Does anyone know of a way to hold together or mold sawdust to a shape that could be burned in a fireplace? It just seems like a waste not to use it.—- Is there a web site or info. on tools made in the U.S.A.?
Thanks and have a blessed Christmas.
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Replies
A shop I used to work at kept a metal bucket of sawdust w/ some diesel fuel mixed in it. Used if for a fire starter. Burns hot for a long time. Worked great, smelled not so great.
I too toss lots, especially from the planer, though I keep a bucket around for absorbing oil spills.
Don't know on the tool question.
If your goal is to re-cycle, and you have a garden mulch or compost pile, mix in the sawdust. Make sure to add a little nitrogen, since wood uses nitrogen when it breaks down.
Michael
There was mention of someone that used sawdust to make pellets for a pellet stove in tauntons The Workshop Book. It didn't go into any detail though. I would also be interested in finding a way to use it. I currently dump mine off at a neighbors stables unless there is walnut in it and then it goes to a coworker who uses it in his garden.
Why walnut in the garden?
I'm on the front end of a walnut extravanganza (way bigger than a wardrobe) and I'd like to use the shavings and dust productively if possible.
Our Azelia's love walnut shavings from the planer. They like the acid.
PlaneWood by Mike_in_KatyPlaneWood
Acid? Hmmm Miracid is a product that is supposed to be good for plants that love acid (oak trees as well) I'll read a box next time Im out and see whatever other plants would benefit. I expect many a bushel of walnut planer shavings as well as sawdust.
Be careful with Black Walnut shavings in the garden. I know that there is some kind of toxin released by Black Walnut trees that kills tomatoe plants and would be concerned that the shavings might do the same. I'm not aware of any other plants being affected.
It's not so much why walnut in the garden but why not walnut for the horses. Rumor has it that walnut shavings are very bad for horses. The co-worker will take any type of shavings for his garden but it is not nearly as convenient as the stable down the street so he usually only gets whatever I don't want to give to the horses.Tom
If you compress it under enough pressure you don't need any binder at all. That's the way pellets are made for pellet stoves. However, stove pellets are only about 1/4" in diameter, and the machinery to compress an 1-1/2" or 2" diameter cylinder of sawdust to several thousand PSI would probably be fairly expensive. The web page referenced below says you can't burn pellets effectively in a fireplace or conventional stove because you can't get enough draft through the pile.
http://www.woodheat.org/changeout/pellet.htm
Hey Y'all. I saw this in Mother Earth News once. Take sawdust or shavins and mix into melted parifin wax. Use a double boiler on the stove to melt the wax for safety. Mix the shavins/dust to get a mixture like oatmeal. Spoon into muffin tins and allow to cool. Pop out cooled sawdust muffins or run under hot water to release. Use em to start fires. They work great and last along time. I found it efficient to cut them in half on the band saw as a whole muffin lasts along time. Richard
TODAY IS A DAY THAT THE LORD HATH MADE, REJOICE AND BE GLAD IN IT
I used to teach my boy scout troup to dip small rolls of cardboard w/ a string tied around them in wax. You light the string like a candle, and it makes a great hot fire starter. Works well even when wet. Sounds like the same idea.
I've also tilled sawdust into my garden. It's supposed to help aerate the soil. Though I know walnut and some exotic woods contain natural herbicides that may stunt other plant growth. Saw a good discussion on toxic woods once, but the only one I ever used was walnut. To my recollection pine, fir, oak, maple make good compost or tillage. Obviously avoid any compressed wood sheeting products because of the glues and chemicals in them.
Anyway,
Merry Christmas
Bill
If you pour the sawdust / wax mixture into egg cartons, you don't have to pop them out, just tear them apart and burn the whole thing.
I'm assuming you can still get paper egg cartons. Plastic ones might melt at hot wax temperature, and would definitely smoke when burned.
Along the "use in the garden line" if you have trees that are coping with competitive surrounding grasses, you can pull out the grass in a circle around the tree trunk, lay several layers of newspaper on the resulting bare ground and then cover with 2-3 inches of sawdust or shaving (careful not to lay it right up against the trunk though). This treatment once a year or so will keep the grasses away without having to weed.
forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
Several people at Over the Fence say that cardboard works even better than newspaper under mulch.
Depending on where you live, you might also want to do something to keep the sawdust from blowing away. My neighborhood routinely gets 60 mph gusts in the winter and spring. Wetting it and temping it down firmly might be enough.
Yep, cardboard would work great. Forgot about that stuff. Dunno why -- I make 2 or 3 trips a month to the recycling center with stacks of the stuff!forestgirl -- you can take the girl out of the forest, but you can't take the forest out of the girl ;-)
not sure it this would work, but if you took flower and water and saw dust and compressed it that should work. the flower and water should act a binding agent.
If you had a log splitter replace the splitter with a flat steel plate and get a steel cylinder some thing to use a piston. put the saw dust and flower and water in the cylinder and hold the against the flat plate on the log splitter and compress.
Sounds innovative.
For that matter you could probably just wet the shavings and compress them in the cylinder of doom. The water might make them more plyable/compressible.
I might suggest a cone rather than a cylinder as releasing the puck or log would be tough in a cylinder.
I've been rather curious about that myself - I worked in a production woodshop environment, and it only takes about a day (or less) to realize the benefits of being able to use the huge amount of waste that's created. The Workshop Book by Scott Landis (pg. 102), shows a fella named Walter Phelps who uses a German made Spanex bricketer. Yep, probably a little spendier that what you had in mind, but ... maybe someone on this forum will come up w/ something - sounds like a business opportunity!
It makes sense to heat your woodworking shop with waste - scraps, shavings and sawdust. I did that for twenty years in my Connecticut boat shop.
In the morning, I filled the empty woodstove with the previous day's sweepings, packing it tightly, and adding wood scraps so as to create an airway from the intake to the chimney. I ignited the bottom of the load with a plumber's torch, and the fire burned for hours, getting hotter as the fire created more air space. If I packed the entire firebox tightly enough, I didn't add split firewood until well after lunch. I did have a spark arrestor at the chimney cap, and I learned early on NEVER to add sweepings when the fire was burning.
It's a shame that I have to pay for natural gas heat in my current, leased commercial shop, and that I send scraps and sweepings to the dump. A couple of old-timers come around for scraps now and then, but the city won't accept plywood for their recycled mulch (I don't blame them). I still produce more than enough waste to take the chill from the air, and the stove would sure be a warm place to sit during my mid morning coffee break.
Namaste,
Gary
http://gwwoodworking.com/
I burn pretty much all my saw dust. No fancy pellets. no fancy system. I build a regular fire with sawdust surrounding it. When it is really low with coals I pile a whole whack more and let it burn. You can get small explosive effects by taking the flour-like dust from sanding and tossing it in when the fire is roaring. (same effect with flour- Who knew?)
On the gardening side the reason why nitrogen should be added is that sawdust has too much carbon and the nitrogen/carbon balance is out. Another way to recycle a perfectly good source of nitrogen is to add your own crap to the sawdust pile. It takes about 2 years. Produces first rate compost. Doesn't polute the water table.
Cheers
Mitt
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