags, charcoal AND ash. Ash contains the minerals that were in the wood, potassium (potash), it also has a liming effect. This is fine for most of us but this is not neutral biochar. Overdoing that... probably not really possible in a field but quite possible in a pot or small garden, could lead to ph or nutrient problems.

Any charcoal from above that screen is pure carbon, the ash dropped out of those screens. I will probably end up grinding that for biochar, that is nutrient free and should be ph neutral. So I'm actually producing 2 different kinds of biochar.

Oh, if you visit the old iron furnace at Foster Falls there is a large slaggy chunk of ore, charcoal, limestone and iron laying beside the furnace. At some point in the life of that furnace they lost blast and the charge inside the furnace "froze". I can only surmise they had to disassemble the front of that furnace and drag it out to where it sits now, then rebuild the furnace, a really bad day! I've scooted inside the Ravens cliff furnace, the firebrick lining inside of it collapsed, ending its service life.

btulloh

That' very interesting.  In your previous post, I thought the propane cylinder was used to make the furnace.  I wouldn't have thought it could be used as the crucible, but there you go. 

For some unknown reason, I'd like to make some aluminum ingots from scrap.  I can't really say why, but that's just the way it goes.

Keep up the good work.
HM126

Don P

Well, I really want to smelt iron and make a blade from local dirt but that's getting way out there :D
I had a juice can lined up to pour that second batch into. I was going to put it on the wood lathe and turn a pulley.

I need to play with simple moldmaking. Michelle has a nice aluminum garden trowel and a grain scoop I'd like to replicate. Then there is the tablesaw crank handle I broke back before the turn of the century which has tied up a perfectly good pair of vice grips ever since. Blower impellers and swinging waterwheel buckets, Victorian table legs...  :D

btulloh

That's quite a list of good things to do.  To quote our own Kbietz, "Never enough time . . . ".

Are you going to use sand molds?  They seem like they'd be pretty easy and you have some good patterns to start with.
HM126

Don P

Sand molding is on the list of things to learn. I've read up on it several times in the past but have never done any. I also have a tub of plaster of paris, quite old I haven't lifted the lid to see if it is a chunk or a powder but it can barely take the heat, it does need to be baked to avoid a steam explosion where greensand, unbaked regular sand molding, is porous enough that even though the sand is damp enough to hold together the steam can escape. Plaster is too tight to let the steam out so most of the moisture has to be driven off. As a kid I had a steam explosion when I was playing around casting lead, My "shadow" was  pretty obvious on the lead covered kitchen cabinets, something best avoided! I'm not sure if I'm technically still grounded  :D. If I remember right steam is about 600 times bigger than water and hot metal can make lots of steam instantly.

gww

Don
I am really enjoying this thread and hope you keep expermenting and also posting those expermants.
Cheers
gww

Ljohnsaw

I've been following along, too.  I have a pile of aluminum that, someday, I want to melt down and make something...
John Sawicky

Just North-East of Sacramento...

SkyTrak 9038, Ford 545D FEL, Davis Little Monster backhoe, Case 16+4 Trencher, Home Built 42" capacity/36" cut Bandmill up to 54' long - using it all to build a timber frame cabin.

Don P

I'm glad y'all are enjoying it too, I've always wanted to mess with this end of things. So far about the only thing I've spent is time. I guarantee those old iron workers here a century ago were using river sand and hillside clay to make molds and refractory lining.

There was one of those aha moments yesterday, actually there were several, we call them ignoseconds cause whatever it was was usually really ignorant and you figure that out in the span of about a second.
One was, the heat and flame are not that visible, and it is some kind of hot. Always have the gloves on.
When the crucible leaked into the furnace there was a second of "where is it?".  "Uh-oh, I hope it doesn't run back to the fan" (Fan should be up with a downward sloping tube to the tuyere!) Quick check and the fan was good. Next thought, 2 or 3 lbs of red hot glowing aluminum just hit the sheet metal bottom of the pail, and I'm over snowmelt saturated wet ground, big spatter hazard. Probably better over a dry bed of sand. Happily, ignorant but unscarred  :)

Dave Shepard

Water expands 1,600 times when turning into vapor.
Wood-Mizer LT40HDD51-WR Wireless, Kubota L48, Honda Rincon 650, TJ208 G-S, and a 60"LogRite!

samandothers

You are wise to recognize the dangers though a bit delayed but better than not recognizing and paying a higher price!

