Randy Bill Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 Turns out our young Godson built himself a small furnace of scrap bricks in which to melt down aluminum cans. Using charcoal briquettes and a hair dryer (dedicated YouTube viewer) he had done so, but our little firebug wanted more heat and started jabbering away about making charcoal and he'd seen that on YouTube and, well, i had the retort made in a few days per the sticky here. Fuel was very dry Spruce, charcoal-to-be was Ash billets about 2"x3". Around here, smart folks split Ash in the winter at below zero temps, not mid-July sogginess. I'm not one of those when it comes to having this much fun. The Ash was not dry enough, billets too large or not enough space between. That's liquid (nasty) on the drum that poured out when the retort was opened. A small amount of unburned fuel left. The nice lumps i did collect are fascinating to me; slightly iridescent and that beautiful "ring" when the pieces are jumbled in the hand, enough to get junior a trial run. I'm hooked. Not sure i'd forge with it yet but very interested in what the yield will be when done correctly. Can i run this batch again when it's dry? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arftist Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 It's dry now. Chunks work better, 4" maximum dimension. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jacob's hammer Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 my retort never does better than 50% unless I use very dry(gray) wood. If it holds its bark it is still too moist. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wpearson Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 yes Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ThomasPowers Posted July 29, 2015 Share Posted July 29, 2015 Sure you can run it over again till you are happy with it, the further runs will just out gas less as the "raw" wood percentage goes down. As you can actually use wood in the forge and let it coal as it goes (I prefer to cut down on the heat and smoke and fire fleas by building a separate wood fire and transferring coals over) you could forge with that. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Randy Bill Posted July 30, 2015 Author Share Posted July 30, 2015 Thanks very much gents for the replies, i will run this batch again asap. Thomas, you tempt me with the idea of just using it as is. I've got plenty of wood but what i really want is my own little coal mine... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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