Gasogen fuel

During WWII my grandfather run his buses and service truck with gasogen. It is the gas produced by burning wood or coal in a closed container.

http://ir.library.oregonstate.edu/xmlui/bitstream/1957/1569/1/FPL_1463ocr.pdf

http://gasengine.farmcollector.com/Gas-Engines/Adaptation-of-the-GASO-GEN-to-Stationary-Engines.aspx

 

it was common in australia too during ww2. i met a man who ran a nissan cedric utility on a gas producer until he passed away about 8 years ago. he used it for 20 years plus on that vehicle.

 

The technology has been around for a long time, and is always being considered as an alternative. The problem I see is the volume of wood you need, when Volvo drove a wood powered car across Sweden it took two other cars to scour the woods ahead for deadwood to keep the other one going. We would run out of forests if there was very large switch over to wood power. You need a pickup truck sized vehicle for the converter, and a trailer full of wood to make about 100 miles. Not very practical i think.

Here is a good article on the subject:

http://www.lowtechmagazine.com/2010/01/wood-gas-cars.html

 

With wood it is not very efficient, but with coal seems to be much better

 

Might as well build a steam engine.

 

That would mean modifying existing machinery. The gasogen is a fuel that works on any internal combustion engine

 

Very interesting stuff, especially the reading provided by Petros. Looking at the size and the weight of both the fuel and the necessary machinery, it might make sense if applied to easy-going displacement boats, and much less when installed on a car. Also because the forest depletion would be much less severe in the former case.

This Mercedes-Benz model shows that the installation can be made pretty compact-size, if foreseen from the early design stage and not as a post-production add-on: http://krisdedecker.typepad.com/.a/6a00e0099229e888330120a7d2345c970b-500wi

I've learned something new today, thank you guys.

 

One of the car's there is Dutch John's, here is his website.

Cheers,
Angel

 

Mybusters did it successfully. You dont burn the wood but cook it therfore you have still some combustible material afterwards that can be sold. Trouble is you need fuel to cook the wood.

In Uk cars ran on town gas in big balloons strapped to the roof of the car.

Oil touched 120 yesterday all these methods of producing fuel for transport will soon be considered depending on your capabilities and or location.