What to do with all that Sawdust 2 Pellet Press
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- čas přidán 31. 05. 2024
- I used a Harbor Freight 20 ton press to make sawdust pellets. I don't think I'll continue with this though.
Prior sawdust video here
• What to do with all th... - Jak na to + styl
Keep trying new things with your down to earth honesty! Just wonderful.
You cannot fail while doing experiments. Each attempt is one step removed. 🇬🇧👍
Wood pellets are infact held together by the natural lignin in the wood, but the lignin has to be melted/softened first before it can effectively bind the wood together. The temperature of the pellets can be a couple of hundred degrees when coming out of the pellet mills so you may want to try heating up the die and making smaller diameter pellets for better heat distribution.
Also we add about 1.5% starch by weight to the saw dust to help bind the pellets together so you could try that as well.
Source: engineer for a wood pellet manufacturer
the theory behind it is that the compressiin alone generates the heat to gkue them
Thank you for posting Bill. I like your stile very open and no fluff. I too love to experiment, especially with byproducts. I was thinking of purchasing a pellet stove but wanted to make my own pellets. I have access to lots of 4x4x48 inch boards used for rigging steel. My company throws these out by the pallet full. I know a lot of work turning a 4x4 into sawdust just to make pellets but time I am rich with :)
You didn't fail. you took a shot, and found a way that didn't work fast. good test run. proved the concept. now scale to suit. maybe a hydraulic ram, powered by a small engine, like a log splitter and a thicker die, to push the wood through. and bingo, you stand there and operate the ram, refill the wood, and wood plugs drop out the bottom.
I think your video is a success. Excellent video and process. The answer may not be what we want but your process and patience proved a very good and positive result. Keep on experimenting. Excellent work.
I do not use a press, but I added 'cooking oil' (Corn oil) and use it quite nicely to START fires in my fireplace.
Really!!! Great idea...
I enjoyed your honesty. It was still a valuable video.
We all appreciate your posts Bill as your doing what we are trying only your brave enough to post it, so thank you and well done. Personally I mix fine sawdust with an equal amount of newspaper; rip the newspaper up into small pieces, put into a bucket, add plenty of water, vigorously mix and leave a few days. Revisit with a quick further mixing; then hands into the bucket, making 'snowball' size saw/paper balls, squeeze as much water out as possible then leave to dry. I put them inside a bucket with plenty of holes in the sides and bottom; for drying, I use a platform high up inside my shed. Give it a go!!!
Thanks for sharing Bill. I have a lot of trees on my property so I usually just spread my shavings and sawdust among my trees but I do know of several households here in southeast Indiana that have outhouses in use and they utilize the sawdust as composting material.
Keep in mind that for sawdust to decompose it will pull nitrogen from the soil so you need to add that back into the soil.
Bill I live in Alaska and heat with firewood. But I am also a preper. I have been making fire starters from sawdust (obtained from the local cabinet makers bin) and old candles. I take an old bread pan and heat up the wax until liquid. Then taking saw dust and adding until the mixture is a stiff like oats consistency then mash out into a thickness of about a inch in the pan. making sure I use a block of wood to pack the mixture. Then let cool thoroughly! then turn pan over tapping it on the bench to release from pan. Then I break apart or cut into cubes and bag!
I think this was not a fail, and it is still a win, for the composting value. Very interesting concept. 👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
Great job Bill
I like your idea. You saved me the attempt.
Thanks.
Thank you, Bill. Properly informative video. The 'Briquette/Pellet' makers have automated machinery that seems to work pretty well, and yes, one of them told me that Paraffin Wax works well in their product. They were looking into alternatives, since Paraffin Wax is typically made from petrochemicals, which hits their green credentials, so they were looking into using Oilseed Rape as a feed stock for the wax... Here in the UK, buying briquettes/pellets made like yours is cheaper than buying town gas or electricity to heat your home. A lot cheaper! So I have been tinkering with stoves a good bit in recent years. I can build a 'rocket stove core' that eats twigs, pellets and offcuts, but chokes on sawdust so far - but it is supremely efficient - in the mid 90% range - no big secret, just get a turbulent burn at around 800/1000C (this calls for refractory ceramic insulation!) and the exhaust is Carbon Monoxide free, which is as good as it gets. Steel tube rocket stoves cannot do this, the steel loses interest! I managed to destroy a stainless stove that I bought, tinkered with it until it got hot enough, and then it disintegrated!