Enjoying the journey.

Don P

Slow learner but learning  :D
The camera decided it wasn't too bad out today.
This is the 5 minute furnace. Small blower, too much for this even, I had an old brake shoe I was shading it with most of the time, I can make an adjustable swinging flap. This would work for a number of pours if lined with some kind of refractory. It would burn hotter with a lot less fuel.



This is inside at the bottom, that is the tuyere, the blow pipe to the fan, the dropped pour did try to head back to the fan, that's melted aluminum in the pipe. Notice it burned though the sheet metal... or without going to the trouble of lining a quickie pail furnace it will last long enough for a few pound pour.



This is the dropped pour, I'll remelt it next time, charcoal floats and skims off easily. Sort of neat as art.



The lined furnace I'm thinking might be a flue pipe stuck in an old drum with hillside clay packed around it and a very slow warmup to cure it then continue on and fire. I'm going to bring the blast in either at several points around it (in our old local iron furnaces that duct around the old furnaces was called the windbelt) or from underneath like a forge to get a more even burn. You can see the cold back corner on the pail. My single inlet charcoal burning drum suffers from the same problem. When I have time I'll make a lined furnace and try again.

Don P

I got back over there yesterday and flipped out the burn barrel from that second burn above. What was up is generally to the right and the bottom end of the slabs as they stood in the packed barrel is to the left.


It looks like the fire went up from my too small inlet at the bottom until it found a level where it had enough air from above to burn and then it never got enough oxygen to really get going down below. I had other things to do yesterday so didn't take time to cut more inlets. I decided to start with a smaller looser fire in the bottom, let it burn and then start feeding those slab ends back into the fire as it could take them. I finished by throwing the roof board cutoffs in. (I pulled about 30 good pieces of reasonable length 1x6 poplar out of what had been chucked into that pile in the background ) I probably fed it every hour or so and then dropped the top on what was then only about a 3/4 full drum and sealed it off with a couple of scoops of dirt. When I would throw in a healthy amount the smoke goes white, steam, then if I had thrown on too much it would have green/yellow in it, unburned wet methane I think, choking it down too much.

I think I've got enough lump and blacksmith charcoal for the near future, my barn shed is about full of bags  :D
I'm going to start just burning and dumping the charcoal and make a pile. Screening and bagging on any scale would need work, its bottlenecking me right now, need to clean up and get out of his pasture. I'd like to have enough frost action after I pull out to help loosen up our compaction of that site over the past year.  I'll let it sit in the weather until I'm done burning. Then I'll get a hammermill and dump the rest through it and grind it to biochar. I cleaned up the planer shavings and put them in the farm compost pile. Moved the planer up into the barn for doing the loft floorboards which will generate a bunch more shavings. The ground biochar will mostly go on the pile with the shavings and I'll roll it all in. Hopefully it will be good black earth for their garden in a year or two

r.man

The easiest way to make charcoal that i have found is in an outdoor furnace. Load heavier than needed one visit and then shovel excess coals into a steel pail the next time. Sift out the ash after the pail has cooled and repeat. I am making fuel grade for a charcoal gasifier so I will grind the raw stuff into smaller pieces and sift out the dust. Without much extra time involved I am producing about 2 pails or close to 10 gallons of raw charcoal a day. I have made charcoal in an indirect barrel system as well as a direct and this is by far the least time consuming way.
Life is too short or my list is too long, not sure which. Dec 2014

Ljohnsaw

That sounds like the best way - you are making heat that you are using and robbing a little to make the charcoal, instead of just wasting all the heat.
John Sawicky

Just North-East of Sacramento...

