R&D & Formulation

Briquette formulation is a set of trade-offs. No recipe wins on every parameter at once.

Feedstock composition sets the ceiling on calorific value and the floor on ash. Mature, clean coconut shell gives high fixed carbon; mixed material with bark and dust raises ash.

Carbonisation parameters — temperature, airflow, duration — decide whether you get high fixed carbon or a soft product with an uncarbonised core. This is the hardest part to control and the most decisive.

Pressing density governs burn duration. Denser burns longer, and is also harder to light.

Shape changes airflow. Hexagonal with a central hole draws air into the core and holds heat steadily for longer; cubes stack most efficiently for shipping.

Drying sets final moisture, which decides whether the product survives the sea voyage.

Raising one usually lowers another. The R&D work is finding the point that suits your use, not chasing the best figure in every column.

1. We need the problem, not the recipe. Tell us how the product is used, what is wrong with the current one, and which figures must be met. A description of use is far more useful than a specification list without context.

2. Feedstock samples, if you have them. If you have your own material, send it. Its character decides what is possible.

3. Trial formulation and burn testing. We make small batches and test them before anything is promised.

4. Laboratory testing. Calorific value, ash, moisture, fixed carbon — measured, not estimated.

5. Samples sent for you to test. On the equipment your customer actually uses, under real working conditions. A test in the factory yard does not tell you what happens in a kitchen or a lounge.

6. Specification locked into the agreement before production runs.

A formulation without figures is only a claim. Every development ends in testing, and testing produces documents you can put in front of a buyer.

Certificate of Analysis (COA) carries the laboratory figures for the batch actually shipped: calorific value, ash, moisture, fixed carbon. For shisha buyers this is frequently the document their own customer asks to see, because ash content decides whether the coal is usable. A COA must reference the batch it describes — a report from a different production run is not a COA for your shipment.

SHT is issued by the testing laboratory as formal evidence that the material was tested.

Our material is tested at the Ministry of Forestry laboratory (PUSPHB Bogor, KAN-accredited) against SNI 06-3730-1995. Report 092/LHU/P2HB/07/2026 records, for the cube briquette: 7,319 cal/g, ash 3.56%, moisture 5.89%.

We publish those figures as they stand, including the unflattering one. That ash figure places this briquette in BBQ and grilling territory rather than the sub-2.5% premium shisha bracket.

Coconut shell, hardwood, and spent coffee grounds — all three are running products, not experiments. We process coffee grounds into briquettes, pellets and biochar.

If you have another biomass waste stream and want to know whether it can become a product, that is a conversation worth having. The answer is sometimes no, and we will say so before you spend money.

We do not guarantee a formulation will hit a given figure before it has been tested. Some combinations of targets cannot be met simultaneously as a matter of physics — very low ash from a feedstock that is inherently high in minerals, for instance.

We also do not handle licensing or product certification. What we provide is laboratory testing and the documents it produces; arranging distribution permits, halal certification, or registration with a particular authority is not our service. If your market requires it, we say so early so you can arrange it through the right party.