Wood burning truck!

[SwampDonkey]

I to saw the videos a while back when I was over at the marketing board looking up some maps. I took a detour and had a watch.

[twobears]

 my dad has gotten mother earth news for years.over the last few weeks i,ve been looking up there storys on woodgas..so,far i,ve found three diffrent uses.of course they made a woodgas truck.they also powered there sawmill with woodgas and they made a genset.from what i,ve read and seen all three woodgas genarators where made diffrent.
 the issue numbers are 69 for the truck and 78 for the sawmill and 70 for the genset.that would put them in 1981 and 1982.
 i,am thinking a woodgas powered genset would be handy to have around a sawmill. 

 delbert

[Paul_H]

Thanks again for the encouragement and enthusiasum for my woodgas project.

Marcel,I appreciate your patience in downloading the videos.It might be faster next time to fly from Kwebec and come see it in person

I've been puttering with the truck the past couple of months when I can but the daylight is short so I couldn't do anything on the truck after work but now we are shutdown for a few weeks,I have got a couple of things done.

The pics below show the 1½" hose delivering the gas to the woodgas side of the carb.I'm going to re-plumb things a bit and add a paper filter inline and also hook up another blower up front so I can start the engine without the need to use gasoline to aid in drawing the initial woodgas(am I clear  )

The following pic shows the gasoline cut off switch that I use after the engine is running on woodgas so that I know it is only woodgas that is fuelling the engine.



 


I added this idle solenoid recently and what it has done is to allow the primary side(gasoline) butterfly to shut off completly at the flick of a switch inside the cab so I won't really need the gasoline shut off valve and I'll have gasoline ready if the gasifier bridges and the engine stalls.It is stock Ford adapted to the Quadrajet.

 

A wider view of the carb and throttle hook ups. The woodgas throttle lever in the middle right hand side of the pic allows for a regular pedal linkage as well as another linkage to set the idle with a lever in the cab.I plan on having a aux lever for the gasoline throttle and the normal foot pedal will be for woodgas only(exept in an emergency,then the cable changeover from woodgas to gasoline is a 30 second swap)



Black is the woodgas idle lever,Red is gasoline throttle.There is another dual lever panel that controls woodgas air/gas mixture and the choke for the gasoline side.

 


I had mentioned before that the Mother earth plans called for a monorator to help remove moisture from the fuel.It works as the wood is warmed and the condensation collects on the cool wall of the feed tank and runs down to a holding tank.This next pic shows the condensate collected from a small load of wood,around 25 lbs after a 12 mile drive.The 25 mile trip I took filled the container shown here to 3/4 full.

 


A couple of weeks ago I got a replacement crown and pinion and swapped the gearing from 3 56 to 4 11's and the difference is noticable and I think it'll be way better for the hills around here,so I thank you all again for the help on this because I wasn't familiar with the diff ratios.The swap over went pretty good and all U joints were changed as well.

 

While waiting on parts,I got the bug to run the truck so wood was cubed and thrown in the gasifier and I ran the truck for 20 minutes or so.The pic below was taken as the gasifier cooked and the engine ran.It felt great to see the snow melt and the steam rise off of the hot gasifier.

 

The steering is haywire on the truck too and when I mentioned this to Marcel at the pig roast last summer,he told me it sounded like it was worn out tie rod ends and I'll be DanGed if he wasn't right.
So I'll change the tie rod out in the next week and hopefully drive it again in the new year

[Radar67]

Paul, how is your truck coming? Have you done any extended time or mileage tests yet?

[jpgreen]

I gotts repost here, cause I didn't get an email notifcation.  This is my favorite thread.. 

[Paul_H]

Radar,

I've tinkered with it some in the Winter when I was off work and changed the rear diffs and the tie rod and drag link.I put a 3 day permit on the truck and drove around town and dropped in on a couple of people that helped out with things.One was Tom, a mechanic that solved my float bowl problem and all he wanted for payment was for me to bring the truck by when it was running on woodgas.He was surprised how "normal" it ran and noticed that the exhaust didn't smell.

Then I drove it up the road a 1/4 mile from there to John the machinist's place.John was the fellow that bent the 16 tubes for the gasifier last year.He came out and had a look and then ran off to the house and came back with a camera and started shooting

I also drove up the steepest paved road we have here again and it went much better with the lower geared diffs.There were two problems I had on the drive,

#1 the speedo was off now that the ratio was changed and the odometer was too ,of course.

#2  the truck still steered haywire and I didn't want to drive it very fast.

Can anybody give me a easy math conversion to calculate the speed? The ratio was 3.59 to 1 and now is 4.11 to 1 revoloution(that's my understanding)
So the fastest I drove that day according to the speedo was 70 mph but I figure I was really only doing just over 50-55 mph.

Problem #2 was solved when a young mechanic at work asked if my kingpins were siezing up.The right hand side wouldn't take grease and when I took the caps off,they were packed with hard grease.I cleaned them,Rust Reapered them and applied heat and finally forced grease to the top and bottom!!

Yesterday I hooked up the hoses from the valve covers that were slobbering oil all over the engine and adapted the air cleaner to fit again and today I plan to hook up the tachometer so I can keep as close to 2500 rpm as possible which is what the gasifier was designed for.

Another job out of the way was installing the hardware cloth/screen between the feedtank and the monorator to keep the sawdust and chunks out of the catch basin for the condensate.Now I should be able to easily dump 3, 40 lb sacks of fuel into the feed tank which should last(rough guess)75-85 miles.

