Paper + Sunflower Seed Husk Fuel Briquettes

by Waldemar Sha

13K10821

Intro: Paper + Sunflower Seed Husk Fuel Briquettes

This instructable is a direct continuation of this one, so I recomend to go there and read atleast read the intro part, because I'm too lazy to copy it here.

Basicaly it's about making fire/fuel briquettes by compressing mix of paper pulp and sunflower seed husk, so without further ado...

STEP 1:

If you consume sunflower seeds regularly, you'll be surprised, how much of a husk you can collect if not thowing it out with garbage. I started to collect sunflower seed husk because I'm going to use it as a substrate for growing mushrooms. But for this experiment I used some amount.

I'm aware that there's industrially produced sunflower seed husk fuel briquettes. Also by looking up some tables I discovered that this material has equal (if not higher) to dry wood amount of energy producet by burning one unit of weight (I don't know correct term for this, even more in English).

So the idea is simple: paper mash acts as binder and fuel as itself and husk is a fuel additive that can not be used by itself (well... it can, but you know, what I mean).

I've already got paper soaked for a few days. This time it's corrugatet cardboard. I was interested in investigating how different types of paper perform with this particular task (making brickets with them), so I sortet them. I'll make my conclusions on this in later instructables.

STEP 2:

I'm talking abot my set up and tools used in my previous instructable, so, once again, go there to look it up.

I'm adding husks to the paper and blending it all up with construction mixer. Rough proportions to aim for are 60% of paper mash, and 40% of husks.

STEP 3:

I'm pouring the mix into the bucket so that I'm able to use scoop, and with it I'm filling then press container, measuring equial ammount for every briquette.

STEP 4:

The press I'm using is regular juice press. There a couple of thing I can tell about using it for these porpouses and all of them are in that previous instructable.

You can see how compressed briquette looks like.

STEP 5:

Now it'll take 1-2 weeks of Summer days for it to dry.

Paper + sawdust and paper + wood shavings briquettes are also there.

STEP 6:

By the way, dryed corncobs are fuel too...

So, this it for now, thanks for your attention and have a nice... I don't know... something.

14 Comments

Dawsie 6 years ago

thanks for the idea I have a lot of seed husks after the birds have finished eating everyday lol (wild birds that is) and I have taken to using my lawn mower like a vacuum cleaner to clean the area up lol I might give them a go as a friend of mine has a wood burner he uses every winter. As the summers get really hot in the Outback it should be quick to dry the bricks I do remember seeing a brick compressing unit in one of those bagin buy magazines so will look at getting that as they would fit in the wood burner plus I don't have a nifty looking fruit compressing machine would love one

Thanks for the instructable I read both

ankara2000 6 years ago

I think you mean BTU, or British thermal unit. How much energy it takes to raise 1 gallon of water 1 degree, The higher the BTU, more heat is created depending on fuel. Wood or any Fuel like it are impossible to assign a BTU. How dry is the wood, where was it grown, etc. If this isn't what you were talking about, sorry for taking up your time.

Atman8 6 years ago

What you're looking for is called the specific energy of something. It's the total number of joules (a measurement of energy) per mass, usually written as megajoules per kilogram, or MJ/Kg, or in Imperial units: BTU/lbs.

jsan618 6 years ago

I think it is:
the energy to raise one pound of water by 1 degree Farenheit (F)

Waldemar Sha 6 years ago

I believe it was calorific value. It was on Russian so I'm not sure about both: the actual term, and the translation. Interestingly, paper has higher value than wood because there's always some amount of moisture in it, so a part of energy goes for heating and boiling it out (this correlates with what you're talking about). I believe, there's different terms for such nuances, but I'm definitely not the person to ask about it.

Phillip.k 6 years ago

Thank you very much for this instruction, I dont have a press so will need to make one utilising a bottle jack.
Do you know if coffe grinds work as i have acces to large scources?
Thanks,
Phillip

Waldemar Sha 6 years ago

Here's a man made a business on turning coffee grings (solely) into fuel briquettes:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2016/04/11/fue...

So, they burn as a fuel by themselves, and will burn in combination with paper. If you try, make an "Imade it" comment here, I thing a lot of people will be interested to know.

pokermind 6 years ago

I really have no need for fuel brickets (briquettes) since I don't do any homesteading, but that's an awesome looking saw horse in the third picture of Step 5 (the one on the left). I'd love to know how you made that.

Waldemar Sha 6 years ago

https://www.instructables.com/id/My-Horse-Is-Amazing-not-a-Tutorial/

Waldemar Sha 6 years ago

Thanks for "briquettes" correction.
I guess I'll take some photos tomorrow and make an ... well sort of instructable on that sawhorse. It has some interesting features I wanted to show anyway. I'll let you know with a link here.