I plan to buy a 'sawdust burner' off eBay, see how it works, maybe go for a gasifier/burner/heat riser design to get the temperatures needed? The sad thing about letting sawdust rot is that not only do the microbes release the carbon in the wood, they also do what cows do and release greenhouse gases! So I salute your search for a solution. Well done! Ben 😉
Hey, it was a good idea. I think about a use for the sawdust every time I walk out and dump it in the pile.
Nice attempt. I love it when you try to repurpose or upcycle in this disposable society. Kind of what we woodworkers do. Ha.
I live in the Yukon Canada and ran into this product at a lumber mill. I found them to be great as long as they don't get wet. I learnt not to over load the wood stove. They burn hot so fill your wood stove is not a good idea.
Failure is the red headed stepchild of creativity and drive. You still love them like your own.
I think your on the right track, your using resources to heat your home, shop etc.. Along with HF bearing press I bought the 11/2 ton air bottle jack instead of cranking by hand, so so much faster.
we have the same setup in our shop. tge air actuated jack is so nice.
Bill, Being a blacksmith, the bottom of my coal bin have fines ( aka sawdust). What i do is make a slurry using bad flour from home or a bakery as a source for a binder. I use cardboard egg cartons as a mould. In your case, old cupcake pans or even tapered plastic containers will work. Let dry and voila, a briquette.
great video and awesome wisdom.
You could use the hardwood sawdust and shavings to grow mushrooms? Would need some sterilising with hot water though...
Hey Bill.. here is how things work.. we watch your video and come up with different ideas to expand on your video.. i think you was successful its just a lot of work... really appreciate your effort and I've got a slightly different and larger setup that I will attempt to make a much bigger log size or maybe 2x4x10 sizes...
Fit the pipe in a block of wood it should add enough strength to keep it from enlarging
Hello, I'm going to do the same thing. I have the Harbor Freight 20-ton press but upgraded the bottle jack to a Big Red Pneumatic air bottle jack. I'm going to hopefully get it. If you look at other briquette makers it's a constant feed. The first five or so don't pack as well, until they tighten the end of the pipe { tappers} with a slit in the pipe. I think that will help with the flaring at the end of your pipe. I will try this weekend and let you know how it goes.
I use my log splitter as a press,I block the outlet to compact, remove the block and advance ram to push out plug.work in progress building a multi small pellet ram.
I keep some for spills.. and collect the fine dust from filter for filler.. like the pellet idea .. pneumatic would be nice and how many can 20 tons do at once.. or maybe make a log.. but your right most goes to compost
Bill, great videos! I believe that the press ram diameter should be close to the diameter of the pellet pipe. this should alleviate the bulging that you are experiencing.
This video was enjoyable! Thank you.
Get the paraffin warm enough to barely melted and then mix the sawdust directly in then form them into small balls and you have made the best firestarters ever. You can even take the wax and sawdust mixture and pack it into paper egg crates. Then you just break off a couple of egg sections and use it as far as starters. This works really well for camping. I have made them for years.
I'm watching this video 4 years after your released it. It's an interesting technique. I was just searching on "pressing sawdust" and your video popped up.
I want to do something similar. The method is time consuming, but it works. And except for the press it's free and you only need elbow grease and patience.
I wonder how much pressure you need. Your press is 20 tons. Will 2, 3 or 5 tons be sufficient as well?
