Making Charcoal

[Iron Clad]

After reading another topic about coal and its future someone mentioned making and using charcoal.

What is the best way to produce charcoal in large quantity? I have always used coal and gas, I would like to try charcoal. If I like it, I would like to produce it in large batches.

Thanks............

P.S. Oh, what is it like to forge weld with charcoal, what do I need to know?

[Nakedanvil - Grant Sarver]

Charcoal is still used in many parts of the world and in the west until just a couple hundred years ago. Burns up a little fast and the fire wants to spread out, but it's pleasant to work with.

Depends on your definition of "large quantity". Many people make it in a 55 gallon drum. Few holes around the bottom, a lid with a hole, get a fire going and fill it with wood and cover. You can tell by the smoke when most of the volatiles have burned off. Takes a couple hours. Put dirt around the holes in the bottom, cover the top and let it cool down. Anything that won't break up easily can go back in the next batch.

[Iron Clad]

Thanks Grant. That sounds easy enough.

Is forge welding using charcoal primarily the same as using coal?

[Willis]

I've been making and using my own charcoal for a few years now. This works great for most of the stuff I enjoy making, however, if I'm going to do some forge welding, I usually add a few handfuls of coal to the mix just to get the heat up. I add the coal mainly when I'm forging tool steel. I forge to shape using coal/charcoal mix then switch to just plain charcoal after annealing. This is a method that suits my needs and allows me to stretch my supply of coal. Coal is a little hard to get in my part Florida.

[Nakedanvil - Grant Sarver]

Thanks Grant. That sounds easy enough.

Is forge welding using charcoal primarily the same as using coal?

Usually just need a little deeper fire.

I've been making and using my own charcoal for a few years now. This works great for most of the stuff I enjoy making, however, if I'm going to do some forge welding, I usually add a few handfuls of coal to the mix just to get the heat up. I add the coal mainly when I'm forging tool steel. I forge to shape using coal/charcoal mix then switch to just plain charcoal after annealing. This is a method that suits my needs and allows me to stretch my supply of coal. Coal is a little hard to get in my part Florida.

Never had any trouble getting enough heat out of charcoal. Funny, I heard of people switching from coal to charcoal when working tool steel, not the other way around. Some like it that way due to the total lack of impurities like sulfur. Plus tool steel doesn't need as high of a temperature.

[AndrewOC]

G'day Willis,

For a serious production scale charcoal kiln/oven i've come accross; http://www.fao.org/docrep/x5328e/x5328e00.htm
particularly the page; http://www.fao.org/docrep/x5328e/x5328e09.htm#8.8.2.%20assembly%20and%20loading%20the%20kiln

This is a system researched and tested to assist developing countries make the most out of their resources.
Do a web search for 'charcoal kiln' and 'oven' and you will come up with all sorts of other ideas.

Tell us what you come up with and how it works.

regs,
AndrewOC
another i quickly found; http://paleoplanet69529.yuku.com/topic/17760

[CurlyGeorge]

Ironclad, if you are going to use charcoal inside of a shop, watch the fire flees(Sparks)!! My shop is inside of a wood frame garage. That's the only thing that I don't like about using it inside. I love to work with charcoal when outdoors. I've not had any trouble forge welding with it, either. :)

[mtforge]

I've helped make charcoal this way. http://twinoaksforge.com/BLADSMITHING/MAKING%20CHARCOAL.htm

[Ranger604]

Check out the Feb/March issue of MotherEarth News. Fella there has an article and is a smithy.
www.motherearthnews.com/charcoal

[ThomasPowers]

Charcoal profits from having a forge built for it---usually a narrower fire pot with taller walls. When I switch to charcoal in my coal forge I will set a couple of firebricks on their sides to narrow and deepen the fire. You also need less air to get charcoal up to temp so it's *great* for human powered systems.

As for forge welding in charcoal all the migration and early medieval pattern welded swords were welded using only charcoal and it's still the fuel for making traditional japanese swords to this day!

[MattBower]

I have used the 55 gallon drum method that Grant described, with good success.

Lee Sauder and Skipp Williams use a lot of charcoal for iron smelting, and they make it themselves. Their charcoal retort is a modified steel dumpster. This is a pretty serious piece of work, and not something you'd want to light off in the middle of suburbia.

[Danocon]

I've helped make charcoal this way. http://twinoaksforge.com/BLADSMITHING/MAKING%20CHARCOAL.htm

This is my site and the system works well. But all things can be improved. I am in the process of building an improved, larger capacity kiln that is a little more controllable.

Surprisingly there is a lot variation in the quality of charcoal. Things like carbon content versus retained volatiles, friability (breakability) and fines(dust)affect heat output, handling and transport.
Not surprisingly, the Japanese have made charcoal making into an art. Many things like restaurant cooking, the tea ceremony and swordmaking each require a specific type of charcoal.

I visited a sworsmiths shop in Nagano last year and the charcoal was an art unto itself.

