fuel briquets drying
A friend of mine has been working to make fuel briquets out of scrap paper, old newspapers, leaves and dried grass clipping. Last week he made a successful run of briquets. He says they burn quite well, but are a bit hard to start. It takes a hot fire.
He used a small cement mixer to mix his raw materials, which consisted mainly of old newspapers and some sawdust. He mixed them with plain water until they were mushy. He then placed 2 handfuls in the mold that he had made. The mold is then place in the press and the water squeezed out. The briquets are then removed from the mold and placed in the sun to dry.
1 Base of mold with center pipe
These types of briquets have been used in third world countries for some time with good results. Overseas they make most of them out of dried vegetation. For areas in which there is a shortage of fuel for fires this is a possible solution. The press my friend is using is only his first attempt and he will go on to make it better. However, this lets you know how little it takes to make them. Be warned they are a bit labor intensive. http://e-fuelbriquetts.blogspot.com/ and http://www.paceproject.net/UserFiles/File/Urban%20Living/make%20briquettes.pdf are websites that give you more information about them.
2 Place perforated pipe over base and fill with two handfuls of mixture
3 Place top ring on and place mold in press
Howard
5 If you use a separator you can make two at a time
4 Remove briquet from mold
My husband and I do this using shredded newspaper and a metal mold we bought in a tool shop. We’ve gone around to the neighbours and got them saving their newspapers for us, and now some of the neighbours with wood stoves are asking us to show them how to make briquettes for use in their stoves and fireplaces.
It is a labour-intensive process just with the newspaper shreddings, and yes, the stove needs to be very hot to ignite the briquettes. The warmth, though, once the briquettes are burning, is quite nice:) Properly dried, the briquettes we’ve made burn for about an hour.
We soak the newspaper shreddings for at least 24 hours then press the resulting pulp mess into the mold. It takes us about two hours to make twenty briquettes, and about six months for the things to properly dry. We use a rack in the garage for drying much like a rack for seasoning harvested fire wood. Because it is labour intensive, and it takes a while to accumulate enough newspaper to make a decent briquette, doing this is only supplemental to purchased or harvested wood, but it does put a dent in how much wood one has to buy.
i need to establish this project in Tanzania – Dar es salaam
but i need fund to pursue it. for any advice please do not hesitate.
I’m new to the fuel brick effort. How is the newspaper shredded? How narrow do you make the strips and how long. Any info will be appreciated. Thanks; Dick B
We put the whole pages is water and let them turn to mush. Kind of like making paper mache, when you were in grade school.
What if you added some drier lint to the mix? That might help with the slow lighting problem.