SkyTrak 9038, Ford 545D FEL, Davis Little Monster backhoe, Case 16+4 Trencher, Home Built 42" capacity/36" cut Bandmill up to 54' long - using it all to build a timber frame cabin.

Don P

r.man, Have you figured out how you're going to grind it? I was thinking a hammermill, curious to hear how people do it.  I'd really like to see plans and progress on the gasifier when you have time.

Dave Shepard

This is at the top of a burn cycle, so everything is glowing pretty well, but it's all charcoal. I could produce a couple barrels a day.

Wood-Mizer LT40HDD51-WR Wireless, Kubota L48, Honda Rincon 650, TJ208 G-S, and a 60"LogRite!

gww

Dave
I have pulled that type of stuff out of my stove before.  Do you find that to be cooking charcoal?  I do know if you do it the indirect way and burn all the gasses out of the wood that you would not smell things like hickory smoke when you used it for cooking.  The stuff out of my stove looked ok but I have tried cooking over wood and it is terrible.  So, You may not be using the charcoal for cooking but does just pulling the wood out of the furnace get it to be smokeless or at least make the smoke not smell like smoke?  Smoke not controlled makes good meat bitter.

I could try it myself cause I am burning wood every day but figured if you already know, I don't have to waste a steak if I am wrong.
Cheers
gww

Dave Shepard

I haven't tried cooking with it. My interests are more along the lines of blacksmithing with it. These are softwood slabs. Hardwood slabs do the same thing. Actual split firewood I don't think would work as well.
Wood-Mizer LT40HDD51-WR Wireless, Kubota L48, Honda Rincon 650, TJ208 G-S, and a 60"LogRite!

gww

Dave
I kinda knew you were using it for differrent stuff but thought I would ask anyway.  Thank you for taking the time to respond.
Cheers
gww

Don P

I've screened out some lump for grilling but haven't tried any yet. I suspect it is creosote or the tars stuck to the charcoal that is giving it the off flavor. One check I read somewhere along the way said that good charcoal shouldn't really need soap to come off you, if it is shiny, oily or tarry it was at too low a temperature so is not just pure carbon yet. That might be the flavor  ???

I picked up some playsand and firebrick today while I was coming home from the last round of physical therapy for the shoulder repair. I think I'll try lining a half barrel with bricks packed with hillside clay, fire it slow then try a melt and see what happens.

The roofers were finishing up at the barn so I cleaned up there, dumped the last load of charcoal and have just smothered todays burn. I think one more and I'll be out of that pasture.  Up behind the haybarn where we set up later and sawed from midsummer to fall has enough slabs and edgings for quite a bit more.

r.man

Don I built a grinder last year based on one by Gary Gilmour. Fairly fast with a separater screen built on to it and it gives good results. I do have a better gear box and motor to put on it as well as some dust control before I use it for large amounts.
Life is too short or my list is too long, not sure which. Dec 2014

Don P

I'd appreciate a look if you have any pics.
How were you direct and indirect firing?
Several years ago a friend was making charcoal indirectly by filling a 55 gallon drum with wood, put the band clamp on the lid and laid the sealed drum on its side across angle iron that was across a cinder block firebox. He put the 2" bung on the bottom and ran a pipe from that hole back to the fire. The unburned gasses coming from the cooking wood would help feed the fire. It was working good until creosote, condensate and ash blocked the pipe. It's kind of suprising how far the top of a drum can go. We decided it needed a hinged steel flap in the lid as a popoff valve.

