Anybody try burning woodchips
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PookCarCzar burns sawdust, IIRC. There are some gasifier boilers that will burn almost any biomass efficiently.
As far as a woodstove goes, I wouldn't recommend it. Same issue as burning pellets as the primary fuel in a woodstove, the airflow just isn't made to do it. Plus, it very well may just be like filling your stove with 1-2" splits; 15 minutes of 4000 degree firebox followed by a mess of ash.
The problem will be that they will smoulder and not get air in there. Controled air flow from underneath is required- like with coal or pellets.
my neibor just trim all his tress 6 ackers worth piles and piles everywhere he is going to rent a chipper thought I might just have him dump it on my landWoodcrib said:
Yes. I know of one guy who is burning chips in a highly modified New Yorker wood boiler. It hasn't been cheap I'll tell you that.
Most wood chips have 30-35%% moisture. Just like green wood, it takes a lot of Btus to remove that moisture, before you get any appreciable gain in water temp (talking boilers here). It takes a ton of air to get combustion and it needs to be fed continuously or no fire.
I like my chips bigger - 10" diameter, 18" long, and as dry as I can get!
Most wood chips have 30-35%% moisture. Just like green wood, it takes a lot of Btus to remove that moisture, before you get any appreciable gain in water temp (talking boilers here). It takes a ton of air to get combustion and it needs to be fed continuously or no fire.
I like my chips bigger - 10" diameter, 18" long, and as dry as I can get!
They won't dry in a pile- they'll compost. Find a good way to dry them passively and you're golden.
Standing each individual chip on its end could be painstakingly slow.karri0n said:Adios Pantalones said:
Exactly. Make a Holz Hausen out of wood chips...
Better off burning sawdust from a wood shop at least it is dry. Say a modified barrel stove with a hopper and a slow turning screw sprinkling th dust into an already hot fire. Just keep the hopper sholveled full.
There is a Polish heating wholesaler Kotly.com who some people in the Boiler Room Forum have imported gasification style boilers from that sells wood chip boilers. They are pretty reasonably priced. You could check a few of them out at the link below.
Wood Chip Boilers
Prices are FOB from Poland and include value added tax which should be rebated since it would be exported outside the EU.
You would still need to deal with importing and shipping costs and figure out how to make the 230V/50Hz controls adapt to our electric system.
Wood Chip Boilers
Prices are FOB from Poland and include value added tax which should be rebated since it would be exported outside the EU.
You would still need to deal with importing and shipping costs and figure out how to make the 230V/50Hz controls adapt to our electric system.
I think you would need a custom stove designed just for this purpose. I would envision an auger fed unit, like a pellet stove. Moisture content doesn't actualy matter, you just burn more chips. Large (and relatively small) biomass electric gernerating plants burn green chips. It is definitly an area in need of development on a small scale though. To see what one inventer has done so far, go to the Phoenix Turbine builders Club, and look around till you find info on a green wood chip burner.
We're just putting the finishing touches on a 90 million dollar biomass boiler which is designed to use 50% or better MC. This puppy will burn upto three B-train loads per hour. There are concerns of spontaneous combustion of biomass storage piles from the heat of decomposition.Dunebilly said:
We burn woodchip all the time using purpose built burners like the Hamech from Poland or REFO from Denmark. Moisture content is 50-60% but we dry this down to 20-30% moisture before we burn it. Drying is carried out in dry polytunnels using 1000 ltr IBC containers. Do not under any circumstances store wet woodchip in a heap more than 2 foot deep as it is likely to spontaneous combust
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