This is our journal of what we pray is our sojourn of life (Hebrews 11:8-10) along the narrow way (Matthew 7:14), even the old paths (Jeremiah 6:16), submitting to the Bible as a light unto both (Psalms 119:105). It is our prayer that these documented moments in our earthly time benefit whom God might choose to edify, but ultimately that God glorifies Himself through them.

Compressed Paper Bricks

One day when bringing up the YouTube main page, there was a video thumbnail displayed with the title something about unlimited fuel for fires, and showed a bucket. Intrigued, I clicked on it, and it ended up being about a fellow who came up with an inexpensive way to press paper into burnable bricks using Home Depot buckets!

Here’s his video:


Nice! Simple and inexpensive…right up my alley! With all of the feed bags we have, I thought I’d give this a go!

Here’s the drilled out bucket:

Drilled Out Bucket

Then drawing the pressing block on a left-over piece of 2×12:

Drawing Block Circle

And the circle drawn:

Drawn Block Circle

Then being cut:

Cutting the Block

And finally cut out:

Circle Block Cut Out

After putting the drilled out bucket in another bucket, I added water and paper. We’ve been tearing up the feed bags, along with snail-mail waste, and old doctrinally-incorrect books we’ve had laying around 🙂 I’ve been letting it sit all day and over night:

Paper in Water in Bucket

I didn’t think I could make the saw blade device he made, but found a left-over broken goat lead tether we had laying around:

Paper Mulcher Cork Screw

And using that, it actually works pretty well to mulch up the paper:

Mulched Paper

Here the drilled-out bucket is stacked on the other bucket ready for pressing:

Buckets Stacked Ready for Pressing

And here the pressing block is set:

Circle Block in Bucket

Then a third bucket is set on that, and here, in first attempts, a cinder block to try to get it started:

Cinder Block Press

And then me laying on the cinder block:

Laying on Cinder Block to Press the Paper

And here’s the result when I tried to sit on that. Oops 🙂 :

Spilled Buckets & Water

But, coming up with a better way, I put a board across the pressing bucket, and am able to sit on it now no problem:

Sitting on Board to Press the Paper

And then, I tried putting a couple of feed bags on top, which frees me up for most of the pressing process — I just come back later and sit on it a bit to finish it off:

Feed Bags Pressing the Paper

And here’s the result!

Compressed Paper Brick

They fit nicely on the bucket lids, so here are several drying in the sun:

Drying Paper Bricks

And several finished ones:

Dried Paper Bricks

The only thing left is to try them once we get to where we’re using the wood burner this winter. It’ll be fun and interesting to see how they work!

Hopefully they will, and we’re thankful to the Lord for granting this idea to maybe be able to use some of the extra resources we have for good use!

— David

2 Comments

  1. Simply Jeannie

    Oh my goodness, my husband and I just started making these about 2 weeks ago!

    You can put twigs in then, sawdust, some even will use a special wax to make it more like those fire logs you can buy.. But for us we are using whatever we have on hand.

  2. David and Susan Sifford

    Hi Ms. Jeannie,

    Very nice! I hope they work out for you!

    Yes, in his video, the guy talks about putting leaves and the like in there too.

    — David

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