Wood gas vehicles: firewood in the fuel tank

[MossRoad]

From the link the Rule of Thumb was 2 pounds is about equal to 1 HP hour. His tractor is at least 100 HP. So he will need to use about 200 pounds of biomass per hour.
Eric

Yeah, I see that now.

So how many gallons of diesel per hour will his 100hp tractor burn?

 

[newbury]

I looked into the GEK about 10 years ago. Blue Hood might have an application here if all things are near perfect.
If he can get the biomass prepared properly (which includes particle size, moisture content, quantity) he could probably do it.
But when I looked into it I couldn't quickly figure out how to easily keep the fuel dry in Mississippi long enough to be burnable.

And

How to make a million dollars: First, start with a million dollars...
<snip>

I think the rule of thumb to make a million dollars start with TWO million dollars.

 

[stuckmotor]

As previously suggested, I think you should recheck your figures.

I've considered building a wood gasifier but am afraid I'm not as careful a craftsman as Wayne Kieth and a spark would get out of my machine and set the woods on fire.

 

[Blue hood]

MossRoad

According to the rule of thumb: 1 HP/hr = 2lbs biomass, so 100HP/hr. = 200lbs.biomass

relating diesel to biomass: 1 gal = 20lb biomass so 100HP/hr. = 200/20 = 10 gallons

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If you verified this result on the table:

Diesel engine power to fuel consumption (natural aspirated) 100HP/hr = 5.63 gal/hr
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Between the two answers there is a (1.77) factor difference that needs to be found from where it comes.

I assume the answer is that more biomass is burn to produce 100HP/hr. than diesel alone.

 

[MossRoad]

Thanks.

While I applaud the technical feat if you accomplish this task, I'm still gonna go out on a limb and say you'd be better off hiring it out, or getting a track hoe and a dump truck, do the work, then sell them.

A wood gassifier sounds like something my father would make just to see if he could do it, and maybe run a generator in a power outage with it, just because he lived through the depression and they had to improvise, and he enjoyed challenges like that.

In all honesty, and as I said before, I can't see any savings for you if you put a value on your time. Do it if you just want to see if it can be done, but don't expect any real savings of time or money.

 

[Oaktree]

Thanks.

While I applaud the technical feat if you accomplish this task, I'm still gonna go out on a limb and say you'd be better off hiring it out, or getting a track hoe and a dump truck, do the work, then sell them.

A wood gassifier sounds like something my father would make just to see if he could do it, and maybe run a generator in a power outage with it, just because he lived through the depression and they had to improvise, and he enjoyed challenges like that.

In all honesty, and as I said before, I can't see any savings for you if you put a value on your time. Do it if you just want to see if it can be done, but don't expect any real savings of time or money.

I agree. Maybe 20 years ago my SIL gave me a couple years' subscription to Mother Earth News, ISTR reading an article similar to what was referenced upthread...may have been the same guy, he did use a Dodge Dakota.
My take on it was that this was more an exercise to thumb his nose at "the man" (as were many of the articles in that magazine) than to build something practical. After the conversion, the truck was fairly useless as a truck...between the gasifier and the necessary fuel pretty much all the bed was taken up.

Kudos to him for doing it, but this seems more a "tinkerer" project than anything useful.

 

[Jac65]

I'm not saying you shouldn't try is I'm just saying be prepared to change methods in the middle. I can't see any way where the wood will provide you any saving over diesel after you figure in costs. Harvesting, prep, feeding the machine, cleaning. The very best gasifiers are reaching just over 30% efficiency and a homebuilt large diesel conversion would be about half of that on a good day. Considering the work lost and time added due to the lack of power it adds even more costs to the overall project. Then you have out of service time due to breakdowns, which you will have (frequently),not to mention all the time invested in building this monster in the first place. Assuming for easy math you could get 50% of the hours of work out of a wood powered machine you can from a diesel, you are now at a 4000 hour project. Unless you have nothing but time to waste, and love frustration and dragging out projects, I just can't find any upside in what you are planning. Again, I'm not saying it can't be done, but what is the cost in dollars time, mental heath, emotionally. Is it really worth it.

 

[Sberry]

Wonder how much this brain fart would generate?

 

[Blue hood]

My quest to find the key information to build a wood gas generator as a diesel fuel alternative has brought to my attention the finding that more people are involved looking, experimenting or putting it to good use of this old technology around the world than you probably think.

I read in this forum some encouraging comments to go for it and some misleading efficiency assumptions that we need to straighten and/or update the correct information of it's possibility, to be on the same page

Please take a look at the next lynk: "Wood gas as engine fuel"

It's a publication of FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations).

https://www.fao.org/3/t0512e/t0512e.pdf

 

[Sberry]

Post back in 10 years and tell how it works.