Hello, ladies and gentlemen, today we’ll talk about the production of charcoal with a minimum of costs.
You will need:
- Firewood.
- A small piece of land.
- Shovel.
- Metal cover with a diameter of about 50 cm.
Charcoal making
First you need to dig a hole about one meter deep and half a meter wide. These sizes may vary.
Next, we prepare firewood, from which coal will be obtained. Firewood needs almost twice as much as your hole. And we begin to make a fire in it. At first, I was afraid that there would not be enough oxygen inside and the fire would not flare up well, but everything turned out to be exactly the opposite. Natural traction arose (most likely), and the firewood flared up perfectly.
And then little by little we raise the fire to the very top, throwing firewood when the old ones burn out. Do not be afraid to throw a lot of firewood at once, since everything burns quite well. And when I thought that I went too far with the firewood and the fire went out, yet it soon flared up again.
I completely filled the hole with firewood, and the fire rose high enough. Then I, I repent, did not take this bonfire, as I was seriously afraid that I could make a small fire. Here is my first jamb - you need to choose an open place, so that there are no flammable objects, at a distance of a meter from the pit.
So, when the top layer of firewood is almost burned out, you need to close the pit with a lid. Here you may have trouble finding a suitable cover. In general, I have a holey barrel in my household, from which it’s enough to use a grinder to cut the bottom, and there will be a wonderful lid. But are we looking for easy ways? There is an option how to get out without a sufficiently large cover. I took some kind of metal mesh, threw it over the pit, and pressed it on the sides with bricks so that it would not move anywhere. Then I put several metal flat sheets on this mesh, which replaced one large cover.
Specifically, this photo was taken after I finished and took out the finished coal, later I will explain why. Well, after that we pour sand on these covers so that oxygen does not enter the pit.
You can’t say that there is some kind of pit here. In general, we leave the whole thing for about ten to twelve hours. I usually start to make a fire at six o’clock in the evening, and in the morning, at ten o’clock, I already get ready coal. That is, it remains only to wait for time, remove the lid, well, or lids, and pull out the finished charcoal.
When I did all this for the first time, at first I thought that coal would be about half the pit, and only ash at the bottom. But it turned out that the whole pit was completely clogged with coal! On the contrary, at the top, some of the firewood remained firewood, since I started to close them too early.
Advice
Firstly, it is better to use one large cover. But if you still do like me, then do everything very quickly. Actually, during the first experiment, I closed and poured a hole too slowly on top of it, because of which a fierce column of smoke fell, be prepared for this!
Secondly, choose an open area, not like me near a wooden fence and wooden doors. Plus, I have the topsoil, i.e. a third of the pit is sandy. Because of this, with coal, I pulled out a lot of sand, which then would have to be separated.
Also, this method is more suitable for those who have at their disposal a large amount of unnecessary firewood. Since buying firewood specifically is not very profitable, it is cheaper to buy ready-made coal.
Well, at the end, it really is coal, not burned wood! I used it to kindle a blacksmith forge, and so I liked it much more than a store.
Good luck to everyone who decides to follow my example!
