Martell man's Ford burns wood, not gas
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By ALGIS J. LAUKAITIS / Lincoln Journal Star
MARTELL — Jonathan Spreadborough drives one ugly pickup.
He’s got this monster of a contraption on the bed of his red and white Ford F-250 that most people say looks like a still.
“I get that a lot,” said Spreadborough, 36.
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Modified truck runs on wood
Jonathan Spreadborough of Martell has modified his Ford truck to run on wood. See his truck in action. (Anthony Roberts / JournalStar.com)...
For more information about woodgas and Jonathan Spreadborough’s projects visit: www.woodgas.net
While most people are paying nearly $4 for a gallon of gas, Spreadborough is chopping wood and throwing the pieces into a generator to produce woodgas, which powers his 1990 truck.
He built it over the winter in Dutch Bentzinger’s shop here for about $500 and began driving it to Lincoln and Crete about a month ago.
“One gunny sack of wood gets you there and back,” Spreadborough said of the 30-mile round trip to Lincoln.
He keeps three sacks of circular elm chunks in the back of his truck near the tailgate. He said he aims for 2-by-2-inch to 4-by-4-inch chunks of wood but can use chunks as big as 6-by-6 inches — as long as they’re mixed with smaller pieces.
Any tree species will work, he said.
Woodgas generators are not a new invention. They were common in Europe during World War II, Spreadborough said, when gasoline was scarce. His neighbor, Mildred Sittler, said she saw them in Japan when she and her late husband, Lloyd, were stationed there in 1949-51.
“Isn’t that fantastic,” she said. “It’s something that’s good for the future. ... We need it.”
Woodgas is a fuel (think propane) produced by partially combusting wood in an oxygen- controlled environment.
“I guess, you could think of it as wood smoke but it’s not,” Spreadborough said. “Wood smoke is a product of complete combustion.”
The gasification process produces hydrogen and carbon monoxide, which emits carbon dioxide and water.
“The beauty of the woodgas is a zero emission,” Spreadborough said. “Any carbon dioxide that is produced is what the tree consumes in its life cycle.”
Spreadborough doesn’t see his woodgas generator as the answer to this country’s energy problems. And he realizes not everyone would relish driving around with a woodgas generator rigged to their vehicle — even if it saved money.
“It doesn’t have to be that big,” he said. “A smaller unit means you have to refuel it more often.”
Spreadborough said he built the system because of skyrocketing gas prices and a personal goal of trying to make his family more energy-independent.
Wood was as an alternative fuel.
“I live on an acre and a half. I have wood all over the place. My neighbors have wood,” he said.
The stay-at-home dad spent 40 to 100 hours building his generator from scrap parts, including metal barrels of various sizes, lots of pipes, filtration equipment to remove soot and a radiator mounted on the front bumper.
On his Web site, he traces his interest in making fuel from wood to his childhood.
“I made my first woodgas discovery… while on a family camping trip. We had an extra tent pole and I was using it to play with the camp fire, I discovered that if I stuck the pole into the fire, smoke would rise out the other end.”
Then he learned he could light the smoke on fire.
“It was pretty cool, I had a nice flame pole, the flame was 5 feet away from the camp fire.”
Today, to start the generator that powers his truck, he uses a monkey wrench to take off a 2-inch metal cap that covers a pipe, allowing him to attach a fan that sucks out air to create a vacuum.
Then he uses a propane torch to ignite twigs or old newspaper near the bottom of the gasifier.
The fan, which operates from a cigarette lighter in the cab, creates a little smoke, but Spreadborough says it disappears once the system is running. He also says there is little chance of an explosion.
His fuel-injected truck is modified so it can burn either gasoline or woodgas. He said it needs gas when he first starts the engine.
Driving solely on woodgas costs a vehicle 30 percent of its acceleration, so he said he rigged a computer chip to allow him to customize his fuel mixture. He also mounted a vacuum gauge on the hood and another inside the cab to keep tabs on the negative pressure.
Spreadborough said he doesn’t have to pay tax on his fuel because there’s no tax on wood.
A spokeswoman for the Nebraska Department of Revenuer’s Motor Fuels Division said there may be some tax consequences, but without knowing the specifics of the woodgas system she couldn’t say for sure.
This isn’t the first woodgas generator he’s made. He built one for his 1976 Dodge Swinger RV, but the radiator weighed 700 pounds, and the back end and trailer hitch were too low to the ground.
He plans to redo the RV and is working on a pilot woodgas system to power an irrigation system for a Norfolk physician interested in renewable energy.
Said Spreadborough: “I just want to open people’s eyes. There’s other way to do this. We don’t have to be slaves to the oil companies.”
