Briquette Making - Stop Block and Push Block

The mold mentioned in a previous entry uses a standard PVC pipe with an inside diameter of 2 inches. This mold casing is the chamber where the compression of the briquette material takes place. But by itself, the PVC pipe has two open ends. The Stop Block and Push Block plug these two open ends.

Stop Block

The Stop Block plugs the rear of the mold. It remains stationary inside the PVC pipe through out the compression process as the Push Block pushes the briquette material. The Stop Block, in turn, presses against the C-Clamp Pad.

Shown below is a magnified view of the front of the Stop Block. This is the face of the Stop Block where the briquette material pushes against.

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Briquette Making - Mold

The mold is another item in the Briquette Making Machine Components that needs to be fabricated. But it's easy enough to make with a hacksaw and a power drill. The mold is made of a standard 2-inch PVC pipe. You don't need the entire length of a pipe so it's very cost effective if you can find a scrap length, maybe from nearby construction sites. That way you can even source it for free.

The mold is the component that will form and shape the briquettes. In the briquette making process, you will be able to finish more briquettes if you have several of these molds.

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Briquette Making - Clamp and Stand

These two items from the list of the briquette making components essentially form the "machine" that will allow the briquetting compression to happen. The rest of the components are merely accessories that will facilitate the briquette-making process.

Although the clamp is easily available in most hardware stores, the clamp stand needs to be fabricated (more on this later) and customized for the clamp. Shown below is the clamp mounted on the stand.

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Briquette Making Machine Components

In a recent entry, I wrote about the workplace where I make my homemade briquettes. Biomass briquettes can come from various ingredients and so the entire process may be a bit messy. Use an apron to keep dry.

In the absence of an affordable commercial machine for home use, you could easily fabricate the various parts that will up the briquetting machine. Shown below are the parts of the homemade briquette making machine. The parts are numerically labeled and briefly explained.

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Preparing the Briquette Ingredients

In a previous post, I mentioned how paper should be prepared as a briquette ingredient. Two other ingredients I use on a regular basis are crushed dried leaves and sawdust.

Sawdust need not be broken down further. Just ensure that wood shavings and chips that typically come from wood planing processes are removed. Dried leaves need to be really dry and brittle that they break up when crushing with your fingers. A really neat tool is a mortar and pestle setup like the one below that's big enough to crush and grind huge amount of dried leaves into smaller suitable pieces. Of course a hammer mill would be convenient, but we're just talking of simple and no-cost tools here.

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Preparing the Paper Component of Briquettes

In a previous entry, I mentioned that paper has good binding properties that helps create a briquette that doesn't immediately fall apart. It's actually the fibers of the paper that has this.

Cutting or shredding the paper (with a paper shredder) like in the picture breaks down the paper in size. The clean cuts do not however expose the paper's fibers.

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Homemade Briquettes

In a previous entry, I discussed the common materials used for briquettes and in another, a background on some commercial briquetting machines.

The briquettes I create for our cooking are essentially made up of paper waste, sawdust and a little of other agricultural waste. The batches of briquettes I have made vary in color because of differing constituent mix. These briquettes are small and measure roughly 2 inches in diameter.

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Materials Used for Biomass Briquettes

The usual materials used for biomass briquetting are agricultural wastes. Examples of agricultural wastes include rice hull (shown on the left), corn husks, coconut shells, grass clippings, dried leaves, dried sticks and so on.

However, many non-traditional "wastes" have been incorporated into biomass briquette-making. Commercial wastes such as sawdust, paper and even charcoal powder have been used successfully in the production of biomass briquettes.


In the briquetting process that I've devised, I've had varying results in the use of some of the above mentioned biomass materials. Since the process involves compaction, the materials would behave differently when compacted.

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Creating a Better Chimney Extension Filter

In a previous entry, I talked about in detail a possible design flaw with the chimney extension. Because of that, I devised a really cheap (no-cost if you’re resourceful enough), yet effective solution to prevent debris from falling into the chimney extension. This is debris that eventually will cause the quick build-up of soot inside the chimney which blocks the exit of smoke.

The filter we made in that entry was very effective but only to a certain extent. After a while, soot will buildup on the filter itself, depositing into the diamond shaped holes or gaps in the screen.

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Making a No-Cost Chimney Extension Filter

When the grill (superkalan) was still new, we didn’t clean or inspect it regularly. Hey, it always worked well and it was new! So imagine one day when the smoke coming out of the chimney extension didn’t look right. By this, I mean the smoke just sort of lingered and drooped downwards rather than the usual rapid upward billowing. There was also more smoke than usual seeping out from the plates and the fuel feeder. In other words, there was too much smoke but not enough fire.

Somehow I suspected that hot air just wasn’t pulling the smoke out of the chimney as easily and as quickly. We were just starting to cook for the grill and concluded there must be something blocking inside the chimney. With potholders and gloves in hand, I carefully detached the chimney extension from the chimney. Yup, there was so much soot clinging inside the walls of the chimney. Lo and behold, a leaf was resting inside the chimney all blackened and thick with soot. The inside was 80% blocked. No wonder there was smoke everywhere. There was nowhere else for the smoke to go.

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