Planning on Making some Charcoal at the Autumn Moot

[Tony]

So, I'm planning on making some charcoal next week at the moot and I've a couple of questions that some of you experienced bods might be able to help me with

I'm thinking of buying a small charcoal maker, so a metal container, chimneys etc, I figured this would make things easy enough. I want to know about wood to put in it, I know that Ideally it needs to be seasoned, my question is, will I get away with dead wood from the woodland? As in dead tree, break branch off, use that. It's also likely that it will be a real mix of woods, and a fair amount of softwood, which I know is not ideal with hardwoods being the best materials.

Basically, I'd like to be able to forage for wood for making charcoal and it's not going to be as dry or hard as ideally wanted, will it still be ok and worth the effort?

Cheers
T

 

[Dave Budd]

Mostly the species doesn't matter (depending on final usage), it is better to have single species burns if you can as it makes it easier to control overall, but it's not all that vital. Its more important to have wood that isn't rotting or too far gone, ie good sound wood. Seasoned is best as is dry, but again not imperative, try and avoid too much that is too wet though as it will slow the whole process down and you'll end up with more over cooked and more undercooked than you would otherwise. I often coal coppiced wood that has only been down for a few months, but preferably 6-12months. So dead standing or dead branches should be fine, just discount the wettest or stick it higher in the kiln, so it has a chance to dry out before it gets to the heat.

Stick similar sized pieces in the kiln or have the larger bits towards the centre or upper parts where they will have longer to get to pyrolising temperature. Smaller bits around the edges and kindling/browns to start it at the base. With an oil drum sized burn, nothing more than 3" round is good and preferably stuff that is split as I've found the bark often acts as a fire resistant cover and stops the wood catching and thus getting up to temperature (only a problem with small kilns, not my 5 footer).

I often do small burns with oil drums. I've done it often with no chimney at all, just holes around the bottom of the drum and a lid on the top that can be used for the exhaust. An oil drum normally yields about 10-15kg of charcoal and I've found that I get a lot of brown ends from a burn of virgin wood, so I then have another drum that is burning the browns and some virgin wood. That gives me about 15-18kg of charcoal in one drum and 10-15kg in the other. An oil drum normally takes about 3-6hours to burn in my woods and I leave over night to cool, though we could dig a hole and cover it in sand and might be able to have charcoal useable an cool in 4 or 5 hours after the burn is closed down.

Happy to help you out with the burn if you like mate

 

[Robson Valley]

While you're at it, set up a mini-system and make charcoal from willow, about the size of a pencil.
Marvellous stuff for the Fine Arts, drawings and under-sketches for oils and acrylics.

 

[John Fenna]

Tin box full of willow twigs works well just like making charcloth...

 

[Dave Budd]

yep, you can also stick the tin in the larger kiln and do both at the same time

 

[John Fenna]

We do that at the Care Farm I work at (we are commercial charcoal producers as well as everything else ) and we sell the Artists Charcoal in neat little cardboard boxes...

 

[Tony]

Charcoal went well, thanks for all the input, I'll get a picture up!!

 

[Dave Budd]

that's good to hear I look forward to seeing how you did it and what sort of yield you got. Did you save the brown ends for camp fires or run them back through?

 

[Wayne]

At the summer Moot it might be nice to do a traditional earth burn.

 

[Dave Budd]

I don't think sand works for that Wayne, it'll just collapse!

 

[Wayne]

I don't think sand works for that Wayne, it'll just collapse!

You might be right. I'll have a word with the experts at the Weald and Downland. They might have a cunning plan.

 

[Dave Budd]

The only ethnographic comparison i can think of that woukd work would be a pit. Basically you dig a big hole, light a fire in it and when the thing is well ablaze you fill it back in and leave to cool fir a day or so. It's still used in parts oc africa and asia, but if is massively ineficient compared to a drum

 

[Wayne]

The only ethnographic comparison i can think of that woukd work would be a pit. Basically you dig a big hole, light a fire in it and when the thing is well ablaze you fill it back in and leave to cool fir a day or so. It's still used in parts oc africa and asia, but if is massively ineficient compared to a drum

I went to a lecture on a massive earth burn they do each year in Germany. 100s of tonnes in a single burn. Massive tradition that the whole village gets involved with. Quite a bit of sand used on that but it was a while back so I have forgotten the finer details.

 

[Dave Budd]

In ye olde days in this country where wood colliers worked, for example along wooded vallies, they would cut semi circular plarforms to run their burns. As the immediate area was deplleyed they would move along the valley to the next platform, migrating with the other cutting activity. The spoil from each burn would often be moved from site to site because it needed the right consistancy and ratio of inorgainc material, so was more efficient to move tonnes if soil than tonnes of wood.

It could be that the soil where they were burning in Germany was too humic or too much clay, so the sand added structure. I wouldn't think it would be too much sand though. Sand is still used even with ring kilns to plug holes, stopping leaks and for smothering any embers that pop up in the emptying stage