The chunks in the bottom are about ¾ of a sack of fuel.

 


I cleaned the ash out of the bottom of the gasifier and with a Pink handled mirror borrowed from my daughter,I took a picture of the hearth in through the 4" port.

 

This was the mirror pic looking at the hearth grate(frying pans)



If all goes well,I'll put some more miles on this week.I appreciate any help with the speedometer conversion

[Jeff]

I think the easiest conversion Paul is another vehicle leading you and you both have cell phones. 

[Corley5]

You should be able to get the correct speedometer gear for the new ratio at an auto parts store.  That's quite a system you've built 

[Paul_H]

I subtracted 3.59 from 4.11 and ended up with .79 and then multiplied my speed (70 mph) by .79 and got somewhere around 55 mph but I think that was not the correct way to convert.

My math class had windows and I was easily distracted  

Greg,

the tranny in the truck is a light one.Reverse is towards the driver and up,like a gravel truck and then there are 3 speeds and a OD,someone suggested that it was a car transmission and I might have trouble finding a speedo gear for the 4 11.

When I get back this afternoon I'll crawl under and take a pic where the cable meets the transmission.

[jpgreen]

My math class had windows and I was easily distracted  

Greg,

Oh lordy so did mine and even had girls in thar too.. 

The new automobile world conversations are goining to go like...

"So, how many miles per cord are you gettin'?"  .  . .....

[Timburr]

Paul, here's your ratio conversion formula:-

Current ratio  _{x 100%  =} 1/4.11  _{x 100 % =}          0.2433  _{x 100% =}  86.62%         
Original ratio              1/3.56                        0.2809

So your final mph is 70 x 86.62% = 60.63mph.

Have you installed the lower diff. ratio because of the extra weight of the gasifier or the lower BMEP (less power) of woodgas, or both?

[SwampDonkey]

Gear Design Equations and Formulas Calculator


Timburr got to it before me.  Just a simple x  =  1
                                                       3.59  4.11
                                                        x    = 0.8735 works.

or

3.59-4.11 + 1  = 0.8735
    4.11

[Paul_H]

Thank you for the conversions,Gentlemen

Have you installed the lower diff. ratio because of the extra weight of the gasifier or the lower BMEP (less power) of woodgas, or both?

Timburr,

The truck was too high geared for the hills here even with gasoline but yes,it was the lower power of woodgas that caused me to change gearing.
When I chose the truck to convert,I was still in the dark regarding woodgas.It would be great to have another gear between 2nd and 3rd on this truck but we'll make do.

[twobears]

 PAUL:over the winter i have done alot of websufing on woodgas.one thing i found was that adding steam to the woodgas gives it more power.some woodgas gen,s are setup with a steam generator.it was just a tank that had hot coolant lines ran thur it or it was hooked to the side of the woodgas generator then,a line was ran into the woodgas gen just like the airlines.i also found one woodgas generator that used the monorator water to make steam.the water boiled away and left just the solids.the tank had a cleanout on it to get the solids out.if you use that water to make steam you have alot less waste to get rid of.
 just thought i,de pass that on.

 delbert

[Paul_H]

Hi Delbert,

I've heard if the steam injection too but my understanding of it was that it applied more to coal or charcoal systems although Wayne Keith from Alabama(mentioned in this thread) injects water in his stratified downdraft system.

From what I've read,there is already more than enough moisture in the wood,even at a low MC of 10% to produce Hydrogen and the rest is condensate.If the wood MC is to high,it lowers the temp in the gasifier and the result is tar production whereas Charcoal needs the addition of water.
It might be worth messing with sometime though,I could rig up a nozzle through the lighting port.

Thanks.

[Corley5]

the tranny in the truck is a light one.Reverse is towards the driver and up,like a gravel truck and then there are 3 speeds and a OD,someone suggested that it was a car transmission and I might have trouble finding a speedo gear for the 4 11.

When I get back this afternoon I'll crawl under and take a pic where the cable meets the transmission.

It'd be worth a visit to your local auto parts store or an IM to Burlkraft    I bet Eggiman's could set you up with the right gear 

[pineywoods]

Paul, got a couple questions

From the sound of the truck on the video, I assume it's a  V8.. which one, 302???
Reason I ask, I have in storage a 1976 ford with the 300 big six that I would love to convert to wood gas, should work out pretty close to yours. Even has 3.59 gears.
Carb would obviously be different.
What was your reasoning for picking the up-draft system as opposed to the down draft ?
Downdraft looks simpler to build, but I know looks can be deceiving.

[Paul_H]

pineywoods,

yes,the engine in my truck is a 302 and my gasifier is sized to run your 300 too.In my plans there is a few pages on converting a 2 bbl Ford/Autolite Motorcraft 5200 which might be small for your engine or you could go with a Quadrajet and make a adapter plate.

My gasifier is a Downdraft Imbert style which has a closed lid and the air is delivered with nozzles  It is the style that was used in Europe during the war.

Imbert



The Statified Downdraft that you see in FEMA was built for emergencies out of materials that are readily available using simple tools but they tend to produce a lot of tar and the fire isn't always easy to control.

Stratified downdraft

[jpgreen]

An inline 6 would be a great conversion because you would have the inherent torque of the inline configuration.. 

[dundee]

With kyoto/carbon tax/ carbon foot prints, and all of the other lingo about global warming in our faces, this link of a wood fueld truck would be of interest to Paul H., ( and others I am guessing

Richard

www.sfws.auburn.edu/south/woodtruck.pdf