I poured 6-7 quarts of - filtered - waste engine oil into a little more than half a tank, along with a dose of Diesel Kleen to make up for the lost cetane. The car got a taste of it and did not like it at all.

Drove it about 25 miles to the city of poughkeepsie. My friend needed to to use a pay phone, so I pulled into a mobil station. Idling away in the parking space when it started to run very rough and finally stuttered out. Naturally I tried to start it again, but it was mad at me. It would crank fine and even fire, butt would stall as soon as I took my hand off of the key.

After about ten minutes, I turned up the idle and cranked it, luckily it fired up. I gunned it, kept the RPMs up for a minute or two. My friend and I came to the agreement that we needed to get some diesel into the tank, and perhaps even replace the - primary - fuel filter, so we headed home.

One the way there, the car kept failing. It would continue running as long as I kept the pedal to the floor, but it would stall when I came to a stop. I wound up having to put it in neutral and gun the engine as I rolled to a stop. It would also experience bouts of power loss; be driving along, and suddenly it would lurch and start slowing down, occasionally bucking as it got off a few good strokes.

Finally I got to a station that sells diesel, and I topped it off (by that time I'd run the tank down to about 1/3, so hopefully I diluted the bad fuel mix)

After about 10 to 15 minutes of driving it perked up again. Has anyone else had an experience like this with waste engine oil?

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1982 240D.
My name is Michael, and I am an 18 year old binge-drinkin', cigar-smokin', novel-writin', all around unsavory and unnattractive guy. I tell long-winded stories, and I only shave once a week, although I've had to do it every day since I was 16.

Back in the days when I drove a 123 diesel 60,000 to 70,000 miles per year I burned waste diesel all the time, but I NEVER put in such a strong concentration as you describe. I never put over about two quarts in a FULL tank of fuel, and I never put it in without pouring it through an arrangement of heavy cloth that I used as a filter. Also I changed BOTH fuel filters every 25,000 miles religiously.

At one point I stopped doing it thinking that it was causing trouble, but if I remember correctly that trouble turned out to be something else and I never got back in the waste oil habit again.

Have a great day,

If you try this again. I would put the motor oil in first then fill up the tank. What I think happened was that the motor oil poolled up and went to the engine all at once.

I used waste motor oil last year and told a mechanic friend of mine. He told me that motor oil would gum up when burned and that could cause problems in the engine.

I hope this helps.

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2000 VW Jetta TDI with 213,000 miles and climbing
84 300D non turbo getting ready for wvo conversion

Glinko when you say filtered what did you do exactly?
Your symptoms sure seem consistant with already having a dirty fuel filter before you started. If the filter was pretty clogged already but barely hanging in there the thicker fuel blend would then make the slow flowing filter suddenly apparant.
Roughly speaking if you put about a gallon of waste enginge oil into 10 gal of diesel thats 10%. That sure seems like a pretty aggressive blend. Even the guys that are doing experimenting with some pretty wild blends arn't putting that much waste engine oil. I think the most those guys are putting in in is about 5% and that is just for the anti gel properties of it.
Here is the link to the straight veg oil forum

Eric Z
Chattanooga TN
84 300sd unmodified 80%veggie/ 20% whatever is handy (diesel, kerosene etc)

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84 300SD 274K
38K miles on flatplate heat exchanger and various diesel/veg blends. prior to that 4K miles on unheated veggie blends with kero and DinoD.

Yes, my fuel filter was opaque before I put the waste oil in. I bought a new one today (I decided to just get the car home last night and F*** worrying about the filter) and attempted to install it.

For some reason the hoses that connect to the filter aren't wide enough to fit around the "nipples"* on the filter. wtf?

*sorry if that sounded perverted.

I would have purchased a secondary filter as well, but Autozone did not have it in stock and had to order it from the warehouse. I'll pick it up tomorrow.

EDIT: By "filtered" I meant poured through a sock inside of a funnel with a built-in mesh filter.

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1982 240D.
My name is Michael, and I am an 18 year old binge-drinkin', cigar-smokin', novel-writin', all around unsavory and unnattractive guy. I tell long-winded stories, and I only shave once a week, although I've had to do it every day since I was 16.

