Originally Posted by
fishboat
In this application, "gasifier" and referring to burning gases is pseudo science(using techy terms to capture attention that mean nothing)..at best.
I've run airtight wood stoves to partially heat my house for many years. When a wood stove gets good and hot it'll actually burn wood-gases(smoke) in the top-inside of the stove.
There's no magic here..the stove described here is a stick/twig stove. Any gases escape unburned just like any other open wood fire.
I was thinking the same thing. That is a good explanation of where gasification is used in relation to burning wood - proper stoves designed as you state.
Originally Posted by
Mark Hoaglund
Hope to avoid the black pot syndrome by waiting for the gasification to clear the smoke then place my new 20 ounce stainless steel lidded water cup on to see how fast it boils. Check for ash & soot. Seems simple enough.
The first test there was no charcoal and little ash which was pleasing from a full charge thus no sooty warmed hands or handling the stove. Freak accident? Who knows. We'll see how things go next time.
Thanks folks.
I get the point you're making about wood fires burning "clean". However, that is not going to be the norm.
Case in point - how are you going to add fuel to keep the heat going as you are cooking? If you add "fresh" wood you have a couple things against you:
- if the wood is seasoned it has to go through the soldering phase before it catches on fire. There will be a period of time where the wood is heating through to coals. You are going to have smoke in this phase, no matter what.
- If the wood is green now you have fresh sap to add to the above time and process to get to that hot coal phase.
So now you are waiting for the fire to burn "clean" (and what may appear to your eyes as clean may, over time, prove not to be as soot can still be present) before putting your pot on. Then if you can't finish cooking in the one fill up of the wood you have to add wood, let the new wood heat up and get to the "clean" phase, all the while your pot is off = cooling down as opposed to cooking. That is unless you figure the sooty pot is worth the continuous cooking in which case the "gasification" that you are referring to is not a consideration at all at the end of the day.
One more note is wood like maple and all pines are quite sappy. Pine is frowned upon in fireplaces because of the sap and the soot that accumulates. It causes creosote buildup in chimneys that ends up leading to a lot of chimney fires. Thats the same stuff that will accumulate on your pots. I wouldn't think there would be much of a "fire hazard" unless you neglected your pots enormously, but the gunk build up is going to happen.
The more green the wood and the wetter the wood the less energy it will put out and the more energy it will require to heat up to combustion temp.