17 replies to this topic

[WestCoastPat]

It's getting close to where the rubber meets the road folks. California is in trouble and it could get worse.

I compose this thread as I sit here in the Shasta Trinity National Forest, in remote upper Northern California.  The only industry doing well in these parts is the pot growing (illegal) drug trade operating with impunity under the shield of Prop 215 medicinal Marijuana laws.

There are still those amongst us who choose to make a living legally, and are having a tough time. Living and operating costs- including fuel in California is expensive and ever increasing, along with fees, taxes, and regulations. Add the potential title wave of the same coming from Federal Government and things start to look bleak on the horizon.

As a self starting entrepreneur- I choose not to participate, but the reality is going to require some hard preparation and smart decision making to be prepared for what is going on now, and what may be coming in our own country, and in our own state of California.

We live off grid solar/w dino fuel generator backup on 15 acres. Have been for 11 years with no services, not even mail. I mill my own lumber and have built a machine shop- taught myself machining including CNC, and produce my own product designs of which I market myself via the internet. We have an abundance of trees, and are surrounded by the national forest. I've been a homeshop welder and fabricator for some 25 years.

This is a new business and has been 2 years in development. I'm still perfecting production and even though there is a demand, we're still squeaking by to bring in enough sales to survive, and up production enough to meet the demand and increase product availability.

One of the biggest expenses and concerns of mine is fuel. The cost thereof. Being off grid and running machines requires a certain amount. My needs are not huge as I've modified my shop machines to run 120v single phase, converted 3 phase machines and literally run everything on solar panels and 2- Delco Alternators charging direct DC to the battery banks.  I have an inverter system in our home, and another dedicated to CNC in the shop. Part of the home system also runs all the non- CNC manual shop machines.

Currently, I'm running a Honda engine for each Delco charging system which is far from fuel efficient, but gets the job done with ease of maintenance. I have 2- new PowerSolutions CS-6/1 Listers waiting to be assembled and put online for the task at hand.

I've been following wood gasificaton for quite some time, and checking progress here from time to time.

My point of this thread and the long winded picture I've painted is this....

Soon I believe we are seriously going to need alternative energy here at home, and here in our country to be able to compete on some level with business and survive through these tough economic times.

My questions are what kind of practical blueprint can be followed to utilize the GEK systems?

What equipment does a guy like me need in the forest for wood processing to be able to supply fuel for a GEK small power plant, or plants to run these small engines and turn a Delco Alternator?

Is this a viable practical solution, or would a person find himself having to work so many hours processing fuel to supply a gasifier, he would find himself in a vicious squirrel cage working to run the unit but no time to use the power for practical needs and income?

I'm willing to take a real world hard look at the practicality of this scenario.

For my minimum needs-

I'm picturing 2- GEK Lister power pallets turning Delco Alts  for a minimum of 30-40 amps DC output.

I've read where a lister owner is turning an alternator with a 6/1 Lister (dino fuel) at 300 rpm and producing 35 amps continuous.  I need one system running up to 8 hours a day (6 days a week) for my shop, and one running no more than 6 hours every other day for the house system. Less in the summer with the addition of good sun. Both Honda gas systems would be kept for backup.

Next I'm picturing a sizable dry woodshed... where wood chucks could be blown in filling the shed once or twice per dry season to produce enough material to run the systems above. Chips would be bagged and placed next to the power pallets- ready to supply the days power needs.

I have equipment (CAT track skid loader) that can easily bring bundles of logs, (preferably taking advantage of very small diameters) to the processing site. Even two large sheds- one for greener fuel that can season for a year, while dry fuel is taken from the second shed. We have a dry climate here and wood seasons very well.

What model machine chipper will work? I've read where Jim mentions a Chinese disk chipper, but I've followed the links to Yahoo and cannot find it.  I cannot afford to import and pay for a Laimet screw auger type chipper. I can afford to keep a Chinese chipper (purchased in the USA) running with my CAT.

If I can produce enough useable fuel in 2 months out of the year, that would supply our power needs I think it would be doable.

What say you experienced Wood Gasifiers across the world?

My goal is to put together a practical working system. Please forgive me if specifics have been covered here on this forum previously regarding the subject. I have not been able to read through and find it as yet.

I wish to contribute positive helpful information and useable applications to this great forum,.

