Making Briquettes From Wood Waste

[BradNaylor]

I'm thinking of getting a wood-burning stove for our living room.

As you can imagine, I have a fair amount of wood waste from my workshop, some in the form of off-cuts, but most as shavings or dust. Does anyone have any experience of making this stuff into burnable briquettes?

A Google search reveals many machines on the market such as this

http://www.greenwarehouse.co.uk/index.p ... o-products

which seem a bit low-tech, and systems such as this

http://www.briquetting.com/mas_holz.php

which are on an industrial scale. Is there anything in between?

Also, do they work with MDF dust? My mate Phil who I share the workshop with happily burns MDF offcuts in the multi fuel stove on his narrowboat, but does the dust combine with the other wood waste to form briquettes OK?

I have a lot of MDF dust!

Cheers
Dan

 

[TonyW]

I may be talking rubbish here but I would be concerned about burning MDF including making MDF dust into briquettes.

I believe that extreme heat will release formaldehyde fumes. Therefore you should only burn in an incinerator or outside where harmful gasses can escape.

Cheers
Tony

 

[wizer]

I was looking at one of those machines that turned shredded papers into briquettes for stoves in Axminster t'other day, very clever but 11k :shock:

 

[maltrout512]

Hi Dan, I looked into the briquettes about a year ago. The cheapest machine I could find was about 6k (scott and sargent) I think. The settings may vary but in general you can adjust compression to type of dust size. To make this more cost effective I would have to have enough dust/shavings so I could then sell the briquettes. Dust/shavings required about 1 ton a week. I'm not producing that amount so would have to source the rest. Most woodyards etc that I contacted had contracts with removal companys, which made it a closed book. I never took it any further. It is a good idea but if it's for (small) use it does make it very costly.

 

[NickWelford]

Some of us might remember, in the long past 1960's, a comic character whom I seem to remember was called 'Wonderful' Wilson, who lived and worked in some railway arches. Now, my memory is rather sketchy, but I seem to recall that he was an ace at soccer, cricket and possibly other sports, to the extent that he was England Captain material. (Yes, I know it's very unlikely!!)
Anyway, he used to make a living by making briquettes from, I think, a dampened mixture of sawdust, coal dust and cement, formed into wooden moulds. Can't hurt trying.........

 

[jasonB]

South London Hardwoods put one of these in about 18mths ago at the end of their extraction system. They now use them to fire their workshop heating and also sell the surplus at a bigger profit than what they used to sell sawdust/shavings for.

Not seen a small enough version for a one man workshop though.

Jason

 

[dedee]

I found this site some time back but never got around to buying one

http://www.logmaker.org.uk/index.html

I'd be interested to hear if anyone else has tried this.

Cheers

Andy

 

[OLD]

I have just installed a work shop stove and fill with saw dust & planer chips mixed ram down just below flue, light then wood off cuts which burn quite quickly but the saw dust burns at a slower rate works well and heats up fast.

 

[Ironballs]

I have one of the briquette makers that compresses wet newspaper into blocks that you then dry and burn. Cost about 15 quid and works very well. Was chatting to my local timber yard chap the other week as he burns huge amounts of sawdust and shavings, more than his stove can cope with. He'd looked into it and he needed to produce more sawdust and produce it continuously to make one of the big sawdust briquette makers worthwhile.

I turn newspaper into briquettes, plane shavings are used to start the stove, offcuts go in the stove and anything from the extractor is used as cat litter or animal bedding

 

[bluezephyr]

How much effort goes into crumpling newspapers up to put into the squisher to produce something worthwhile putting on a fire?
And whats the burn time?

 

[Ironballs]

I'll be honest, it's a PITA so I stockpile the papers and only do it about once a quarter. However I then make a stash of about 30 briquettes, each one taking about 5 mins to make start to finish, with about 2 days drying time by the radiator if it's not sunny outside. Burn time is about 1 hour, the more effort you put into mushing up the paper and compressing it nicely the longer and hotter it burns with the least amount of ash.

Nearly exhausted the current stock and I have a big sack full of newspapers so I think it's time to get the black fingernails again - last did it in Sep. Try and do it when there's some decent footy matches on 5 live to keep you interested

 

[BradNaylor]

I'll be honest, it's a PITA so I stockpile the papers and only do it about once a quarter. However I then make a stash of about 30 briquettes, each one taking about 5 mins to make start to finish, with about 2 days drying time by the radiator if it's not sunny outside. Burn time is about 1 hour, the more effort you put into mushing up the paper and compressing it nicely the longer and hotter it burns with the least amount of ash.

Nearly exhausted the current stock and I have a big sack full of newspapers so I think it's time to get the black fingernails again - last did it in Sep. Try and do it when there's some decent footy matches on 5 live to keep you interested

Hmmm...

Sounds like a little job for Dan jr.

20p a briquette and he could earn some serious pocket money. Knowing him he would make a load extra and set up a stall by the front gate.

I'd get home from work and find he'd got his schoolmates round churning them out for 15p a time.

He's not 8 yet and he already has an angle on everything!

Dan

 

[Mr T]

Hi Dan

I wonder how big these machines are. Someone in the NCFM was looking at them and considering if it was possible to buy one between a number of woodworkers and transport it between workshops.

MDF is amazing stuff to burn as the embers seem to last for ever. The formaldehyde is probably killing me but its lovely and warm!

Chris

 

[bluezephyr]

The smallest in Scott and Sargeant or Axminster is about 800ish Kilo's.

 

[wizer]

I'm sure a small amount of Formaldehyde is ok in the mix, but burning MDF raw is a bit silly.

It's a shame that the hobby woodworking community is so far wide spread in this country. We could have put together a co-op to buy, make and sell briquettes from our waste.

 

[Finial]

burning MDF raw is a bit silly

Burning wood or mdf pollutes the air with particulates, that is why smoke control areas were introduced years ago. Incomplete combustion of either makes tar and vapours with any number of harmful substances. Methanol for example used to be called wood spirit. But if you are going to burn anything on an open fire do you think mdf is worse than wood?

 

[maltrout512]

I'm not an expert but, is it not common knowledge that a wood burner has a very small so called carbon foot print. CO2 which is given off by burning wood is then taken in by wood (trees) that are growing. Don't see the problem with burning wood.

 

[Escudo]

Dan I have a customer who is looking into a wood pellet (I think) machine to compliment plans to sell and install some sort of scandinavian type burner central heating system/boiler. Apparently it is a big thing over there.

I am not up to speed yet but apparently the pellets (made from sawdust)are held in a hopper and the boiler loads itself when needed, self regulating. A computer monitors use and reports back to client when hopper needs topping up. Clever, hey 8) .

The business will supply, install equipment and supply fuel. Apparently it is a cheap form of heating, not with standing capital outlay for burner/boiler.

I must learn a bit more about this venture / business idea.

Tony.

 

[wizer]

I must learn a bit more about this venture / business idea.

Tony.

There must be more and more people burning fuel in the country/western world as modern traditional fuel prices go up. If you can work out a business that can exchange sawdust for briquettes and also strike deals up with saw dust producers to take their waste. Then I'm certain you could make a profitable business out of it. Not sure how much each briquette will weigh, but maybe even it would be done mail order too.