The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area General Truck Talk Disels run on cooking oil

I've seen it all! A few days ago I dropped by my friend who painted my old 37 and ask what a contraption was laying in his shop. It turns out a local doctor/car-nut has purchased a KIT that includes a round stainless tank complete with the "heater" and pump etc to convert a disel engine to run on cooking oil. I understand that once the oil is heated you can switch the engine over to run on the cooking oil and then about 10 minutes before you shut the engine down you put it back onto disel fuel so the engine will start next time. The doctor has some local resturants giving him their old oil. I understand from my friend that the doc paid about 7 or $800 for this set up with the intentions of eventually making the kits and sellling them himself!! Some of you may have heard of this but its new to me! Can't you just see pullling up at the local Cracker Barrel, while traveling, and say "filler up with granola oil" :p This is the truth or at least some version of it! Anyone tried this before?? The doc is having my friend install this on an old Mercedes to start with. Maybe I need to start saving the oil out of my frydaddy

There has been quite a bit of talk about it here on the bolt before. Cool stuff.
Look up BioDiesel.
Or Go to Homepower.com They have some good articles on it and some links to kits and things too I think.

Be the first one on your block with a biodiesel stovebolt.

[img]http://www.veggievan.org/stories/travellog/travellog%20pics/2004/josh-and-daryl-hannah-pic.jpg[/img]

Daryl Hannah shows off her
autographed copy of
From the Fryer to the Fuel Tank
in front of her
biodiesel El Camino

I beat yah to the punch Drew!
Adios, Kip

and some can run on cow patties,,,,

there are whole forums on this stuff...

the important thing if you do this, is Filter Filter Filter!!! WVO (waste Vegtable oil) is usually full of crap, and you don't want to gunk up your injectors.

a conversion to true biodiesl requires some alchohol, labor and time.

-Mike R.

(Sorry, this is going to get technical. I apologize in advance but I can't help myself!!!)

Biodiesel is actually trans-esterified cooking oil. The triglycerides are "broken down" into simple esters of their original fatty acids. They have straight carbon chains of about 18 carbon atoms or so. The diesel standard, cetane, has 16 carbon atoms in a straight chain. Not a bad match. Biodiesel proponents will also say the esters have oxygen so they are like "oxyfuel" gasoline. Hummmmm.

One of the big problems must be storage life. Cooking oils are liquid oils because they contain some carbon-carbon double bonds (unsaturated!). These double bonds react with oxygen and, in essence, "crosslink". This is the way that linseed oil hardens. Using saturated fats would avoid this problem!! Crisco, anyone?

A fellow in town makes biodiesel. He asked if I would use it in my Dodge/Cummins. Nope, not unless he bought me a new Dodge first.

There is a guy at the U of Iowa that converted a small car diesel to run on bio. He even made the news. Now the government wants him for not paying any road-use tax on his home-made fuel. Wouldn't you know it,
Scott

Chipmonk, I ran my E350 with a 7.3 litre diesel all summer on straight vegatable oil. No heater, no modifications of any kind. The Furd was easy to use SVO in because it already has 2 fuel tanks. The engine needs to be switched to diesel 2/3 minutes before shutdown to charge the injecton system with diesel fuel and to prevent "cokeing" in the engine. I am going to sell this van soon so I did not install a tank heater that would enable me to burn SVO all year.

A friend of mine has been gathering SVO, filtering it and selling it for a buck a gallon. I pay the $0.22 a gallon road use fuel tax up front. It is only right to pay the tax. When using any thing as a motor fuel to run on the roads you need to pay for the use of the roads.

SVO is a great fuel, more lubicery, emissions are almost nothing. Engine preformance is the same, "seems" even better. I can't see any difference in fuel milage. And the exhaust smells like french fries or what ever was cooked in it. The engine don't seem to have as harsh a diesel knock on SVO. I will make and install a small extra fuel tank in my GMC van, 6.2 diesel so I can start burning SVO in it next spring. Good stuff Maynard. greasel.com

Mike

Don't know the exact details.. but there is a posted sign at work stating we'll be burning bio-deisel in our transit buses soon. We're also getting 3 New Flyer hybred buses. I didn't drive the test model, but it will be weird stepping on the brakes and hearing the engine rev up.. Step on the throttle and you go, but the engine slows down? Gonna take some getting used to!!

I have several uncles and cousins in Louisiana that move dirt for a living. They have run veggie oil in their tractors for years. I think that they use a mixture of oil and diesel, but am not sure. The girls own a bakery and doughnut shop, so they have a good constant supply of oil to use.
Ralph

there is a lot of fuels that are called bio-diesel. Some people are using a mixture of SVO and diesel, from 5% to 50% SVO, to 100% SVO like I do.

To me bio-diesel is the fuel made from veggie oil using a chemical process. This fuel don't need any heat to keep it flowing. It is good stuff, burn it just like diesel. The only draw back is the harsh chemicals, lye, used in the process attacks seals in the fuel system. If your engine/fuel system has the right seals there is no prroblem. But who is to know what seals are in a vehicle a few years old. Up to 5% of bio-diesel can be added to diesel fuel with out any seal worries. Further testing may show higher percentages are possible.

SVO needs heat to keep flowing in cooler temps. And diesels with the hi pressure injection systems may not work as well as the older engines, like mine. I use cooking oil, no lard. Soybean and several other veggie oils will work fine. When Diesel built the first combustion ignited engine he ran it on peanut oil. So this really ain't nothing new.

Keep eatin them fries, I need the fuel. Mike

Hey hey hey, I knew you guys would edgeekate me on this! I'm gonna make sure my pal see's these response's. I would just hate paying fuel tax. Of coarse it wouldn't be so bad if ALL the folks were working when doing road repairs etc. Around here you have 8-10 people on the "site" but only about 3 of them accomplishing anything!
But then thats another story. Thanks for giving me all the insight!