With this I was trying to find an easy way to make charcoal on site out of the slab pile. For a teenager this might turn a few bucks.

gww

Don
Thanks for mentioning the 50 gal barrel thing and also what to be carefull of on it.
Cheers
gww

Paul_H

Hi Don,

here is a FF link to a thread on making charcoal and running small engines on the the screened fuel. This link should take you to a charcoal grinder built by FF member Magicmikey

https://forestryforum.com/board/index.php/topic,81327.msg1297600.html#msg1297600
Science isn't meant to be trusted it's to be tested

Don P

Thanks Paul!  I made the mistake of reading the whole thread and watching all the videos. That looks so much easier with charcoal. This could be a problem, that looks like fun  ;D

Paul_H

Yes,charcoal like sawdust is addicting!😀
I remember the threads you posted long ago of the charcoal kilns near where you were working. Pretty interesting,we have nothing like it around here.
Science isn't meant to be trusted it's to be tested

Don P

That looks like an easy way to get into running on wood. I liked Gary's method of making charcoal. I do have another tank I could make an afterburner out of for this tank. It would take the knuckleboom to set it, although that's do-able. I can see even when my smoke cleans up there is a lot of unburned gas rolling out of the drum, that extra burn room I'm sure would help clean that up. I like the big barrel for holding a fair amount of slabwood at a time. It makes a pretty good whack of charcoal but I can see that as a good thing, there are several vehicles that don't leave the farm but run a lot. That I think would be a good place for charcoal or wood gas.

The rotary screen is a great idea, looks very much like a gristmill's bolter reel. They start out with a fine screen for cornstarch and then become progressively more coarse as the ground grain travels down the bolter. There are dividers underneath at each screen change. What I've been capturing between chicken wire and expanded metal screens, my aluminum melting size, looks like about the size you all are using for transport fuel.

bdsmith

Don P:
I grind my charcoal with a Toro leaf blower using the vacuum attachment and bag.  I have to control the moisture content of the charcoal between "dusty" and "muddy" but I can process 5 gallons in about 5 minutes.  The Toro has an aluminum fan blade that fractures any size of chunk into 3/8" or less.  The unburned pieces pile up behind the fan and you can hear the sound change.

Also, charcoal used for biochar ought to be burned at a low temp - around 600 to 700 degrees.  This leaves tars and petroleum behind.  Various bacteria and fungi feed on these.

I have adapted the TLUD stove (Top Lit, Up Draft) method to my charcoal making.  I burn wood in a vertical sided pit and keep adding wood to move the combustion layer upwards. This robs the lower wood of O2 and the residual heat bakes out the wood gases leaving charcoal.
I have been making 2 to 3 cu yards at a time, with 5 to 6 hour burns.

Don P

Cool, I'll try some through my sawmill blower and see what happens. It has a steel impeller I welded up and it can take a pretty good hit, not sure if it'll grind or just pass it through. I could install a screen above the blades so it can't eject above the screen size, not sure if that would work or just clog but its a easy starting place. Thanks for keeping the ideas flowing.

That's interesting about low temp and leaving hydrocarbons intact, that is the opposite of what I read... somewhere. That article was saying that the soil bacteria would clear it from the char with time but that it was not a good thing. I'm still at the open minded skeptic stage of learning. I'm hoping to get some passed around and played with.

With the recent cold snap we got into the charcoal slab pile the other day, we've all been blowing through the firewood this winter and it's early yet! There's still plenty of sawing to do there still though.

Just in case this works out, be thinking of doing this in a third world country to make cooking fuel and garden amendment and how to use that charcoal safely and efficiently in a simple tin can rocket type burner.

Al_Smith

I don't really set out to make charcoal by using a coking oven or retort of sorts .However if I rake the ashes of my slash pile after a burn I may have as much as a 5 gallon bucket full of lump charcoal.
I burn the slash from the top down so in theory the smoke wafts up through the flames and as such the ashes tend to cover the bottom of the pile where it burns up with a lack of oxygen  .Presto chango charcoal

Don P

That works for very small amounts of grilling charcoal but the rest went up in smoke and ash. I'm trying to look at it sort of like the butcher, those pigs ears and ham bones are another resource.

