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Author Topic: The next hairbrained Idea......  (Read 9896 times)

guest22972

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The next hairbrained Idea......
« on: September 29, 2018, 10:32:01 AM »

Decided the Hydrogen gas was a failure.  Didn't fail to make gas, started off slow but then came along very nicely.
Failure  was in me being too scared to use it once I realised what it's flammability ratio was in air.... Way too wide for my comfort level.

On to bigger and other wastes of time....
With the weather warming up here and my solar production going through the roof, I decided to give the Bio gas thing another go.
Got a 110L Plastic drum same as the one I used for the hydrogen generation but instead of cutting the backside out of it, I left it complete, screwed the Valved outlet from the Hydrogen generator in the top and filled the thing about 80% with a mix of horse manure, Rabbit manure and a good handfull of Biological pellets.

Premixed it all into a slury of unspeakable Yecch! and put it in the Drum.  I'm just going to try a batch system first, make sure I can get the thing to work this time.  Last time I think I went the wrong way adding sugar which makes booze and CO2 not the methane I want.
The day temps are getting up to around 25 oC here and the solar is going off it's nut so using some to heat the mix is not a problem at all.

I put the smaller drum inside the larger one and sat that on some expanded white polystyrene for insulation from the cement floor and put it inside the shed door. I heated the water using a 2 KW element meant for Cups of water or whatever and my trusty old plastic Urn which was doing just under 2 KW.  With probably only 120L of water to heat up, I was over heating pretty quickly and had to back them right down.  I got the water jacket up to about 47 which I figured was OK because the inner drum will take a while to heat sink and stabilise the whole mix.  I want to run the thing around 35 but I might go to 40 in the day as the inner drum probably won't reach that anyhow and from what I saw, 40 is the upper limit for the middle temp digestion anyway.

I wasn't going to worry about insulating the outer drum as I'm not worried about the power to heat it and in a few weeks daytime temps will be 30 and night won't go  below 20.  One thing I over looked was the digestion drum is supposed to be dark to keep out light so Algae don't grow and waste Nutrient that the gas microbes could use.  The outer drum is blue but the inner is translucent.
With this in mind I found a larger Black Nylon tarp and wrapped the outer drum and covered the top.  Probably provide some insulation and well as darkness. As the air in the shed will be still at night, I wouldn't expect terrible heat loss anyway.

I have my Voltage monitoring Relay hooked up to the PWM Controller to reduce the power of the heater element which I have set to 1 KW. Soon as the solar starts pushing the voltage in the Circuit up, the heating element will kick in. I have enough hysteresis  programmed into the Voltage relay so once it kicks in, it will stay on at the reduced voltage level and not see saw all the time.

I spose now I wait a week to a fortnight and see what gas I make.  I have been looking for a a way to burn off the extra solar I am making and this is probably a tragic return But I have nothing else I can do with the power I'm making atm anyway.  Maybe in another month or so, The average temps will be high enough that I won't need to heat at all. Certainly will be like that at least 4 months of the year.

I will need t stir the mix and that one is eluding me for the moment other than to give the Digestor barrel a shake now and then.
My preferred option is see if I can find an airpump with an in and an out I can tap a hose to. I'll take the gas from the outlet Tube and put a Feed to the bottom of the tank and it can  Agitate with it's own gas. For this half arsed system probably wouldn't matter if it wasn't stirred, just make for slower gas production. Speed isn't the object here, just getting a successful gas production at any rate is.

I see on the net many Systems that use household scraps, Chicken, horse, cow and pug dung as the feed source but also a lot that utilise Human waste.
Really am not the least bit concerned about getting elbow deep in animal Crap but I sure draw the line at what comes out my own Fundamental orifice.
That said, I'm surprised I haven't seen any commercial systems that work like the Aerobic system everyone round here has done as an anaerobic with the gas as a by product.  Might be something that requires too much maintence for the average householder.

If this shows to be worthwhile I Might consider a bigger system but I doubt it would really be viable here. I would definitely have to heat it in winter and electricity is in short supply then. Could use oil but it would need daily attention.  Highly doubtful I'd get enough gas to do anything worth while with it anyway.  Might get enough to cook with but I'm not going to plumb it to the house and sure as hell not going to go up the yard for anything more to boil the kettle during ( a fine) Day.
To run an engine, I'd need a Much bigger digestor and a few cows in the back yard or be running to the equine park every weekend and shoveling a ton of shit literally. Much easier for me to run on oil.

Even just setting these things up you learn a lot which if nothing else is good experience and knowledge for having a real world understanding of these  alternative " save the world" technologies and their viability.
From what I have seen on the net, there is a lot that could be done with municipal waste to reduce landfill here, get a renewable energy ( or 2 in gas and power) and have a worthwhile by product in the fertiliser.  Other countries are making it work successfully which is why it will probably NEVER be adapted here.
 ::)

LowGear

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #1 on: September 29, 2018, 06:08:34 PM »
I heard some loose talk about beefing up the wiring out to the power shed?
NPR Tipper/Dump Truck
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dax021

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #3 on: October 11, 2018, 06:02:11 PM »
Or try this.  I think Ed mentioned it a while ago.

dieselspanner

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #4 on: October 12, 2018, 10:31:28 AM »
Hi Glort.

