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Whats the going rate for native charcoal?


Woodworks
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Hi Beau

Image of our latest batch in the Adam retort, hazel and birch if I recall. I think you're about right with your price, we also use the Selway coppice assoc bags; we get £2 for the small and £3.90 for the large from the farm shops near us. Not sure what the mark up is when they retail them on. Check out Oxford charcoal's website they sell retail from around £2.80 a kilo for Non species specific. Or Matt at Hertswood's Stag charcoal website ,think he's closer to £2 a kilo for "ordinary" hardwood charcoal.

On the enquires I've made for larger bags, 10kilo, the best I've been offered locally is £1 a kilo, the argument being they need a 50%ish mark up in the shop for retail. Also at that end you're starting to compete with the12kg blue caterer's charcoal bags, imported which they sell for around£10-12. It's tricky but I think the market for high end charcoal is fairly limited outside of London. Most people will buy by price, or bulk( as we both know 5kg of well made charcoal gives you a greater volume than 5kg of the dense imported stuff. I reckon about 3kg of our charcoal will fill a bag that has 5Kg of the heavier charcoal in it, but people will often go for the 5 over the 3 as they think its better value for the extra 2kgs of weight, even though its the same volume) Hope that all makes sense, seem to have gone a bit convoluted and waffly at the end.

Ernie.

20180604_141026.jpg

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I use to sell sweet chestnut charcoal for £12 a 2-2.5 kg bag to customers, I offered their money back if they didn't like it.  I would explain to them that all it took was a piece of paper to light it, how it lasts longer that other charcoal how 95% of charcoal is imported.  99% of them came back and brought double, one came back with empty bag and asked for refund.  I use to do market stalls, different shows.  I enjoyed doing it but moved onto other things, don't like retailers adding 100% and paying shite for all your hard work

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6 hours ago, Ernesto said:

Hi Beau

Image of our latest batch in the Adam retort, hazel and birch if I recall. I think you're about right with your price, we also use the Selway coppice assoc bags; we get £2 for the small and £3.90 for the large from the farm shops near us. Not sure what the mark up is when they retail them on. Check out Oxford charcoal's website they sell retail from around £2.80 a kilo for Non species specific. Or Matt at Hertswood's Stag charcoal website ,think he's closer to £2 a kilo for "ordinary" hardwood charcoal.

On the enquires I've made for larger bags, 10kilo, the best I've been offered locally is £1 a kilo, the argument being they need a 50%ish mark up in the shop for retail. Also at that end you're starting to compete with the12kg blue caterer's charcoal bags, imported which they sell for around£10-12. It's tricky but I think the market for high end charcoal is fairly limited outside of London. Most people will buy by price, or bulk( as we both know 5kg of well made charcoal gives you a greater volume than 5kg of the dense imported stuff. I reckon about 3kg of our charcoal will fill a bag that has 5Kg of the heavier charcoal in it, but people will often go for the 5 over the 3 as they think its better value for the extra 2kgs of weight, even though its the same volume) Hope that all makes sense, seem to have gone a bit convoluted and waffly at the end.

Ernie.

20180604_141026.jpg

Great stuff Ernie Thanks

 

Dont know much about the Adam retort but looks like a nice pile of charcoal.

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Sorry for the delay posting again Beau been working in my main summer job on the marquees, up at Download and am back for the derig on Tuesday.

Yes the retort will hold just about 4 cube of loose stacked wood but was only about 3/4 full for that burn. So probably looking at around 150-200 kg of charcoal plus loads of fines. I am going to see if I can moves the fines as bio-char, via the farm shops also.

Anyway the only pics of the retort are on an old phone so I'll try and get some Monday and probably get them up here next weekend.