Thanks! Great video! 😃👍
Anytime I need a hydraulic press I fire up the wood splitter. I just make jigs for what ever project I’m building...it really works great for bending metal.....think outside of the box.....a country boy will survive lol
Bill, I haven't done it in a long time, but I think its a viable use of the sawdust. Take something like a popsicle mold and pack it/them with a mixture of wax & shavings. You could also use hard plastic cups. Because it is a little time consuming I would do it while I was trying to figure something else out. They say that the best way to solve a problem is to set it aside & work on something else. Just one man's opinion.
my best use for sawdust reclaimed from the band saw, circular saw and drill press is to mix it with epoxy to create an epoxy fillet for filling screw holes, gaps and various joints on the 21' fishing boat that I'm building. it helps me to achieve perfection where my craftsmanship is lacking. I bought four containers' of wood flour from CLC Boats for the same purpose and found that I've produced enough sawdust to not need theirs. I fill plastic containers with lids depending on the size of the particles for differing needs. When I need a super fine filler I use all the fiberglass dust I've gathered from sanding, all with minimal waste from the building materials. Everyone needs a hobby, FISHSTICKS.
Yep, my Uncle always told me...when in doubt, if you have the cash, buy the tools. You have a press now, and there are MANY other things you can do with it. Velcro was discovered by accident :). Thanks for posting.
If you have a tapered mold made out of steel you could just keep adding sawdust to it with every stroke of the press, and it will compress it 2 ways with it coming out the bottom in a log. it shouldn't be very hard to break it to size if they don't do so on their own.
you may be able to make a "proof of concept" out of wood to give it a try.
Have you ever tried using pine tar? I would also try mixing in larger bits and pieces of wood with the sawdust. Also, have you ever tried making a long, thick log like an actual wood log that would be put in a fireplace?
I mix my sawdust with paper shreddings plus old veg oil, I put the mix into a briquette press lined with newspaper. I stop the press as soon as I see liquid 'wetting' the newspaper. Even though i wasn't using the press to it's maximum, I still had to build the briquette maker into a framework made from a sleeper.
You can get a machine to make pellets, for a pellet stove for about 400 bucks on DHgate. Or elsewhere on the net. You can make wood pellets for a pellet stove, and also make feed pellets out of grass clippings if you have rabbits or other livestock. Seems to be as handy as an electric wood splitter.
It all looks very good and I am sure it works well. But given the time taken to produce one log I suspect you could probably burn them faster than you could produce them.
I think you should use a log splitter. Just like your press but by mashing a button. Just an idea.
You did your best 👍
I add sawdust to an empty paper towel holder. Close off one end and fill tube half way then add peanut oil . Fill the rest of the tune with sawdust and tamp down with a dowel. When full close off the other end. Place on hot coals or light with a match and it will burn hit and fir a long time.
how mutch pressure to make a good solid pellet, I am thinking about using my hydraulic log splitter to make pellets good vid THANX!
Use a 12" tube and drill 1/16" holes in bottom 6" for fluid to drain out. 2" abs or PVC works well.
Wood pellet manufacturers add only water to the mix when pressing then let it dry afterwards. A fire log sized mold would use up more sawdust and take less time overall.
We only add water to the saw dust if the moisture content is too low. We shoot for 12-13% moisture content in the wood before going into the press and it usually comes out around 7-8% moisture due to the heating of the material in the press.
@@joshjordan6201 Depending on conditions the saw dust from a woodworking shop might still be too dry. Then again it could be too wet.
I've never made pellets but I used to sell woodchips and sawdust to pellet manufactures. We often had to wait until Summer to ship as it rains all winter in these parts. A tractor-trailer load of sawdust gains a lot of weight in the rain.
do not compress the sawdust to 100 psi, hook up a pnumatic drive to your press, make a pellet press like the farmers do and mis the sawdust with grass cuttings, many ways to skin the .... get the job done.
You need to make an extruder for the sawdust. It's a constant process that uses compression and heat and once set up makes lots of briquets.
Bill, make the tube longer and only stop the tube for the/a small first pressing. After that has been compressed, remove the stop at the bottom and load more sawdust into the tube (as much as you can put inside). Compress again allowing the bottom to come out and cut off to the desired length as it is pushed through the tube.
With the suggestion a continuous fill can be achieved thus making the process faster and less messy.
Good luck.
I think the short strokes are the issue. Constantly having to mess about raising the ram to add more sawdust.