Kindest regards,

Pat

[Mike LaRosa]

Hi Pat, It's turning to winter here in Wisconsin and we are going into survival mode. I recently met one of your "legal" growers here while she was visiting her folks. I let her play my violin, and amazingly she actually was a natural so I got my junk one out of my truck and finally got to play with another violinist. Fuel processing has become one of the main issues that I have to deal with. I do a large part of my driving on wood chunks. I am running around 2 inch by 2 inch stuff be it cut branches or chopped slices. Both seem to run the same. I process in several different ways but need to build a better machine. I will probably try to do like they did during WW2 running a buzz saw with tilt table and then a plunger type die to make the chunks. My systems don't care much for chips but the GEK runs pretty much seamlessly on them. It requires a grate shaker and ash removal where my vehicles have a fixed grate and I can always drive on the shoulder and bounce things a bit if the grate plugs which rarely ever happens. I think a gasifier built right on the lister platform would get enough shaking. I think the GEK's stainless preheat tubes could handle it if "wired" up some during assembly. The October workshop was the first time I had seen a lister run. They are interesting.
I run most of my stuff here on PV and wind. I've been at it long enough that I need to buy new batteries now. I once had 2000 amp hours at 12V but I'm way down now. Some of my batteries are from the 1980's and some from the late 90's. That's another issue.
Regards, Mike LaRosa

[WestCoastPat]

Medicinal violinist Mike?

Sounds like trouble, or fun depending on your perspective I would imagine... LOL.

Yes I agree that a key component to the puzzle is fuel processing. Still would like to see a picture of the chinese chipper Jim speaks of. Maybe he will chime in with one.

I'm a retired musician myself. Do you have picture of your rigs?

[jimmason]

WestCoastPat said:

Medicinal violinist Mike?

Yes I agree that a key component to the puzzle is fuel processing. Still would like to see a picture of the chinese chipper Jim speaks of. Maybe he will chime in with one.

mike, as for the inexpensive small disk chippers that produce the chip we need, see here:

http://www.libertych...hipper.html#top

if you search on 4" or 5" chippers, you will see more.

the best doc on how to use this, with the accompanying sorter, is greg manning's pix in the yahoo woodgas forum.  you need to signup to the forum to see the gallery.  

the link to greg's is here:
http://groups.yahoo....ount=20&dir=asc

[WestCoastPat]

Thanks for the Links.

I really like that "Trommel" style classifier. Can any standard drum type chipper be used if it's classified like that, or does the Liberty chipper linked produce a different chip, with the disks?

[jimmason]

WestCoastPat said:

Thanks for the Links.
Can any standard drum type chipper be used if it's classified like that, or does the Liberty chipper linked produce a different chip, with the disks?

any disk chipper will work, as long is it is not the small garden ones.  those mostly make shavings.  you need the more formal and typical larger ones.  what you do not want is a drum chipper.  those make a long skinny slice.  not the domino chip like shape that comes from the disk chipper.

you can adjust the chip size a bit by blade height.  less blades and more height is better than lots of blades and low cut.  as chippers get more powerful, they tend to add more blades.  low power ones will have only one or two blades.

the pto on the power pallet can be used to run a chipper.  we've yet to do this, but it is part of what was planned with the electricity, heat and shaft power tri gen combo of on it.  however, you are going to be limited to a max of about 15-20hp, so we'll need the smallest chipper possible.  i think it will be just enough for these 4-5" ones.  not sure yet though.  we'll know more after a test at some point.

j

[WestCoastPat]

Thanks Jim- that's what I thought about the big drum chippers, but I've never operated one myself but have seen the chips.  To bad on that as there's a lot of them around.  

Would be cool to come up with a bolt in drum modification for those machines, that produced a different chip.

Any links or any published info or threads on fuel consumption or "Chips per hour" with your existing gassifier tests?

This has probably been covered but I have not been able to find any yet.

I'm picturing "Chip bins" at ARCO- debit card friendly ...LOL.

[WestCoastPat]

jimmason said:

the pto on the power pallet can be used to run a chipper.  we've yet to do this, but it is part of what was planned with the electricity, heat and shaft power tri gen combo of on it.  however, you are going to be limited to a max of about 15-20hp, so we'll need the smallest chipper possible.  i think it will be just enough for these 4-5" ones.  not sure yet though.  we'll know more after a test at some point.

j

Another option would be to run a hydraulic pump, and hydraulic motor in place of the pto shaft. More costly. The power pallet could run your log splitter as well. Do they still allow wood burning stoves in the bay?

I miss the food down there more than anything. That's one of the downsides to living in the outback.

[WestCoastPat]

Mike LaRosa said:

It requires a grate shaker and ash removal where my vehicles have a fixed grate and I can always drive on the shoulder and bounce things a bit if the grate plugs which rarely ever happens.

I think a gasifier built right on the lister platform would get enough shaking. I think the GEK's stainless preheat tubes could handle it if "wired" up some during assembly. The October workshop was the first time I had seen a lister run. They are interesting.

