COTS gasifier stove

[T. Loos]

Lost patrol checking in.....

Been busy hiding out and building stuff again. Here is a gasifier cookstove made from common off the shelf parts.

My build instructions:
http://www.instructables.com/id/Large-portable-wood-gasifier-Campfi...

This design is made from simple restaurant cooking pots and a computer fan.
I have a design that can be made from hand tools only. Will be posting that later.
This one is much nicer and has long term durability.
Will boil 5 gallons of water in 30 minutes.

The cooking pots are all made in India. Hopefully they are awash in them.

Now how do we get these to Haiti ASAP?
People have to cook on something. Wood fires will waste what little trees they have left.
Gasifiers can burn any wood building scrap.

Get to work kids...it's a crappy world out there sometimes.

[Lucas]

Hi, long time no see, been busy and all that.

Your points about trees are important, and many thanks for sharing this!

Mind if I turn this design into an appropedia wikipage, with this license http://www.appropedia.org/Appropedia:Copyrights (or appropedia could just link to your page)?

There are at least two initiatives linking to pages within appropedia, for better visibility:
- http://www.appropedia.org/HAITI_EARTHQUAKE_ASSISTANCE_PROJECT and http://www.appropedia.org/HAITI_EARTHQUAKE_APPROPRIATE_TECHNOLOGY_P... (this one looks like a place holder)
- http://www.appropedia.org/Haiti_SCIM

[T. Loos]

No problem. Do anything you want with it!

I'll be working on the Instructable little by little when I have time. Have to make another one with the simpler version of the gasifier soon. It's very similar but much cheaper to make.

The stainless and aluminum version is really a heavy duty setup. It should last for years. If you build one out of large tin cans, you will still get a long life but the burner can be damaged easily.

Wait till you see my next project. I'm going to make a heat exchanger to mount over the burner. It's a cross between a tankless water heater and a "combi" unit (as they are called in the rest of the world I guess).
This will allow hydronic floor heating for a Hexayurt.

Actually, I've already made something that can heat a Hexayurt floor with water. You can use a regular insulated tank water heater or build a water heater from scratch yourself (from a 55 gal drum). I thought up a unique method that uses plain plumbing fittings and brazing to do it (the 55 gal heater). This should allow construction anywhere.

I'd like to sell copies of the gasifier for $100 USD. This is for people that don't have the tools or time to make it themselves.
The first one sold will fund the purchase of a correct MAPP gas torch head. I should be able to do the brazing on the 55 gal with that. I'll see if I can get a sketch made of the system. It's dead simple and should work great. It would allow people anywhere to keep warm at night using scrapwood or biomass.

Nobody makes small "personal" size gasifier heating systems. All the units are HUGE and intended for heating commercial buildings and whatnot. That ain't helping anybody.

Lucas, build a MIDGE and try it. You will be hooked. I'll try and put up a very short Instructable on building a MIDGE. The existing tutorials are a bit lacking. It's easier than it looks to build one. People don't accurately describe the sizes of the air holes though. That is the #1 critical thing in any gasifier design. The airflow through the unit makes or breaks any design.

My large pot gasifier is great due to the fact it needs almost no air sealing. The design gets around the need for sloppy looking high temp sealants in the usual spots.

[Lucas]

Linked to this page from http://crisiscommons.org/wiki/index.php?title=Food_and_Nutrition

[T. Loos]

Here is a direct link to download the plans in .PDF made by Instructables:

http://www.filedropper.com/large-portable-wood-gasifier

MIDGE plans:
http://www.filedropper.com/thecompletemidge

Lucas, I'll get the text and pics out of the .PDF for you. Do you have a preferred word editing file format?

[Lucas]

OpenOffice would be fine, or I think I can get the text out myself.

[T. Loos]

PC or Mac?

I can send the original pics in a self extractor (PC).

http://www.filedropper.com/gasifierinstructpics

[Lucas]

PC, with either Linux or WinXP, preferably Linux.

[T. Loos]

There yugo. Not the car ;)

Let me know when you get it done! If it's in an Open Office doc, that's a good thing. We need to get off this .PDF deal for the future. They are nice but not when you need to share critical "open source" things.

I love it when a plan comes together.

[Lucas]

@appropedia (ChrisWaterGuy) would agree with the "pdf is (almost) evil" line.

Awaiting it and thanks a lot!

I'll appropedise whatever I can as soon as possible. Today or tomorrow if I can.

[T. Loos]

Yeah just take the pics and run with it.

http://www.filedropper.com/gasifierinstructpics

I'm going to the shop to redo the original gasifier. Going to show a ghetto method of attaching a normal PC fan. This will let people get one up and running quicker.

[T. Loos]

Here the the new Instructable with the old simple gasifier stove:

http://www.instructables.com/id/Easy-large-portable-woodgas-stove/


Here is the .PDF for those not wanting to sign up for Instructables:

http://www.filedropper.com/easy-large-portable-woodgas-stove

[Lucas]

Great, good to have the pdf.
No video that I can see.
Will try and start appropediation tomorrow.
Can anyone looking at this try and replicate?