Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

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77Gowing
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#16

Post by 77Gowing »

ericheath wrote:It’s called Doomsday. If they’re a no gas available, it will be better.
Better than what? I know better than no fuel. fly into a rage DOOMSDAY I get it, ala Mel Gibson in Mad Max.
And Robin calls me an :IDTS:
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#17

Post by CYBORG »

I need a date on this "doomsday " thing,........so I can prepare,...you know bulk up and everything ;)
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#18

Post by ericheath »

1984
Whatever I suggest here should be given ample time for a moderator to delicately correct. I apologize in advance.
77 WING, 1200 engine with 77 heads, cams, gl1100 foot pegs, Magna V65 front end, 764A carbs, [-gone Suzuki M109 monoshock--, replaced with gl1100 shocks] gl 1200 swing arm, gl1500 final drive, wheel and rear brakes Valkyrie seat, Meanstreak tank, Sportster pipes, Power Arc ignition off crank.
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#19

Post by desertrefugee »

77Gowing wrote:...And Robin calls me an :IDTS:
:lol: Better than calling you a girl1
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#20

Post by Bootstrapper »

robin1731 wrote:How much power can an engine make using this compared to the same engine using gasoline?
Short answer is I don't know yet. Most woodgassers say ~30% reduction in power.
77Gowing wrote: 1. What wood will you be gasifying? (different woods have different specific energy ratios, btu/lb, or kWhr/kg)
2. So I presume you must partially burn the wood to a charcoal state at less than unity energy balance, then re-burn it at less than energy unity to deliver how much efficiency starting an energy conversion from your source...wood to charcoal and then an energy conversion from charcoal to gass and from gas to combustion in the engine from combustion from your gas to mechanical work. There are a lot of energy conversions in your process and each one always delivers less energy than was put in (just a fact of physics as no process of conversion can attain unity).
1. Whatever I can get. Hardwoods are preferred, but the design is ultimately fuel agnostic, as long it is carbon and between 1/8" and 3/4".
2. Yes. Lots of energy conversions. But I'm not concerned with initial mj/kg of the wood. I'm simply concerned with having a fuel that works that isn't gasoline. That being said, proper retort design that recirculates the offgassing volatiles during charcoal production will help keep the amount of fuel expended to make the conversion to a minimum.

This is the most common criticism of charcoal gasification. Too much energy is expended in fuel production. The retort is that the systems are smaller and simpler to run clean. On a motorcycle, this is paramount.
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1983 GL1100 - Charwing - Runs on charcoal
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#21

Post by BikeMaine »

What wood? was the question.

How about wood pellets, like in the example on the youtube video you shared.

I've been heating my house for 25 years with a combination of a wood stove and a pellet stove. Pellets fit the size of fuel that you stated. You can get them in hardwood, softwood or a "utility" pellet. For pellet stoves, you get more BTUs from softwood pellets. This is backwards from what you might initially think. This is because once the wood is ground up, the hardwood no longer has the advantage of being more dense. So once the density is the same, the soft woods create more BTUs because of having more sap/pitch/resin in them. My favorite pellets are out of Alabama, they're made from souther, yellow pine. Those things burn so hot that I had to turn down the auger feed-speed on my stove and it still kept the house warmer than any other brand of pellet. HOWEVER, having said all that, maybe that wouldn't be the best for a "chargas" system.

I realize that you can't just get pellets anywhere like you can just firewood, but more and more pellet mills are being built. Here in Maine, they just built a couple more. (But I know that it isn't comparing apples to apples, because we're the most heavily forested state in the country.)

Just my thoughts, but I find this topic extremely interesting Bootlegger.
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#22

Post by BikeMaine »

In case anybody else likes to read the history of things like this, here is a link to the history of wood-gasification.
http://www.build-a-gasifier.com/gasifier-history/

BTW- this article mentions using coal, many stores that sell bagged wood pellets also sell bags of granulated coal.
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#23

Post by Whiskerfish »

Watching with interest!!
"Agreement is not a requirement for Respect" CDR Michael Smith USN (Ret) 2017
"The book is wrong, this whole Conclusion is Fallacious" River Tam
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and a whole garage full of possibilities!!

Psst. oh and by the way CHANGE YOUR BELTS!!!!
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#24

Post by Bootstrapper »

Proud to say I had a chance to meet with CYBORG today. Had an awesome time sharing war and wing stories. I'm confident with his guidance, and my wife's approval (which I've got, Thank God), we'll have the Charwing running in time for the Paris, Ontario meetup in June.
Specialization is for insects.

1983 GL1100 - Charwing - Runs on charcoal
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#25

Post by CYBORG »

Good to hear. Look forward to seeing it
1978 custom GL1000
1977 custom with 1200 engine
1985 gl1200
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#26

Post by Bootstrapper »

Doing an experiment tonight, but the path is well trod. I put the subframe, centerstand and kickstand into a vinegar bath. Ill post bwf9re and after pics tomorrow.

The subframe had a substantial amount of rust inside of it. I decided to pull the plates with the little holes from either end and managed to rinse it out. I'll probably simply use hot glue to fill the ends until I can craft a more permanent solution.

If the vinegar works well, I'm going to use it to clean out the open tubes on the left side of the frame.

Here's a video of a guy riding with a charcoal gasifier on his dirt bike: https://youtu.be/P3wkIAMbMQI. I'll probably go with two smaller, fire extinguisher size cylinders mounted just in front of the engine. Something to stew on while I continue putting this back together.
Specialization is for insects.

1983 GL1100 - Charwing - Runs on charcoal
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#27

Post by sunnbobb »

Loving this. A few years back we had a member build a propane wing, it was fun to watch. As for your pump, might you run it off the front crank, like some guys do alternators and superchargers?
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---- Bradshaw Bikes custom polishing for your wing. Visit us on facebook!

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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#28

Post by robin1731 »

Bootstrapper wrote:snip....................
Short answer is I don't know yet. Most woodgassers say ~30% reduction in power.
Thank you. That's all the answer I needed.

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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#29

Post by Bootstrapper »

As I understand it, one of the main reasons for the loss of power is because the fuel gas is about half inert nitrogen before it ever hits the air mixer. The easy way to mitigate this is to recirculate the exhaust back through the gasifier. The thing we'll have to pin down is the max ratio of exhaust/air. Too much CO2 exhaust and there's not enough free O2 to sustain combustion.

I should've put this in the first post, but here's a community of folks driving on wood/charcoal: http://forum.driveonwood.com
Specialization is for insects.

1983 GL1100 - Charwing - Runs on charcoal
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Re: Charwing - Doomsday GL1100 Build, Charcoal Powered

#30

Post by Bootstrapper »

Some pictures of bikes from the golden age of gasifiers:
35c52ad071_690x421.jpg
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2127359fa6_326x500.jpg (128.52 KiB) Viewed 254 times
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ce1b2943a211dabe.jpg (62.41 KiB) Viewed 254 times
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a67005b326ea8c37.jpg (30.02 KiB) Viewed 254 times
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d889a27745_690x460.jpg (186.25 KiB) Viewed 254 times
Specialization is for insects.

1983 GL1100 - Charwing - Runs on charcoal
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