Reach Algis J. Laukaitis at 473-7243 or alaukaitis@journalstar.com.
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HA wrote on May 29, 2008 7:15 am:
Galen wrote on May 29, 2008 8:12 am:
OF COURSE the tax people would say that! The state HAS to suck all the fun out of everything by adding a tax. "
T wrote on May 29, 2008 8:18 am:
Phil wrote on May 29, 2008 9:37 am:
Katy wrote on May 29, 2008 9:51 am:
mikeotter wrote on May 29, 2008 9:53 am:
Mike. "
Fresh Air wrote on May 29, 2008 9:56 am:
Rainforest wrote on May 29, 2008 10:01 am:
Marsha wrote on May 29, 2008 10:07 am:
GMP wrote on May 29, 2008 11:39 am:
Alan wrote on May 29, 2008 12:39 pm:
Bob wrote on May 29, 2008 1:19 pm:
Kent H. wrote on May 29, 2008 1:46 pm:
I believe any tree cut down for business purposes (mainly logging and strip mining I believe) will be compensated by the company cutting it down. I believe it used to be a couple or few sapling for every tree. That was from then. Is it still around?
Yes, logging is a huge problem in a lot of places around the world and was a large problem here but not so much now. What is a problem is over population as far as dangers to forested areas. Look up Pittman-Robertson Wildlife Restoration Act of 1937 and Federal Duck Stamp Program for other areas that the US helps with deforestation.
I don't like to see whole forested areas get destroyed, even if they are to be replaced but there are logging plans(required by law) and things to work around that. (if you are still unsatisfied with it see:rain forest) However, a small counterpoint that isn't to be taken too seriously but to be considered. How many trees were in our great state just 150 years ago compared to now? Deforestation should be a huge concern for the world, but in the past century we have done a lot of good things. We shouldn't be too hard on ourselves in these specific regards.
I would like to know if their is a place where we can look at statistics of wooded areas in Nebraska for the past 100 years to see if we are losing ground.
Either way, freaking out over the thought of people randomly cutting down trees for fuel and causing deforestation is hilarious and I would like to hear more about it. "
Jonathan wrote on May 29, 2008 2:20 pm:
Have you ever seen how much wood goes out to the land fill every year? Most of it gets chipped up to make mulch. Where do you think all the trees that got knocked down in this last windstorm went? We have enough biomass from trees that just goes to waste. Not to mention that a gassifer is not limited to just wood. Any combustible material will make gas; in fact people have run their gassifer on dried chicken dung. This is not a deforestation issue. Besides if you want wood chips to run a vehicle on just go to the dump you can get all you want for free.
Yes, thank goodness Nebraska started Arbor Day. We need trees, but when they die or need removed what do you do with them? Instead of letting them rot and releasing CO2 into the atmosphere, maybe we should look at other options. They all release the same amount of CO2. "
tree hugger wrote on May 29, 2008 2:46 pm:
PS - I've heard the cars that run on cooking oil have exhaust that smells like french fries. If this gentleman tosses some hickory in, does it smell like Lazlo's? "
SettleDown wrote on May 29, 2008 2:50 pm:
whinners wrote on May 29, 2008 7:34 pm:
It aint easy being greasy wrote on May 29, 2008 9:32 pm:
Paul Bunyans OX wrote on May 30, 2008 2:21 am:
Agreed, somebody always has to be a spoilsport when it comes to somebody else's innovative thinking, and the greedy tax people here in "The Tax Life" are probably brainstorming to find a way to tax this man for using wood as an alternative fuel. If I were him I would challenge it. People that burn wood in woodstoves for heat don't pay tax on their wood. Wood is an alternative fuel to natural gas or propane heat. "
Lisa wrote on May 30, 2008 9:00 am:
Nina wrote on May 30, 2008 11:54 am:
Jonathan wrote on June 5, 2008 2:55 pm:
Hartmut Jonathan Spreadboroughierle wrote on June 9, 2008 12:59 am:
I'm from Germany, we had these gasifiers during WWII because liquid fuel was strictly forbidden for the general people and only available to the army. Nearly all private and public transport was done by woodgas.
There were also cars, tractors, buses, trains, boats and other prime movers with gas generators attached to them.
The were scrapped as soon as there was diesel and gasoline available after the war. Now we also see a renaissance here because gas prices are more then twice as high as they are in the states. Gas costs 1,50 Euro per liter not per gallon !!! Jonathan Spreadborough did a great job, there are several other woodgas enthusiasts all around the globe.
Visit his site and learn: www.woodgas.net :-)
Bye,
Hardy "