PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum - View Single Post

TonyFromWestOz · #3 04-14-2005, 09:38 AM

WANT '71 280SEL,
I live in a mild "Mediterranean" climate where summer temperatures reach 40'C in mid summer and winter minimums sometimes get below 5'C.

SWMBO's '82 300D , non-turbo (Australia), has been running on a 50% average blend for 12 months. More WVO in summer, less in winter. I made a small coolant/fuel heat exchanger to overcome any small lumps of solid oil which may accumulate in the prefilter. This heat exchanger raises the blend to approx 60-80'C, depending on driving conditions. This is the only modification to the car.
This heat exchanger is made from a couple of pieces of copper pipe, brazes together, with connections for the coolant (outer pipe) and fuel (inner pipe). This is fed with coolant by teeing into the heater hose near the oil filter and at the return line at the LHS front of the engine. The heatexchanger is plumbed into the fuel line just before the prefilter.

Depending on your climate, you could use more or less WVO, need a better heater, or even heat the tank and fuel lines, additional electric heating of fuel line prior to the IP, and other possible modifications.

With respect to heating of the diesel, the vegetable oil will provide more IP lubrication even in a hot 5% blend with diesel, than LSD or ULSD has cold.

In Europe, OM617 diesel are routinely operated on cold 100% new veg oil.

My '84 300D runs a 2 tank WVO conversion where I start on biodiesel and when the engine warms up, I switch to 100% WVO. When I want to shutdown for long enough for the engine to cool down, I switch back to start tank 5 minutes before shutdown, to purge the WVO from the IP and injectors. I have a coolant/fuel heat exchanger in the WVO fuel line which has the WVO at 80'C as soon as the engine is at operating temperature.