Anybody can make biodiesel. It's simple, you can make it in your kitchen area-- and it's BETTER than the petro-diesel fuel the huge oil companies sell you. Your diesel motor will run better and last longer on your home-made fuel, and it's much cleaner-- much better for the environment and much better for health.
If you make it from used cooking oil it's not only inexpensive but you'll be recycling a frustrating waste item. Most importantly is the GREAT feeling of flexibility, self-reliance and empowerment it will give you. Here's how to do it-- whatever you need to understand.
Straight vegetable oil fuel (SVO) systems can be a clean, effective and cost-effective alternative. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you have to modify the engine. The finest way is to fit an expert singletank SVO system with replacement injectors and glowplugs optimised for veg-oil, as well as fuel heating.
With the German Elsbett single-tank SVO system for instance you can utilize petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any combination. Just start up and go, stop and turn off, like any other car. Journey to Forever's Toyota TownAce van uses an Elsbett single-tank system. More
There are also two-tank SVO systems which pre-heat the oil to make it thinner. You have to start the engine on normal petroleum diesel or biodiesel in one tank and then switch to SVO in the other tank when the veg-oil is hot enough, and change back to petro- or biodiesel before you stop the engine, or you'll coke up the injectors.
More details on straight grease systems in my blog.
3. Biodiesel or SVO?
Biodiesel has some clear benefits over SVO: it works in any diesel, with no conversion or modifications to the engine or the fuel system-- just put it in and go. It also has better cold-weather properties than SVO (however not as good as petro-diesel-- see Using biodiesel in winter). Unlike SVO,
it's backed by many long-term tests in numerous countries, including countless miles on the road.
Biodiesel is a tidy, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it's fair to say that many SVO systems are still speculative and need further advancement.
On the other hand, biodiesel can be more expensive, depending just how much you make, what you make it from and whether you're comparing it with brand-new oil or utilized oil (and depending upon where you live). And unlike SVO, it needs to be processed first.
But the large and rapidly growing worldwide band of do not mind-- they make a supply weekly or once a month and quickly get used to it. Many have been doing it for several years.
Anyway you have to process SVO too, specifically WVO (waste grease, utilized, cooked), which many individuals with SVO systems utilize since it's inexpensive or totally free for the taking. With WVO food particles and impurities and water need to be gotten rid of, and it most likely must be deacidified too. Biodieselers say, "If I'm going to need to do all that I may as well make biodiesel instead." But SVO types belittle that-- it's much less processing than making biodiesel, they state. To each his own.
1
Make your own Biodiesel Part 2
Homer Landrum edited this page 4 months ago