pdp1@EARTHLINK.NET on wed 28 dec 05
Hi Joseph,
This sounds wonderful to me...
I like this idea very much in many ways in fact.
If I lived somewhere that had these big Hay-Rolls, I would consider to
design a Kiln specifically to use them.
The fly ash would likely be very nice indeed too...
Done right, there is probably a Kiln Design which would allow such a 'roll'
(or two) to be used whole, rolled into place as it were, and lit to proceed
as may be according to the draft and ministerings given to it...with a long
and adequate Candleing of some kind first of course...
Placement methods could be worked out easily enough with an old Truck and or
a gin pole or something...or more easily so of course for the smaller Bales.
Excellent ideas all around...a Tun-is-a-Tun indeed, and compressed
dessicated Plant material is an abundance readily renewable and inexpensive.
Well worth thinking about...
Fun...
Phil
Las Vegas
----- Original Message -----
From: "Joseph Herbert"
> I have suggested, from time to time, the burning of non-wood plant matter
to
> wood fire potters and just gotten odd looks. Some say I got my odd looks
> from my father, but I discount that. Anyway, the growth, processing, and
> transport of annual plant materials (hay, fodder) is pretty advanced and
> efficient. The roll bales that one sees in the fields and along the
> highways weigh 1500 to 2000 pounds. They are made by taking a long pile of
> dried plants into a machine that rolls that material into a 5 foot
diameter
> roll before spitting it out on the ground. This process could be easily
> reversed, unrolling the plant material into the fire box of a kiln. These
> bales cost as little as $15.00 in some areas at some times. If you buy
> older bales that are less attractive for animal feed, you can get them for
> less than that.
>
> People (wood firers) often disparage the use of annual plant materials on
> the basis of quoted analyses for rice and other straws. Usually these
> analyses show really high silica content and that leaves the desire for
> fluxing of surfaces and melting of ash onto the pots begging. I believe
> that non-grain plants have a more interesting ash content because the
plant
> does different things than do grains. All the stalk of a wheat plant is
> there for is to hold the grain head off the ground; all the energy of the
> plant goes into the seed head. I believe that non-grass plants would have
> more interesting mineral content and that would mean better ash deposition
> on ware.
>
> I think just simple laziness on the part of someone would get them to try
> this. YOU DON'T HAVE TO SPLIT HAY!!
>
> From the standpoint of heat, a ton of carbon is a ton of carbon. Hay
> usually comes from unfertilized fields, there are exceptions, and some
times
> "trash plants" like the cuttings of mixed vegetation along road sides are
> roll baled. I would expect that rolls like that might be available for
the
> hauling.
>
> It could turn out that some plants have especially desirable ash profiles
> and thus be raised, cut, and baled for pottery production. On the scale
of
> environmental desirability, burning annual plant material has to be fairly
> innocuous when compared to any kind of fossil fuel burning. Perhaps the
> only better thing, environmentally, would be to burn a natural industrial
> byproduct that would be disposed of in a land fill, like grape seeds after
> the oil is extracted, walnut hulls, cotton seed hulls, and other things.
>
> All the western tradition of burning wood has lead to a well developed
> technology of wood burning fire boxes, but for grass burning, not so much.
> So it may be that the adaptation of an existing kiln to burn some non-wood
> plant material is not trivial. People have made sawdust burners which
blow
> sawdust into a furnace. there are airtight stoves that are fed
> automatically using wood pellets (made from sawdust), and some stoves that
> burn corn, a hot fire that.
>
> Being an urban, part time, hobby potter, I will probably not get to try
this
> but surely some ex-urban, east Texas, frugal, mechanically creative potter
> might be able to.
>
> Joseph Herbert
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