Al_Smith

A little bit is nice for grilling if you have time to do it .To me lump charcoal is better than briquettes .However it takes a good bit to get the fire going just the way you like . It's worth the time if you have the time .

justallan1

What I did was take a 20-25 gallon oil drum, punch some holes in the lid, cram it plumb full of wood and then put the lid on. I then put that upside down in a 55 gallon drum and filled around and on top with wood and lit the wood. I then took a half of a 55 gallon drum with no ends and perched that on top for a flue. I had already punched some holes in the bottom few inches of the 55 gallon drum that I have the fire in to let air in.
After I let the fire burn itself out I took the flue off and covered the 55 gallon drum with a chunk of sheet metal with a couple cinder blocks to weight it down and plugged the vent holes at the bottom with dirt.
The following morning I pulled out the 20 gallon oil drum and opened it to find I had probably 12-15 gallons of charcoal.
My little charcoal gasifier is built and hooked up to a generator, now I just need to bust up the charcoal and fire the thing up.

mike_belben

Any of you guys ever look into making "active" charcoal?
Praise The Lord

TKehl

@r.man or anyone else using a wood stove to make charcoal.

Do you put a lid on the bucket when you take the coals out or dowse them with water or?  Seems like they would keep burning if they were moved to an open bucket. 

Wanting to try this out.  Am I overthinking things? 
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

Don P

If it is still hot it'll burn if it can get oxygen, so yes you need an airtight lid. I've heard stories of old time colliers opening up the mound before it had completely cooled and losing it in a very hot fire.

I had a little pile of cooled charcoal on the ground a few feet from the burn barrel and had the bottom bung open, glowing bright. The black charcoal that could see the fire relit. Play in a safe area.

I noticed they have a charcoal retort set up in Liberia for turning their scraps into cooking fuel.

TKehl

Well, I just couldn't wait for a response.   ::)  Had been thinking about doing this for a week or two and had a bunch of extra coals in the stove tonight. 

I filled a 5 gallon metal bucket with coals from the fireplace.  It lit fire 3 times while I was filling it.  I threw a little snow on it to settle the flames with the intent of leaving enough heat to dry itself out.  LOTS OF STEAM!

After that, I packed 2 inches of ash on top and mounded our tremendous amount of snow (2 whole inches!) around the bucket smearing some on the sides to take advantage of latent heat.  Still some steam here for a bit.

So far the only casualty is the plastic handle on the bucket bail.   ::)  :'(   ;)
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

bdsmith

TKehl:
Ash will allow air in very slowly so the coals will remain lit.  They will also keep in the heat.  That's how the oldtimers kept from having to go through the pain of using the flint and steel to respark a fire.

Combustion requires 3 things - fuel, oxygen and heat.
You need an air tight lid on the container if you want to stop combustion or you can put water on the coals to cool them off.  Otherwise it will burn until only ash is left.

I have tried to a couple of different ways to smother the fire when I make biochar in pits.  I found that lots of water is the only consistently effective method.

TKehl

You bring up a lot of good points that I would have a hard time arguing with.  I had nothing to loose but about 10-20 minutes of my time.   

Unfortunately though, it looks like it worked.   ;D  Will open it this afternoon and see.    ;)

None of the packed ash "cap" has fallen and the bucket is cold to the touch.  I did pour a little water on the ash cap about 1AM this morning when I went out to feed the stove.  Thinking that frozen packed ash would be a better air barrier than just packed ash.  On the other hand, the bucket was already pretty cold at that time.  I don't think wet packed ash made a difference over dry packed ash.
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

Al_Smith

Charcoal has been around since cavemen discovered fire .When in England for example during the dark ages they set huge piles of wood afire to make the stuff.Covered the pile with dirt and watched it for several days on end .Those tending the fire sat on one legged stools so if they fell asleep they'd fall off which would wake them up .If the dirt cover fell away the whole pile could burst into flames and be lost,all that work .

TKehl

My setup:



Removal of frozen ash cap:



My supervisors  ;) :



Results:



Very small batch and still need to sift out the ash.  But, I had no money and very little time involved in this.  Charcoal came out nice and dry.   Pretty happy with the results!  ;D
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

Don P

Burger time  ;D

If you look back at the big barrel burn I was doing I was dropping a lid on top and then a few scoops of dirt packed on top of the lid to exclude air. Then I look for smoke and if any shows I pack that area better. That amount was taking a couple of days to cool off.

