Alternative fuels

Anyone interested in a discussion on fuels. ie biodiesel veg oil etc. There is a lot of conflicting info on the net ranging from ' add a few lts of veg' to complete complex conversions with dire warnings re engine damage. A recent change in the tax rules (UK) means that small volume users do not need to register as fuel producers for tax purposes if using less than 2500 lts per year( if my memory serves me correctly.)I will look up the sites & post links. One particular site offering conversions shows that a user like me would break even on conversion costs in as little as 4 months. This makes the idea more attractive. Your comments & experiences would be most interesting.Some years back the Pugeot 404 diesel car would run happily on 22 sec home heating oil, but this was a tough low tech engine and heating oil as a road fuel was illegal.

I'm interested to get into it at some point. In Canada, I believe they are promoted. I recently saw a TV program on it. There are commercial outlets for bio-diesel, and apparently it comes itn different grades for the different waether we have during the year.

will post when I've more info.

I'm also from Canada.
Two neighbours run their diesel cars and trucks on a concoction they make by filtering vegetable oil from a local restaurant's deep fryer into regular diesel fuel.
Perhaps I'll buy a tank full for my HiAce and report.

I have used clean rapeseed oil from a local supermarket which worked o.k. It was quite dilute though.

One thing to be cautious of when blending Vege oil is (because it is a bit thicker) it tends to bring-up all of the crud that has accumulated in your fuel tank over the years. Expect to have to change your fuel filter shortly after you start mixing. Because our fuel filters are not cheap, I added an inexpensive inline fuel filter before the stock filter. I went through a half dozen of those until my tank started running clean.

I had a quick look into this the other day. I forget the exact details, but I think sodium hydroxide is used to separate out the usable stuff. In Australia, SuperCustoms are not imported by the dealers and getting parts can be like pulling teeth, especially if the dealerships have a "don't want to know about imports" attitude. I would give it a go on something older with easily replaceable parts but haven't been game with the Hiace. I'd want to see something signed in blood that says there is no sodium hydroxide in the fuel before I'd trust it.

Everything you ever could want to know about biodiesel, straight vegetable oil, and blending fuels can be found here:

http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/eve/forums

As far as for the Hiace specifically, the 3L is the perfect engine for burning alternative fuels. Not sure about other engines.

Sodium Hydroxide is used in making biodiesel I believe... You don;t need to make biodiesel. It’s more efficient to simply burn the vege oil in it's entirety.

The other day I came across a garage selling 50/50 biodiesel at 99p per ltr.
I had a chat with garage owner and he said the same about the muck coming
up from the tank.I put in £20 worth and I was very low in the tank.I then ran
my 3L till nearly all was used up and I did not notice any problems,it all ran as
normal.

petethepaint... I recommend you change your fuel filter sooner than later. It's best to change the filter before you start noticing problems.

I contributed this on another forum on my Hiace fuel system conversion:

http://www.burnveg.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=85

Anyone else noticed that the prices have shot up recently?
Bit of a shame but if the demand is too high...

Hopefully it's not the supermarkets ripping us off.

Parents wont let me try it yet but I'll talk them round it

Richard, Brisbane wrote:

I had a quick look into this the other day. I forget the exact details, but I think sodium hydroxide is used to separate out the usable stuff. In Australia, SuperCustoms are not imported by the dealers and getting parts can be like pulling teeth, especially if the dealerships have a "don't want to know about imports" attitude. I would give it a go on something older with easily replaceable parts but haven't been game with the Hiace. I'd want to see something signed in blood that says there is no sodium hydroxide in the fuel before I'd trust it.

Yeah Richard, I'll stick with pure diesel from busy service stations .

I am tempted to look into the LPG mod though. An extra 20% power and torque is hard to argue with. A bigger exhaust would be cheap too. No need for stainless and no Catalytic Converter to replace .

Go the diesel .

Anything I'd like to do to my Focus XR5 will cost mega bux. It stays standard with a de-resonated growl.

Robbo and Richard: You guys are missing the point here. I'm not referring to biodiesel. Biodiesel is a waste of time, money, and food. You don’t need to make biodiesel, just burn the vegetable oil in its entirety.

Most of the modifications I have made to my Hiace are because I live in Canada. If I lived in a milder climate I wouldn’t have needed to change anything (other than add an extra fuel filter for good measure).

I get over 100L of oil a week for free 90% of which ends up in my fuel tank. You do the math.

I have been running on a 50 /50 mix of veg oil and fuel for about a year now no problems so far apart from the price of veg oil shooting up over the past 6 months

Found a web site a while ago run by mechanics that reckoned if you use much more than 25% mix of pure veg oil with out a conversion it will eventually (in about 25000 miles) gum the piston rings up and score the barrels but less than this was reasonably safe

Ive been running my 2.8L flat diesel on 25% mix with new veg oil for a while now and apart from an increase in power (and the smell) haven't noticed a difference (the first diesel filter i changed was pretty crappy but nothing has ever blocked up).

One word of warning though - i did try using Lidl's corn oil - it ran lumpy, smoked and stank too - don't try it!

I would agree w/ moogdrew. 25% is fine w/o modifying your vehicle if you are blending w/ #2 diesel. At higher latitudes we get #1 diesel in the winter, which is better to blend w/ as it contains no paraffin. I would say 50% is fine blending w/ #1 or kerosene.