Cheers Ernie.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Finally got some time to get this done. The 2 flue stacks are 4m high (making it look like a model of Battersea power station) this was to improve the draw as we were losing a lot of heat out of the door of the fire box, we also raised the base plate another 100mm again to keep the heat underneath. The chamber is lined with ceramic fibre insulation again to keep the heat in the charge and not lose too much into the brickwork. The crack happened before the mods as we over heated the fire box/front corner trying to get the temperature up; crack repointed and also heat resistant silicone applied where it opened slightly, now airtight. Arb waste for the fire not for charge in the background. the pulleys lift the lid on a pivot hinge, for top loading. These picks are from Thursday, emptied the last load and refilled with a new charge (now in shopping baskets to make loading/unloading quicker and easier. Also stack nicely, we'll see how its works next Thursday when we look inside. The kiln had been lit about ten mins when I took these. Ernie.

20180628_133214.jpg

20180628_133227.jpg

20180628_133201.jpg

Edited by Ernesto
mistake at end
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On 30/06/2018 at 09:00, Ernesto said:

Finally got some time to get this done. The 2 flue stacks are 4m high (making it look like a model of Battersea power station) this was to improve the draw as we were losing a lot of heat out of the door of the fire box, we also raised the base plate another 100mm again to keep the heat underneath. The chamber is lined with ceramic fibre insulation again to keep the heat in the charge and not lose too much into the brickwork. The crack happened before the mods as we over heated the fire box/front corner trying to get the temperature up; crack repointed and also heat resistant silicone applied where it opened slightly, now airtight. Arb waste for the fire not for charge in the background. the pulleys lift the lid on a pivot hinge, for top loading. These picks are from Thursday, emptied the last load and refilled with a new charge (now in shopping baskets to make loading/unloading quicker and easier. Also stack nicely, we'll see how its works next Thursday when we look inside. The kiln had been lit about ten mins when I took these. Ernie.

20180628_133214.jpg

20180628_133227.jpg

20180628_133201.jpg

Thanks again Ernie. How do go about making an Adam retort. Am I right in thinking you buy plans? Interested in this aspect as I have a retort design but dont want to go into production but like the idea of selling plans 

Edited by Woodworks
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  • 1 month later...
On ‎01‎/‎07‎/‎2018 at 22:15, Woodworks said:

Thanks again Ernie. How do go about making an Adam retort. Am I right in thinking you buy plans? Interested in this aspect as I have a retort design but dont want to go into production but like the idea of selling plans 

Hi Beau, much belated reply, been out and about doing marquees on the festival circuit, with a bit of charcoaling in between.

Yes that's essentially what happens , Dr Adam sells you a set of plans with permission to build up to 4 retorts, you can pay per retort if you want to build any others. You have to sign a contract/confidentiality agreement re the design and send the location for those you build.

Her's the result of the shopping basket batch 55 baskets in 3 and a bit burned away as too close to the vent, I knew we'd left a gap previously for a reason ,doh! Just need to do some weighing to work out the conversion rate. But overall a better burn with better conversion than when densely packed in.

Ernie.

20180720_132343.jpg

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Just a thought, but might be worth putting a post on “British BBQ forum” on Facebook the people on there are really into there BBQing and smoking they are always looking for quality reliable lump wood charcoal. You may get a few local customers if your willing to ship you should definitely shift some!

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2 hours ago, Spongey said:

Just a thought, but might be worth putting a post on “British BBQ forum” on Facebook the people on there are really into there BBQing and smoking they are always looking for quality reliable lump wood charcoal. You may get a few local customers if your willing to ship you should definitely shift some!

Yes I am a member of a BBQ group and if we were prepared to ship there would be more sales to be made. As it's turned out this season has been good and used up all the wood and more we had set aside for charcoal making. Mind you it's probably the best summer we have had here in 30 years so doubt next season will be as good.

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5 hours ago, Ernesto said:

Hi Beau, much belated reply, been out and about doing marquees on the festival circuit, with a bit of charcoaling in between.

Yes that's essentially what happens , Dr Adam sells you a set of plans with permission to build up to 4 retorts, you can pay per retort if you want to build any others. You have to sign a contract/confidentiality agreement re the design and send the location for those you build.

Her's the result of the shopping basket batch 55 baskets in 3 and a bit burned away as too close to the vent, I knew we'd left a gap previously for a reason ,doh! Just need to do some weighing to work out the conversion rate. But overall a better burn with better conversion than when densely packed in.

Ernie.

20180720_132343.jpg

Love the use of super market baskets ?

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