Maybe try a two stage ram. They will allow quick ram movement in stage one and then stage two for the intense pressure to compress into the plug. I agree with you. I am always trying new things. Failure is just finding the way that doesn't work.
Hi, I enjoyed the video. I seen somewhere on CZcams where a man shredded junk mail he wet the junk mail first like paper mache then added the sawdust and they turned out to be bricks
For my fire place insert as a fire starter - In a 5 gallon bucket, compact saw dust 90% full add 1 gallon of used motor oil. Use as bed to base for fire wood
Modify an wood splitter maybe, Im not sure of the pressures required to make the wood stick together .
Sir, for a good briquette you need to compress dry sawdust with 60 tones for every square centimeter long enough to reach 120 Celsius.
Hey bill your cutting out the hammer mill process you can get a pellet maker from premer1 or any where really and make nice burner pellets for stove for bbqing hope this helps you god bless
I use mine to mulch around my trees and in my garden
Thank you for trying
You can replace the bottle jack with a air controlled bottle jack and not have to pump a handle. Harbor freight sells those too
Heat up some wax mix in small amounts in with the saw dust. Keep all heated then press and let cool overnight. Should give you a good burnable log. Or smaller for fire starters.
Do you just want to get rid of sawdust or are you trying to develop another fuel source? If the former, try this. I just fill a four-cent brown-paper lunch sack about two-thirds full of sawdust and double-fold the top. I put one bag on top before lighting a new fire and place a fresh bag on the hot coals when adding more firewood. As the paper is consumed, the flame produces a crust over the surface of the sawdust. The sawdust retains the shape of the bag and slowly burns on the surface. If not disturbed, it is consumed along with the wood. Even if the burning sawdust gets scattered around when adding more wood, It has never put out the fire. Getting rid of sawdust can be simple and easy. Turning sawdust into fuel doesn't seem worth the time and effort.
Question what type of saw dust do you have. You can bag it up and sell it.
I’d try using sugar water as an additive. Mix it with the sawdust to dampen lightly. You’ll have to let the pellets dry afterwards. But the sugar will both keep it together as well as adding another fuel source. You can even use sugar to build model rocket engines.
I was going to suggest adding water and leave it to sit soaking for a few days then when it turn into a "mud like" consistency press into briquettes and let them dry
If you have a garden use it to hold moisture in and as a weed barrier. Turn it in at the end of the growing season.
Yes sir, it takes a lot of goofy ideas to come up with something thats gold, aint no shame in playing the game. Take care!
If you produce a lot of saw dust - would it be worth the investment to purchase a wood pellet mill? and make pellets for wood pellet stoves
How long do the pellets burn? Are they easy to light and keep burning?
I put a cup into a paper lunch bag. I make a box ful and leave it in the garage. You can put them into the wood stove and light the bag as a fire starter.
Things worth while usually don't come easily. A great binder is paper shreds in water., Then mix in sawdust until it's like busquit dough consistency.. a simple weighed plunger and gravity can produce 6" picks with little effort 😅
make burning logs, soak in water with a binding agent, like paper "pulp", soak all mix well and then compress. dry and you got a burning log.
I love that you tried it and tbh I think you should just try to optimize the production more. The ideas were good (except the stove), but you didn't do them very efficient.
For example: Mixing paper and sawdust is a great idea, because you will get free heating forever! By using a larger buck to mix more sawdust and paper together and let it soak a day, you only have to mix once for huge amounts of pulp. This method is used to make bricks for buildings, and there are tools to create them very quickly. Mainly there is a kind of mold-press, where you just put the pulp in and squeeze a bit and you get a larger brick. You leave it there to dry and make the second brick next to it. It's a matter of 10-20 seconds per brick.
If you don't wanna do it yourself, have someone's kid do it for some extra money. It's a fun thing to do when you think about it :)
I will try to find a vid on yt that shows more effective ways.
#edit: I found a video with the tool I mentioned: czcams.com/video/7bwKYfMoFYQ/video.html
Maybe it's something for you!
Thanks for reading!
