Burning sawdust

[TheLastDeadMouse]

I've started a hobby wood shop this summer, and I've quickly realized just how much sawdust even my small scale woodworking produces. I've only just started, and my jointer planer has already filled several 13 gallon trash bags with sawdust that have just been going out with the garbage.

I've seen sawdust burning stoves online, but it seems to be almost exclusively a European or developing world thing. I haven't been able to find anything available in the US so far, and I'm sure if there was a fire my insurance company wouldn't smile upon a homemade stove.

All these stoves center around the idea of a steel cylinder filled with packed sawdust, a ~2" vertical hole down the center, and an air intake hole in the bottom. I'm considering buying a 8-10 gallon steel drum that would fit inside a regular wood stove, welding a pair of short legs on the bottom to allow air to flow in the bottom, and them putting that in a normal wood stove. Is there any problem with this I'm not seeing? I'm mostly concerned about damaging the stove in some way.

 

[begreen]

Wish you lived closer, I would gladly take it for mulch. If you have a local community freecycle paper or web group I would post on it there. Or see about taking it to a composting facility.
http://www.cvcompost.com/

During WWII sawdust used to be a common fuel in this area and there were stoves and furnaces specifically designed to burn it. You might contact these folks. Some of the old timers there still remember these burners. It's how the company got its name.
http://www.sawdustsupply.com/

The designs you are looking at sound like modified rocket stoves. This blog might be helpful.
http://www.uswoodpower.com/rocket-stoves/

 

[dougand3]

Is there any problem with this I'm not seeing?

Not an approved / tested use - insurance may deny claim if fire damage. I use sawdust in fire startup - throw some handfuls on paper.

 

[KindredSpiritzz]

I toss some in my furnace when i clean up the shop, it kind of flashes and explodes a little when i toss it in there. I think if you used a lot of it you'd have to continually stir it to get it to all burn.

 

[blades]

Some of the designs spray the fine sawdust into the burn chamber much like an oil furnace. Any biomass ground to the consistence of milled flower will work with the proper air ratio mix. Very explosive as witnessed by the occasional grain elevator explosions such as one that happened here in Milwaukee several years ago. A empty silo was being cleaned/refurbished a spark of some type set it off.

 

[Grisu]

I would put a few handful in during startups. Anything else I would advertise in the free section of Craigslist instead of throwing it out with the trash. Someone with a woodshop did that here and had way more people interested than he had bags of sawdust.

 

[peakbagger]

When I used to buy milk in waxed paper cartons, I would save them and pack them with sawdust and put them in the fire like firewood. I don't generate as much as before and usually just dump it in with leaf clippings.

Planer shavings are in demand for animal bedding.

 

[Huntindog1]

There are people on youtube making their own wood pellets. Alot of time involved.

 

[Silenced38]

You might try mixing some paraffin wax
With some and make your own super cedars.