[Terrapreta] Electrical conductivity of charcoal + 08 wishes

[geoff moxham]

Hi list,

I have been charring in 44 gal drums for  a while now, to supply the
garden, the orchard and the Midge stoves that keep evolving. So I have
a need for both agricultural and cooking charcoal.

I use mainly forest red gum, but a few drums have been mixed  rainforest spp.
plus whats lying around including bamboo (bambusa), lantana, and scrap meranti.

Playing with the midge one day I was measuring the current drain of
the computer fan motor (50mA!) and calculating how long it would run
on a car battery continuously (about 1.5y?) when der... carbon
conducts...lets look at that  biscuit tin full of mixed rainforest
charcoal...

3 hours later I was on the net finding a bamboo charcoal pillow
maufacturer with his prods stuck in his pillow showing 0 Ohms....just
what I found....the site said good charcoal conducts...yet the blue
gum has very high resistance (megohm range), and blue gum bark off the
scale resistance. All of the lantana conducts, all of the bambusa,
some of the others...all from the same batch....aaak!

I then searched this site for electrical conductivity of charcoal and
found nothing.

Anybody out there gone there?

I am now designing a series of closed (the hundredth monkey biscuit
tin) pyrolysis tests on each species including toona australis and
camphor spp. for conductivity tests.
And that will have to be x3, using kiln temps of 400, 600 and 800 C.
in the space heater...great visual access and fume cupboard for the
experimenter.
seeya
geoff

PS
 wishlist for 2008
#1 finish 1 cu.metre AlOx kiln with durablanket, and fire large loads
with long **soaks**, optimising for microporosity.
#2 Do another Garnaut Review submission or 2 (Thanks folks)
#3 Carbon date some local midden charcoal ...anyone help there?
#4 Pyrolise Dr Keith Boltons hurds, after separating from the bast in
this years agricultural hemp trials through SCU.
#5 Experiment with gunpowder
#6 Experiment with Limelight (1850 to1910) driven by woodgas mini generators.