Sawdust briquets

[johnnyb]

just as a heads up I have professionally made sawdust burner that works exactly like that youtube one. only it doesn't....Well it will produce quite a bit of heat and it also has the heat exchanger for central heating. I gave up on it years ago and just burn waste wood(like a normal stove)as it was a bit of a faff and not really warm enough in winter.
I chuck my sawdust on before I light up about 3 shovels. I pour heating oil on then sticks and light. I put 90% wood in and shovel sawdust on particularly if I need to slow it down ie I'm going out for a bit or the shops warm enough.
9 hours is a long time and I burn huge amounts if wood all of it taken from upvc installation companies and waste.
many big joinery companies make briquettes and sell em £3 a bag.

 

[Just4Fun]

I burn some by stuffing them into kitchen or bog roll tubes with pound shop masking tape on the ends.

I have done that but never needed to tape the ends. I have also used the paper/card-based milk cartons we get here. Not sure if you have the same thing in the UK. It is a boring & laborius process though.

The amount of effort and time to produce a few feebly burning logs meant we abandoned it after a few months.

I guess you have to think about how you evaluate success. If your aim is to heat your house your conclusion may be different than if you aim to clear rubbish from your workshop.

 

[Trainee neophyte]

Olive presses use the left over dry olive pulp to heat water and use an auger to feed the pulp from a hopper. The pulp, which is identical to sawdust, and just as dry (very efficient, these modern presses), probably has a bit more calorific energy than plain old sawdust, but not by much . The auger turns at perhaps 1rpm (ie very, very slowly) and has forced air blower to help things along, and the fire sits under a 2 or 3 cubic metre water tank. Some Heath - Robinson system could be cobbled together for not much money, I would think.

Alternatively, this appears to be the perfect solution: a weekend in the workshop at most:

 

[BEE13]

I use my wood shavings as a mulch on the flower beds. Keeps the weeds down. The fine dust goes in a bag in the waste wheelie bin (not the recycling bin).

 

[gregmcateer]

I use quite a lot of shavings to raise the height of our carpets.
Apparently

 

[julianf]

If you just want to get rid of them as quickly as possible, a forced air burner will make them disappear quickly.

I think the Americans call them barrel burners - basically a 45g drum with a blower piped in the side.

 

[topchippyles]

I mill all my own stuff and you would not believe how much saw dust i create. Can do a ton sack in a few hrs

 

[Ollie78]

Sounds like a use for an old stationary engine with lots of torque and a great big flywheel.
I bet there is an old timey machine you could hook up to a belt drive for doing this, you could run a stream powered one with the shavings.

Dustception ? or shaveingception ?

Ollie

 

[julianf]

Sounds like a use for an old staitionary engine with lots of torque and a great big flywheel.
I bet there is an old timey machine you could hook up to a belt drive for doing this, you could run a stream powered one with the shavings.

Dustception ? or shaveingception ?

Ollie

If you had the motivation, running an engine on woodgas may be a better idea than steam.

Steam is all a bit regulated (not without reason either) whilst i think woodgas holds different dangers!

I used to know (not well) someone who ran a lister cs6 on a gassifier. They did it more for engineering curiosity than much else, but im sure google will tell you more.

 

[Trainee neophyte]

If you had the motivation, running an engine on woodgas may be a better idea than steam.

Steam is all a bit regulated (not without reason either) whilst i think woodgas holds different dangers!

I used to know (not well) someone who ran a lister cs6 on a gassifier. They did it more for engineering curiosity than much else, but im sure google will tell you more.

Hook it up to a generator and power the workshop from the waste from the workshop.

 

[Nick.]

Just as an anecdote, one of my accounts up in Cumbria produce large amounts of natural wood sawdust/ shavings through their sawmill/joinery shop - that costs a lot to dispose of commercially.
They told me they struck a deal with another local factory who produce smoked fish, who then collected it all for free and used it for the smoking process.
And in return once a month they got a huge free delivery of smoked fish for all the staff to divvy up between them.
Win / Win

 

[D_W]

Off on a tangent I know but I just bag mine and offer them free for collection as pet bedding.

High labor given your need to load it 6 or 7 times a day to warm a small house.

 

[Cabinetman]

Just as an anecdote, one of my accounts up in Cumbria produce large amounts of natural wood sawdust/ shavings through their sawmill/joinery shop - that costs a lot to dispose of commercially.
They told me they struck a deal with another local factory who produce smoked fish, who then collected it all for free and used it for the smoking process.
And in return once a month they got a huge free delivery of smoked fish for all the staff to divvy up between them.
Win / Win

It has to be just sawdust or else it burns instead of smoulders, I know because until recently I had a traditional smokehouse next to my workshop and obviously I was trying to get him to use all my sawdust and shavings – no good and also not certified (yes I know, what rubbish).
Then last November after 160 years of setting fire to his sawdust and leaving it to smoke overnight it decided to set fire to his building, it very very nearly took my building with it, the joist ends were completely burnt away at one area of my roof and the resulting water damage to my workshop took weeks to resolve.
The water running down the wiring went straight down into the fuse box (which had been isolated by this time).
The easiest way was to take the fuse box home and dry out all the isolators in front of the fire for 10 days. Jfyi.

 

[johnnyb]

it's odd really but sawdust is an asset. white stuff can be sold. hardwood I shovel straight on the fire(at the start or when it dies down)not when it's roaring.
briquettes are brilliant but really tricky to make. a few of the big joinery shops have facilities to manufacture them. but there supply is intermittent dependant on jobs and weather.

 

[Jacob]

I burn all my sawdust/shavings really easily. You just need the right shaped stove. It needs to be big so you can pack a lot in and it needs to be pyramid shape or similar so that the top of the heap has a large surface area, which is where it burns - from the top.
This is mine but no doubt there are others which will do it Dowling Stoves - Sumo
I scoop the sawdust up with an old fashioned coke hod and it takes 3 or 4 to fill it.
Burns as fast/slow and as hot as you want. The only drawback is it needs recharging quite often and you have to let it burn right down before putting any more in or you risk explosive blow back

 

[NickDReed]

I was quite impressed by this. Would it work with the slightly larger chips from my planer?
I suppose it would be possible to coil a water pipe around it and connect it to the central heating system.

Could you see where the flue attaches Ian?

Surely one of these wouldn't be too difficult to fabricate. Would make my garage a more hospitable place in the depths of winter.