Build a Wood-Burning Alcohol Fuel Still

By The Mother Earth News Editors
Published on July 1, 1979
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PHOTO: MOTHER EARTH NEWS STAFF
The assembled wood-burning alcohol fuel still all ready for a run!

It’s been half a year since this magazine began its research into and coverage of home-produced alcohol fuel (see the interview with Lance Crombie). In the course of those six months we’ve learned a good bit about ethanol distillation both by “picking the brains” of experts from the beverage (and fuel) distillation industry and by reading every bit of printed information we could get our hands on. 

Well, all of that work is beginning to pay off. In the article that follows, we’ll detail the plans for our first wood-burning alcohol fuel still. 

You’ll notice that this still is a good bit different from the simple solar still based upon Lance Crombie’s design. The reason for our “change of direction” is that—although there may well be great potential in such uncomplicated stills as Lance’s—we feel that a practical, productive piece of backyard distillation apparatus is needed now, and we haven’t yet seen a “box type” still that was efficient enough to produce a reliable supply of fuel. 

We’re not giving up on the notion of a solar still, of course (in fact, we have a working model all built and rarin’ to go as soon as we get enough test data in), but that report will have to wait for another issue. The point is that we all need an alternative means of supplying our liquid fuel needs today! 

And, again, let us emphasize that the folks at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms have continued to be most helpful. Meet them halfway, supply the Bureau with whatever information they require when applying for your permit (and DON’T EVEN CONSIDER using your experimental distilled spirits plant permit to produce drinkin’ liquor!), and the result of such cooperation should be less stringent regulations in the future and—we hope—more progress toward making farm-produced ethanol fuel a nationwide reality. 


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