making horse poo bricks in paper brick maker

Rotor

I know it's a bit of a long shot but has anyone tried making poo bricks for the fire.
Does it stay together?
Does it burn ok?

I've got tonnes of said stuff and if it worked it would be a good way of using it

Leif

My guess is that you can make them using a mould and a press, but I would advise caution. Whilst horse dung is relatively benign, compared to dog excrement for example, it can still pose a health risk. I know of one person who caught a bladder infection from cow poo. (I think the urine was the culprit.) Once dried it should be relatively safe, although I am not sure a house filled with the aroma of roasting horse excrement is entirely appealing. I am sure some Africans use dried animal dung as fuel. Perhaps some Indians too. I look forward to more informative responses.

Rotor

Yea - lol. Havn't told the wife about my grand plan yet:D
It's an enclosed fire and old,dried horse muck isn't too pungent anyway.
Good idea though - may dry some loose and test it on the fire before I go to the trouble of bricking it (if you pardon the expression)

GreenTricky

In northern india/nepal/ tibet it was common to see lots of 'cakes' being made for winter fuel, think they mixed it with straw to give something to hold it together and was normally from cows/buffalos, werent many horses around but guess it should work

lostinrates

Yep, horse poo fuel is a traditional metod, but i have not tried the bricks, we thought about it when choose a heating system for here, but the idea of how long they would take to dry put put us off.

TheMoneySpider

GreenTricky wrote: »

In northern india/nepal/ tibet it was common to see lots of 'cakes' being made for winter fuel, think they mixed it with straw to give something to hold it together and was normally from cows/buffalos, werent many horses around but guess it should work

That brings back memories of seeing them all drying in the sun on the rooves.

cyclonebri1

Rotor wrote: »

Yea - lol. Havn't told the wife about my grand plan yet:D
It's an enclosed fire and old,dried horse muck isn't too pungent anyway.
Good idea though - may dry some loose and test it on the fire before I go to the trouble of bricking it (if you pardon the expression)

Soon to be your exwife :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

But seriously, to get the stuff dry enough to burn it will need long term dry storage, and ok if you have well rotted stuff to start with, say a couple of years old, then fine.

However the stuff I pick up from the surrounding stables is still very dry and strawy, would burn in a single flash if dried, needs time to decay.

Rotor

Well as paper log machine is on offer at argos (£4.99) I've bought one. Have made 3 logs as an experiment ; 2 with well rotted and one with fresh. They are in the greenhouse now.
The rotted ones are definitly denser . Will update when they are dry but I think it will be a few weeks yet : probably need a fire in september with the summer we're having!

cyclonebri1

I suppose you could make them the stuff in your compost bin too, assuming you have 1, after all they used to burn peat blocks so you could even chuck old compost in there.

Bit ironic though if you needed a fire to dry them so you could burn them :D:D

Rotor

Well , for all you coprophiles out there the results are in.

Fresh dung made a very light brick which burnt very quickly and , to be honest, is not worth the effort of making them.

Rotted dung ( by which I mean a big anaerobic pile, not one that is turned for compost) made a more solid brick which lasted longer but was less keen to burn. You need a good base to the fire then they burn ok.

I know lots of you have been on tenterhooks about this so hopefully you will sleep easier tonight.:D

whitewing

So, will you be making more rotted dung bricks? (What a great hobby!)