''Although what that worthwhile purpose for me is i'm not sure?''

Given the amount of panels you've got how about one of these?


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LZ_127_Graf_Zeppelin#/media/File:ZeppelinLZ127a.jpg


Cheers
Stef
Tighten 'til it strips, weld nut to chassis, peen stud, adjust with angle grinder.

guest23837

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #5 on: October 12, 2018, 12:13:08 PM »
Glort when are you going nuclear?

ajaffa1

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #6 on: October 12, 2018, 12:29:27 PM »
Hey JD, funniest comment of the week.  :laugh: Very glad I don`t live anywhere near Sydney.

Please don`t encourage him, I think Glort is perfectly capable of taking out most of his neighborhood without going nuclear,  he doesn`t need our help!

That said, to run a barbecue or gas cooker requires very little pressure. I think LPG runs at about 14 psi, which should be easily and safely achieved at home.

Bob

mike90045

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #7 on: October 12, 2018, 04:39:35 PM »
Somehow, the idea of cooking my food with "fart gas" is not appealing.

I think the best use is an old fashion style gas lamp streetlight.

guest23837

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #8 on: October 13, 2018, 12:35:02 AM »
Glort going nuclear was a throwaway comment but I think we are going to have to stop burning stuff for energy. I know I'm an engine lover like all of the people on here but I doubt we contribute a whole lot of the overall emissions but countries do. Ireland uses oil gas even peat to generate power and of course we import power from the UK some of which has to be nuclear generated. There's been a strict no nuclear policy for many years and I can't understand why. A small nuclear reactor would easily power the whole country and have some spare plus our emissions for power generation would drop to almost zero. We do have plenty of wind power, but its not something you could depend on. There's wind turbines all over the place, it seems we send that power to the UK so they can reduce their carbon emissions, more mad stuff! Really wind, solar or hydro aren't reliable enough for Ireland so we will continue to be hypocrites.

Of course eventually Glort or a Glort type in a shed will come up with a small reliable non polluting power source that every house will have to make their own power unfortunately I probably won't live to see it!

guest23837

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #9 on: October 13, 2018, 08:46:22 AM »
You could be right Glort that the governments are sitting on the solution for decades. I doubt it's nuclear powered either way too dangerous for the Glort in the shed to be messing around with and too complicated. It will be one of those "how the hell didn't I see that" ideas and yes there well may be some fella living high on the hog with money from big oil for his invention.

I understand your irritation about solar power part of the problems are indeed caused by big business and some of it, like the petty rules and regulations are caused by officialdom and government sucking up to big business by making it very difficult to use small scale green power generation.  I know in Ireland its difficult to get permission to erect wind turbines or solar panels on a small scale and almost impossible to get permission to feed into the grid. For example I'm not allowed a wind turbine with blades longer than 18" without permission. Of course permission isn't going to be granted because I live in a rural area and it would be an "eyesore", same with solar panels. A 2 foot turbine isn't going to power much more than a mobile phone charger

dax021

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #10 on: October 13, 2018, 08:16:02 PM »
Read something once about a farmer who used an old tractor tube connectected to the digester outlet.  When it was full he rolled it to his house, connected it to his stove and plonked a couple of concrete lintels on it to give pressure

guest23837

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #11 on: October 13, 2018, 10:04:43 PM »
Do those little gas conversion kits for petrol engines on a certain auction site actually work? Will they work for both propane and butane? They are interesting because you can store the fuel for a long period without it going "off" like petrol does. I did see a video of a guy that connected the crankcase pipe to bottled gas on a generator or lawnmower I cant remember which. It was a bit of a Heath Robinson affair.
How long would it run on a 12kg tank of butane? Is it safe?

guest23837

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #12 on: October 14, 2018, 12:09:22 PM »
I think I will get that little adaptor glort I was going to buy one from the UK it's £50 but 2 day delivery that's under €20!. I will keep an eye out for a non runner honda or honda clone generator. It's usually a fcuked carburettor full of varnish that stops these little machines from running. I could have a cheap generator and if it doeskin work out it's a very small loss. Gas is 50% cheaper than petrol I read somewhere but that's not really the appeal it's the machine sitting for 6 months unused and firing right up. Much better than cleaning the jets on a carburettor by the light off a Tilley lamp!

guest23837

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #13 on: October 14, 2018, 02:51:45 PM »
Petrol here is €1.50+ per litre gas is about €25 for the small cylinder you would use in a gas heater so relatively cheap. thats with shopping around you can also pay €1.65 for petrol and €30 for the gas. There's no non runners for sale near me at the minute but I can wait. The website I was looking at that said gas was 50% cheaper was American and they were using mains gas I know that even in Ireland its way cheaper than bottled gas. It has to be worth a shot I think.

mike90045

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Re: The next hairbrained Idea......
« Reply #14 on: October 14, 2018, 05:53:47 PM »
I think most of the automotive AC pumps, require lube oil in the line, and not a simple sump.