Finding an old 30 ton (or so) log splitter and converting it would be the way to go. Build a hopper that you can fill, have the ram pass through that pushing and compacting the sawdust into a die. When the die if full, open the end and use the ram to push it out. I make a lot of sawdust but not enough to justify the cost of building the machine nor do I have a place to store it since space at my place is a premium. .
A suggestion for your sawdust is try a pellet machine. They are available and work real well. The sawdust needs to fine like yours . There are fire boxes now that only burn pellets!!!
I saw someone make an automated pellet machine, using a hydrolic ram.
It is possible to buy a pellet machine to make home made pellets but those machines are a bit pricey. You could probably sell the pellets you don't use.
for a binder try dampening saw dust with a mixture of water with a small amount o sugar
Perseverance will pay off
Have u thought of using a sq. Metal container & flattening with a steel plate might work +a larger block of fuel. ??
water and a way to allow that water to strain out should help and also shouldn't take as much pressure. There are a few other good video's here on YT showing presses similar to your's doing much larger logs using sawdust. I assume after 10 months, you may have seen them by now, but hey, never too late to keep trying, never goofy experimenting either, good luck and great video!
I make pallets for burning and find that you're doing too much to rush the process. I mix saw dust water and scrap newspaper in a 5 gallon bucket. Equal parts paper and saw dust, water to cover and saturate. Then I simply let it sit and dry out in a 5 gallon bucket. When dry and compressed naturally. I take pellet out and cut down into smaller bits. I add paraffin for a longer burn and use them for camping, sell as natural hookah coals and are great for starting that fireplace to set the mood
Great video. 👍 Real easy way to get rid of all that sawdust is pretty simple.. just take some used motor oil. Mix it up and put it in small little baggies. Then toss it in the wood stove.
I suppose you could compress it into a fire log. Which I'm all for.
Anyway I can heat the house for free. 😁
Great video Bill, thanks. What else can you use that press for now? Hope you didn't get it "only" to make compressed saw dust. Guess you could always put grapes it for wine lol
Yes, I bought it just for that purpose. but Harbor Freight has a good return policy, so it is going back.
I have a long air cylinder with a large air compressor I'm going to try.
The best part of this video is (and that's ok ) I like that your a cool dude, the video is good to
I think Mathias Wandel just puts the sawdust in small carboard boxes. They burn well. =D
What kind of stove do you have to burn the sawdust
I would try soaking it with water. Then get a larger pan put the pulp in and crank down as the water pressed out it should dry to a brick. You should also try beeswax or wax but melted and pour into and mix. I've used 5 gallon buckets with a weight to press it. Then brick it out. As long as its a hot fire should burn clean
Make a small jig where you press multiple, spread the pressure out among many pucks,
Look at some of the other CZcams videos about DIY pellet makers.
I put my sawdust in a small paper bag roll it up and throw it onto a hot fire may not be as dense or hurting this pallets for firewood but it still Burns and gives off BTUs
Very simple and easy way to get rid of Sawdust besides composting
will those pellets load in a pellet heater?
The very first issue with that press is lack of efficiency.
wood splitter with pellet making adapter would be nice,
Hi. I've had my hand press briquette maker for 10 years. It's pretty good. You can watch my videos if it helps. But the composted wood chip makes much better briquettes. 3 or 4 months composted and then make your briquettes and you'll be amazed at the heat and the length of the burn.
you have try nice idea.
i seen a guy using used cooking oil and he said you could use old motor oil to but he just mixed it in loose with the wood chips put it in a paper back then in the fire it went
Put the sawdust in an egg carton and saturate with melted wax to make the best fire starter around. One "egg" will get your stove going.
I use cardboard egg cartons and fill them with sawdust then use old candles or tealights. And melt them over the sawdust and egg cartons. Then when I need a Firestarter I just rip a peice of the egg carton off
Try mixing it with water and paper. Paper is a natural glue if memory serves right. Also i would suggest a bigger pipe so you can make logs instead of pellets
Great video, first time commenting. How about you get some dirt cheap candles, melt them down, remove the string and mix the wax with sawdust? You can place the mixture into cake moulds or even make some from tin foil to make your own fire lighters!