Mike, tell me more about activated charcoal. I'm thinking it is just "hot" charcoal, clean, everything but the carbon has been burned out.

mike_belben

Naw, i checked wikipedia and its a bit more involved.  Either steam or chemical process.  Its expensive to buy and has a million uses.
Praise The Lord

JohnW

Don. I've made charcoal, probably about 20 times, with various direct burn setups.  I smothered the fire out most of the time, but I like extinguishing with water better.  It puts the fire out faster, saves more charcoal and bigger pieces.

However you do it, sifting out the ashes and fines is important for blacksmith type use.

bdsmith

TKehl,
Using snow to remove heat!  That a new one for me - I live in south Mississippi.

While we just had 1" a few days ago, it has been 25 years sine the previous snow fall.

TKehl

We don't get snow all that often compared to further North.  An inch or two a few times a winter and it may stick around for a week maybe two.  There are exceptions to that though...

As such, if I do more, I think I will set the bucket on a couple concrete blocks inside a plastic tub of water/ice.  The tubs that the cattle protein licks come in look just right.   ;)
In the long run, you make your own luck – good, bad, or indifferent. Loretta Lynn

r.man

My cooling pail is a steel pail with a steel lid that used to have a retractable plastic pour spout. I fill it with hot coals, pop on the lid and then drop a brick over the big pour hole. If you want the charcoal for biochar quenching works well, if for fuel choking is better. Last year I was dumping directly into a steel barrel with a steel lid but decided I was converting some char into ash, too much air available in the barrel. Banking the fire was burying live coal in a thick layer of ash to avoid having to relight and it works good but not in a pail out in the cold. I can cap the pail with ash only and in 8 hrs everything in it will be cold. Too much heat loss through the sides and not enough volume to protect the core area. Hope this helps.
Life is too short or my list is too long, not sure which. Dec 2014

Don P

 I played around with the little gasifying stove from the driveonwood site today, pretty neat. Even with it cold and windy it was smoke free and a little fistful of wood lasted about 30 minutes and produced good heat



 

 

 

 

 

Don P

I've been slowly gathering parts for a simple fire and ruminating, let me run this by you guys. A lot of effort goes into sealing the top to keep oxygen out of the top of the container. I'm going to try it with an old water pressure tank. What if I just put the output pipe fitting up top and my charge/cleanout port is on a plate at the bottom that has the inlet nozzle in it. A small air leak there simply feeds the fire. I'll have to invert it to charge but not a big deal on a small tank. Thoughts?

bdsmith

How will you light the charge after you invert the tank?
The proper positioning of the fuel in relation to air will enable pyrolysis, i.e. a combustion moving through the fuel towards air, leaving behind charcoal. 
With an air vent at the bottom, you need to light top of the charge. Wood gas will escape out the top.
With an air vent at the top, you need to light the bottom and have the wood gas leave through the bottom port. Since the hot gasses will rise, this method might not work well.

Most people find that with a Top Lit, Up Draft stove (TLUD), they often build it with too little air flow to keep the fire burning.  What they don't realize is that more air doesn't mean less charcoal, it just means faster burning.
Of course, stopping the combustion at the right time is key otherwise you end up with a pile of ash instead of charcoal.

Don P

Whoops sorry, I'm jumping around. My wife says I start conversations in the middle  :D
check out this video on the simple fire charcoal gasifier, that's what I'm gathering parts for;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yL79ci4TH7k
It is similar to what justallen and puffergas have done.

LeeB

How long would that engine run on 5 gal. of charcoal?
'98 LT40HDD/Lombardini, Case 580L, Cat D4C, JD 3032 tractor, JD 5410 tractor, Husky 346, 372 and 562XP's. Stihl MS180 and MS361, 1998 and 2006 3/4 Ton 5.9 Cummins 4x4's, 1989 Dodge D100 w/ 318, and a 1966 Chevy C60 w/ dump bed.

