They Run Their Truck on Wood!

Image Gallery Air volume is controlled by the slotted mixer valve.

As even greater numbers of folks turn to renewable fuels to fulfill their energy needs, the potential of firewood is being rediscovered. Most people today aren't strangers to the idea of warming homes or cooking foods with wood, but few realize that the ligneous hydrocarbon can yield a viable—and proven —substitute for gasoline (known as "producer gas" or "gengas") . . . a replacement that might just be the closest thing to a "free ride" in existence today!

AN OLD IDEA REBORN

Throughout the lean years of the Second World War, civilians in Europe—and, to a lesser extent, here at home—took advantage of wood energy to power vehicles and drive stationary engines. (See "How to Run Your Car on Wood", page 68, issue 27 .. . which is available for $3.00 plus $1.00 shipping and handling from THE MOTHER EARTH NEWS®, P.O. Box 70, Hendersonville, North Carolina 28791.) Today, the concept is just beginning to enjoy a new wave of interest as a result of excessive gasoline prices ... and Steve and Lois Nunnikhoven—of Oakville, Iowa—are among the people who are re- pioneering wood-powered vehicle research.

The husband and wife, you see, run a small woodstove manufacturing business and offer delivery service to their customers . . . a practice which used to cost the firm hundreds of dollars in transportation expenses each month. So, to ease their "gas pains", the couple decided to investigate alternative fuels . . . and were surprised to find that energy from wood—in the form of vapors produced under controlled burning conditions—could indeed power a vehicle and would require a minimum of engine modification. After doing some research, the Nunnikhovens fabricated a wood-gas generator for their delivery truck . . . and they've been using the vehicle as a working "guinea pig", to test performance and various designs, over the past several months.

Here's how the Iowa couple's system operates: The wood scraps—pieces ranging from one to five inches on a side—are contained in a four-foot-high, 18"-diameter hopper with 1/8"-thick walls. The chamber is sealed except for an airtight fill lid and an adjustable intake draft control. Inside this drum is a cone-shaped stainless steel hearth that's ventilated to allow interior convection. From the hop per a gas outlet pipe connects, in series, to a drop filter and a centrifugal canister. Then additional tubing routes the fumes through a water vapor separator and on into the engine compartment ... where they're fed into the carburetor's breather shroud through a manually controlled air mixer valve which regulates the amount of "atmosphere" in the blend for a proper ratio. (The Carb's butterfly valve then governs engine speed, as usual.)