Don't let this deter you though.

Using the system Grant described or the one on my website will give you good forging fuel.

Dan

[tomhw]

I prefer coal but supplies are always a problem so I usually use charcoal. I get "Royal Oak" at Wal-Mart. It has large chunks that have to be broken into a useful size but it is clean and makes little smoke. To keep a small fire soak it in water a day before using it.

[Frank Turley]

Dan O'Conner of Katana Builders briefly visited Turley Forge a few days ago. He talked about his charcoal making and his intention to build a larger capacity kiln. I'm happy that he has shown it on his site, because the process is a little difficult to follow verbally.

When Turley Forge was realtively new in the early 1970's, I had a student who was a college major in "Early Technology." He very much wanted to make charcoal. At that time, I knew squat about it...except for a description and diagram in the book, "Frontier Iron." We made a mound not too unlike what the colliers did for the old iron furnaces, except ours was smaller, about 15'D at the base and 6' tall. We stacked 18" split firewood around a central, vertical pole. The book said that the colliers covered their mounds with humus. We hand none, so we mixed up some adobe and plastered the mound leaving a few portholes about a foot upward from grade. We wiggled and removed the central pole, struggling from the tailgate of a pickup. The fire was started in the central hollow with newsprint and kindling. We then added a few pieces of firewood. When it was started, we stopped down the top of the hole with wet debris and adobe, leaving only a small opening for smoke to escape. Santa Fe is windy at times and we didn't want the stack to catch on fire, so three students volunteered to sleep in their sleeping bags near to the stack. They kept watch, and when a northwestern wind came up, they covered the portholes on that side. There was a small collapse on one top/side, and the students quickly patched it with adobe. The next day, we exposed the charcoal, and found that our work was about an 80% effective. Not bad for beginners. We used the charcoal in our forges with success.


When I demoed near Brisbane, Australia, in 2005,* our host, Alan Ball made charcoal in a rectangular steel box that had a hinged lid. This is not a retort system. He built a decent firewood fire in the bottom. When it was going good, he threw in some large chunks of eucalyptus and shut the lid. The next morning we had a decent amount of charcoal.

I'm told that in Japan, a bladesmith's apprentice often spent one quarter of a day or more carefully breaking and/or cutting charcoal into specific sizes.

* Hot Iron Muster, Logan Village, Queensland, Australia

http://www.turleyforge.com Granddaddy of Blacksmith Schools

[Iron Clad]

Thanks again guys. I love the history side of your posts also. It's amazing the info. obtained on this site, even about charcoal!! I'm thinking about buying a bag of charcoal and giving it a try while I'm looking for the 55 gal. drum.

[Clodbuster]

I've found that cooking it in 55 gallon steel barrels works great, but you'll need to do it someplace you can have a large outdoor fire without any trouble. I cooked three drums worth last fall and it turned out amazingly well. My first time too. Here's how I did it:

Use drums with detachable lids, or cut the top off a regular liquid-holding drum 4" down from one end. If you do that then cut a series of notches around the circumference of your new "cap" so that it will slip over the drum and seal it. If you make a similar set of notches in the drum you can align the lid so that no gaps are presented to allow the fire into the retort.
Cut a hole in the lid/cap about 4-6" in diameter.
Punch holes around the base of the barrel, around 3/8" diameter and spaced every 4" or so, 3" from the bottom.
Set the drum on bricks to allow coals to get under it, approximately 4" off the ground.
Load it with wood clear to the top - you'll get the best results if it is consistently sized. I used scrap 2x4s and 2x6s leftover from construction sites (no treated lumber). Stack them vertically with the larger wood arranged to the outside as it will get hotter there faster.
Put on the lid, and rig up a chimney of some type over the hole you cut in the lid. I used ~2' long pieces of scrap HVAC duct. Seal around the base of chimney with dirt if there's any gap there. The volatiles which cook out of the wood will ignite during firing, and the purpose of the chimney is to prevent the flames from burning back down into your retort and consuming your charcoal, so make sure it's long enough to do that.
Stack your non-charcoal-making-worthy wood around the drum to at least halfway up the drum or more. Flames will need to reach all the way up the drum.
Light your fire and keep it going until the flames at the chimney go out or for 3-4 hours. Push hot coals underneath the drum periodically.
If you inadvertently catch the contents of a drum on fire, let it burn for a little bit and then seal it off with dirt. If you smother the fire you'll still get some good charcoal out of it.
When it's done cooking, shovel dirt around the base to plug the air holes and remove the chimney and seal that opening as well.
Let everything cool off fully and you're ready to go! You should get at least 1/2-2/3 of a drum of charcoal yield if it was packed full of wood.

This worked great for me and I like forging with charcoal much better than the coal I can get here, it has much faster heats. Good luck and let us know how it goes!

[doc]

Try this link for another but similar method http://forums.dfoggknives.com/index.php?showtopic=17918