Don P

I've watched several of his videos, including one where he is running a Ranger on charcoal. My memory might be off but I think he was getting about 20 minutes on that setup. A taller container is the trick from what he discovered. I've taken an old water pressure tank and started fabbing one today. I had never opened one up until now, they are kind of interesting. First lesson was bleed the air off before drilling a hole in one  ::). I cut a "door" in the lower section that I'm going to try to load through. I took a piece of 1/8" steel plate and used the radial arm turned sideways to make a concave mold to hammer the plate into a curve that fit over the opening. Then drilled a 1-1/4" hole in that and inserted the nozzle through that removable plate. Inside the tank there is a rubber bladder in the lower third held in by a ring that is press fit at the lower weld. I got a screwdriver in under that, bent it in and then cut it. Cut around the bladder at the bottom inlet and pulled that out. At the weld at the 2/3 height there is a steel domed baffle with a 1" hole in it dividing the upper third from the rest of the container. That might be able to be used as a cooling/storage chamber but I wasn't sure if that was safe and wanted more run time so I cut it out. I think I have more like 15 gallons worth of tank at this point. Out of the top I cut a hole for the 1" outlet pipe and mounted a flange up there. From that I think I'll elbow over and then down into a 2" pipe full of steel wool as a filter/cooler. I'm more paranoid about heat and fire than he is but he's been running on plastic hose and foam filters fine.

gww

I do not know about charcoal but read that on the wood gassifiers that 20 lbs of dry wood added up to 1 gal of gassoline.
Cheers
gww

justallan1

What I did was found an old grease drum that I'm guessing is 20 gallons and had a lid and cleaned it out. (Luckily it had a plastic bag for the grease)
At about 3" from the bottom I cut a hole for the air inlet. I took a plate of thin steel and cut a hole big enough to weld a 1" threaded coupler, with using a couple you can change your fitting inside for where you want the fire and it gives you something on the outside to plumb in any your exhaust feed from your engine if you decide to do that at some point. I then used 8 bolts around that plate bolting it to the drum, using plenty of red RTV. NOTE, put the bolts with the threads facing out so they don't get filled with crap if you ever have to take it apart.
The top of my drum had a lid and a lip for the lid which helped me tremendously. I got lucky and found a cooking pot that fit perfectly. I bought a chunk of stove sealing rope and put it around the lip on the drum and put the cooking pot on that. THAT HAS TO BE AN AIRTIGHT SEAL.
I probably ran the thing for 20 minutes or better and around the base of the gasifier is was slightly warm, but the rest was plenty cool. I used some real old cheap plastic vacuum hose and it didn't hurt it a bit.
The two biggest things that I found that will ruin your chances of success are air leaks and the sizing of your charcoal. Keep in mind that your fire can only get as big as the air will let it get.
Something else to remember is to be able to shut air off, from both directions, BEFORE you light it the first time. If it starts getting hot you want to be able to shut it down and if it still gets any air it will sit there and smolder any charcoal left inside.
I hope this helps a little as I'm basically brand new to this also.



 

Don P

I got the gasifier assembled yesterday and did a trial run. If you look at Allan's above I had the simple fire charcoal reactor made from a well pressure tank. Out of the top I put a section of aluminum vacuum cleaner pipe then plastic vac hose to an old oil burner induction fan. Output from the fan went to a pipe with an elbow, no filter at this point. It fired up and ran well producing a good quantity of grayish white charcoal smelling smoke. I ran it for a half hour or so and it got warm but never hot which sounds correct. I tried to light the smoke with a propane torch and could not. The torch would clean up the smoke immediately but it wouldn't actually light. I tried removing the fan and hoses just leaving the aluminum pipe in, and on natural draft it would still "run" quite well still making good smoke but still would not light. Am I doing something wrong or is this normal?