I run most of my stuff here on PV and wind. I've been at it long enough that I need to buy new batteries now. I once had 2000 amp hours at 12V but I'm way down now. Some of my batteries are from the 1980's and some from the late 90's. That's another issue.
Regards, Mike LaRosa

That's classic- drive on the shoulder occasionally to "shake and grate".
I bought those listers as a kit- JKson PS CS6/1's with separate heads and they sit patently wrapped in factory containers waiting to be put together. Hopefully, I can go through them and set them up to be dependable with the pitfalls of Indian manufaturing quality issues. These were the last of Joel Kotch's imports to Oregon. Pretty decent as far as India goes.

I'm running my CNC machines on an old battery bank. 12- L16's I purchased back in 1999. I'm running a dedicated Outback inverter and just a 9hp Honda and a Delco alt for power. The batteries are good enough to handle surges- but only give me about 15 minutes if I run out of fuel which is fine.

Some machining operations are power heavy and some very light. I simply set the throttle to supply enough amps to keep ahead of the usage. Works surprising well and the CNC's have no problem with the power.

On my lightest load days I use about 2 gallons of fuel, and 3-4 with my heaviest load tasks. Been running like that for 2 years now.

All my other non- CNC machines I run off of the house system which is 12 L-16's and a Trace SW4024 inverter. We have 1 kilowatt of PV panels. Whish I had more, but we are doing well with this system.

[fuel spiller]

I own a usa made chipper that uses a 27 horse Kohler air cooled v twin (2004 year). With a 200 lb flywheel and 10" knives (2), it will chip to 6".  After my visit to APL last Nov. I'm thinking of mounting a 10kw gen head to it to power my shop on your diy gek kit. The chipper was designed and produced for the late Bill Bailey, founder of Bailey's, the largest forestry and tree care supplier. But for the flywheel, the entire machine uses "off the shelf Parts" and welded or bolted plate.

[WestCoastPat]

Bill- what a nice man. I was in the middle of finalizing some business with him for a product of mine to be distributed world wide right before he died.


Do you have any pics of your chipper?  What kind of chip does it make?

[fuel spiller]

The chips are smaller than most, but are not shavings. I'll post some pics soon.

[fuel spiller]

Hey West Coast Pat,
   Sorry it took so long but I have some pics of that Bailey's design chipper built by GME. Guards, belt removed.

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•  DSCF1358.jpg   53.62K   29 downloads
•  DSCF1359.jpg   49.16K   28 downloads

[WestCoastPat]

Wow- That is one cool looking chipper.

Serpentine belt, hydraulic powered. Very cool.

[WestCoastPat]

Is that a Kawasaki engine?

[fuel spiller]

The belt is 5 standard auto belts that were pitch grooved but not cut apart (gates I think), it runs a regular route 'round the two pulley set up. The Kohler 27horse motor is mounted on a pivot plate
(think center of the see saw) with a bar to lock over center and keep the belt tight...THAT IS THE CLUTCH! (slip the belt to get up to speed, lock the lever over center and you are chipping) I can pull the guard and belt off in 30 seconds so switching to a gen head would be a breeze.The smaller belt runs the 2hp hyd. pump for the feed roller. So simple you want to cry. Bill wanted no special parts. All "off the shelf".
   That same chipper came as a PTO 3 point tractor unit claiming to take up to 50horse shaft power! Bill designed it so well, it is over 800# lighter than the 25 horse Vermeer 6" but works just as well. GME of Idaho made them, I think they are gone now.

[TreeHuggingTreeCutter]

The best thing I've seen is a device from Estonia.
They have sold over 7,500 of these in Europe and they are essentially unknown in the US.  They had one American distributor in the US. He bought 7 and still has 3 some years later.  I can give you his contact information if you have a tractor with 30+ hp and a 3 point hitch.

As a firewood splitter biting off 16" chunks it will split well over 2 cord an hour with ideal well staged feedstock.

Creating chips you'd be able to process several hundred to about a thousand pounds an hour with relatively few fines. Working with 6" oak or eucalyptus with it geared to 30rpm, taking off 1" bites you'd get +/-1000lb/hr with fresh material at 50%mc.

http://www.sixfold.e....php?go=firmast

They have also engineered them self powered with a 20hp Honda gas engine.  I know you could hook it right up to the power pallet if you had it set up as a stationary unit.  For self powered units they order all the gear boxes custom to the engine.   So you'd need to figure out the amount of torque the power pallet can generate and what rpm the spline turns at.

I don't represent them or work for them but I have seriously considered buying one and I've spoken to their head sales rep.  There is a significant savings per unit if you can order a short shipping container load.  Which is either 6 or 8.

[tritowns]

as far as how much wood your gasifier will use? I'm gonna step out on a limb here and say probably about 2lbs per horsepower per hour or there abouts. just from what i've seen... your results could vary...