Pellet mill attachment

[Kendrick]

I was wondering if any one had messed with a pellet mill.
I found 1 at Portable mill

Im half way tempted to get one soon but would love to hear from some one that has one.

[billbill1]

I am very interested in this as well, I have no input though.

[shvl73]

How will you grind the wood fiber to feed it? I've looked at them a bit but, they seem pricey for what they are.

[Reg]

I was (still AM) under the impression that the energy required for drying is HUGE, much greater than that needed for compression/extrusion.
Almost cheaper to buy (& RUN) a kiln to dry green wood for burning.
(-:

[shvl73]

Drying is another issue for sure. I imagine you can build racks with a sreen base and polycarb panel top that you could air dry outside. hard to do in any large quantity though, which I think you need to produce, to offset the cost of the pellet mill & hammer mill. Still, its interesting.

[MikeD74T]

Farm Show magazine had reader feedbacks a coulpe of issues ago. Some were making satisfactory pellets but said the variables to make quality pellets are difficult to overcome, pellet density being the most difficult to attain. Nobody was making for other than their own use. It seemed that the best pellets were being made from straw/grasses. MikeD74T

[charlz]

Around here you can get large loads of sawdust from places processing wood fairly cheap....likely dry enough or close to it. Not sure how consistent the grind is on it though.

Anybody else notice the price difference between the one that comes with a diesel engine and the PTO version is only $100?

$4,000 is about 3 years worth of pellets for me.... little too steep for something that may not work out.


Hmmmm, I just looked on Ebay and noticed these same machines are going for less than 1/2 the price on the PelletPro site. The auction also notes you might need to add binding agent.

[tommu56]

A friend of mine use to work in a feed mill making rabbit pellets and the, like they use to steam the feed before they ran it through the mill to stay in pellet form and then dry it. I asked him about it he said that you would have to have some moisture to get the legin (sp) in the wood to act like glue to get the pellet to stick together. then it would have to be dried.

tommu

[charlz]

A friend of mine use to work in a feed mill making rabbit pellets and the, like they use to steam the feed before they ran it through the mill to stay in pellet form and then dry it. I asked him about it he said that you would have to have some moisture to get the legin (sp) in the wood to act like glue to get the pellet to stick together. then it would have to be dried.

tommu

It could certainly get pricey if you needed to build a whole plant to handle wetting, drying, cooling, screening, bagging or bulk storage etc. Due to the likelyhood of way too much moisture in the winter months this is probably something you need to do in the summer and then store until the winter months... can't just make'em as you need'em in the winter.

I wonder how long you get on the dies before they need to be replaced.

[Kendrick]

Best source for pellets is switch grass/hay field i was planning on using somthing like soy beans for a binding agent. I also have a maple house and all the sawdust from there I was hoping to include. look to waste first then to raw. making pellets from wood wouldent be a effective solution even the current stock is all sawdust like byproducts from lumber mills.

I am getting a pellet stove that can burn pretty much any thing that is dry and goes through the auger.

Shelburne Farms Tests Grass Pellet Heat