Paul_H

If the fan is too powerful it could blow out any flame you try to light. It only takes a minute or two to get good gas from a charcoal gasifier,it should run an engine after a couple minutes. Place a lighted paper on the ground and direct the gas toward it and see if you can see flame although a good gas flame is hard to see in daylight but you should see heat waves,
Science isn't meant to be trusted it's to be tested

Don P

Got a flare  8)


 

This is the reactor at this point, I just had the can sitting on top to light the flare. I'd say do not copy this design, I'll keep playing with it. It's a pain not to have a top load.


 

I think the problem was damp charcoal. That's sacks of it stacked all around there under the barn shed roof, we've had a solid month of rain and damp. I topped off the reactor today. It hadn't burned much yesterday. The smoke was much cleaner looking so I think the majority of what was in there, the old stuff from yesterday was a good bit drier. It is still a damp smoke coming out the top but I think it was dry enough to light today. I ran the fan for a good bit longer and got the reactor too hot to touch much of it then the flare fired up on natural draft. I think, and that is all, I think, the lesson learned is to store simplefire charcoal in a drum with a lid.

Time to start playing with the old Wheel Horse  ;D

Mooseherder

I made a batch of charcoal yesterday from White Birch.  The result was good but will try a couple different things that I think will improve the process.   #1 would be use dry wood.  This stuff was just cut.  #2. Lift barrel, put up higher on bricks, punch bigger openings at bottom of the barrel or remove the bottom completely. 
#3 try putting my inner metal container directly on my fire pit a d eliminate the larger barrel.  



 

 

 

 

 

 

 


doc henderson

 

 

 

 

 

 

my set up.  30-gallon lube barrel, inside of a combine wheel.  hard wood in the retort, and junk whatever wood on the outside.  when the flames stop out the top, it is done.  let cool then uncover.  no flame inside the retort/barrel since there is no O2.  only holes are 1/8th inch holes in the center cap at the top.  about a dozen.
Timber king 2000, 277c track loader, PJ 32 foot gooseneck, 1976 F700 state dump truck, JD 850 tractor.  2007 Chevy 3500HD dually, home built log splitter 18 horse 28 gpm with 5 inch cylinder and 32 inch split range with conveyor powered by a 12 volt tarp motor

Don P

A friend did something kind of similar, he layed a 55 gallon drum with a lock ring lid on its side, put legs on it, aligned the 2" bung at the bottom and with 2 elbows and some pipe ducted that under the barrel and drilled holes along the pipe to flare the gas and use that to heat the barrel more. A self licking ice cream cone once it gets up to temp. Then he made a block enclosure and built a fire under the barrel. It worked perfectly according to plan, until the flares went out, being on the bottom of things tar ran down into the holes. About then the gears began turning, but the bumb was already lit. With no escape for the gas and steam pressure, well its good barrel lids cant build up more pressure than enough to send a 3' metal frisbee a good ways into the woods  :D.

Mooseherder

I boxed it up before 2 days of rain in a chewy box after it was cooled.  There is a piece of royal oak Walmart briquette next to a piece for scale.


 

doc henderson

my lids attach with tabs.  I can get about 6 firings before some part of the lid or more likely the can get thin and burned out.  I remove the rubber seal from the edge of the lid, so as you can see, much of the volatile gasses escape out the edges, and not from the tiny holes in the center of the lid.
my stash goes into a 44-gallon brute trash can, with a lid.
Timber king 2000, 277c track loader, PJ 32 foot gooseneck, 1976 F700 state dump truck, JD 850 tractor.  2007 Chevy 3500HD dually, home built log splitter 18 horse 28 gpm with 5 inch cylinder and 32 inch split range with conveyor powered by a 12 volt tarp motor

Mooseherder

I made another charcoal firing with dry Beech over the fire ring instead of the barrel.  It was much more enjoyable. The white birch charcoal from the first batch has a sweet smell and is a great tasting wood.  I've prepared some more and letting it dry before firing.  

Making Charcoal - YouTube

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