Okay, I installed the filter just fine. When I pulled the line off of the filter, the diesel that splashed onto my hand had particles of black stuff in it. My guess is I didn't filter it properly and the fuel filter took a beating, causing the car to choke.


Idiot, Glinko.

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1982 240D.
My name is Michael, and I am an 18 year old binge-drinkin', cigar-smokin', novel-writin', all around unsavory and unnattractive guy. I tell long-winded stories, and I only shave once a week, although I've had to do it every day since I was 16.

This is an excellent thread and will be of value to members in the future. Especially since you made it through the experience without any total failures.
I'm using drain oil, but am only adding a quart or so per fill-up (about 3/4 tank). I also filter it as well as I can using cloth in a paint filter before adding it to the tank. So far no filter problems. I carry spare filters though, in case Murphy is on duty.

Thanks for taking the risk to test the philosophy of using drain oil as fuel to the extent you did. We all owe you a vote of thanks. I'd do a search on this forum first though, if you ever decide to test any more of our radical ideas.

Cheers,
Wes

I would suggest filtering to at least 10 microns. I think a sock is probably about 500 microns.

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Jim

do you need to use to get to 10?

tom w

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[SIGPIC] Diesel loving autocrossing grandpa Architect. 08 Dodge 3/4 ton with Cummins & six speed; I have had about 35 benzes. I have a 39 Studebaker Coupe Express pickup in which I have had installed a 617 turbo and a five speed manual.[SIGPIC]

..I also have a 427 Cobra replica with an aluminum chassis.

I don't know exactly what micron my "filter" was. I do know that I saw what was called a 10 micron filter and it consisted of an apparatus that stretched a few layers of heavy, canvas looking cloth into funnel shape. So what I did was used to layers of some old drapes that were a very heavy canvas type material in a screen wire "funnel." I poured the oil through that and it took a while to do so.

An earlier poster was exactly right about seeing that the oil is mixed. I poured in a quart or two at the fuel stop before filling.

Good luck,

I mix it with some fuel and pump it (holley blue) via a used fuel filter into the fuel tank. If flow slows down, I know it is taking out stuff which would have blocked the fuel filter in the vehicle. If flow stops, I grab another used fuel filter.
I can get any number of these from a diesel mechanic

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Tony from West Oz.
Fatmobile 3 84 300D 295kkm Silver grey/Blue int. 2 tank WVO - Recipient of TurboDesel engine.
Josephine '82 300D 390kkm White/Palamino int.
Elizabeth '81 280E, sporting a '79 300D engine.
Lucille '87 W124 300D non-turbo 6 cylinder OM603, Pearl Grey with light grey interior


Various parts cars including 280E, 230C & 300D in various states of disassembly.

Since the major solid phase component of the waste oil is probably soot, a clogged filter is no surprise. Straining oil through a series of filters should help remove much of the particulate but I have often wondered if a small centrifugal separator whould be quicker and more effective that filters. Does anyone have any experience with a small separator?

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Make Biodiesel
Not War

'85 300TDT

Glinko, you are probably over doing any more fuel experimenting but if you decide to try again later you can get a 5 micron filter from mc master carr (mcmaster.com) for about $5 or from greasel.com for about $7. They even sell at 1 micron filter if you want to be damn sure you filter all the soot out. Most agree that 5micron is plenty good.

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84 300SD 274K
38K miles on flatplate heat exchanger and various diesel/veg blends. prior to that 4K miles on unheated veggie blends with kero and DinoD.

I used to pour in a gallon at a fillup (about 5%). I filtered with a bag filter down to 1 micron. Never hurt anything, but then I started running wvo and there was no need for it.

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1984 300Sd 210k

Former cars:
1984 300D 445k (!!) (Strider) Original (and not rebuilt) engine and transmission. Currently running on V80 ( 80% vegetable oil, 20% petroleum products). Actually not, taking a WVO break.
1993 300d 2.5 275k. Current 120/day commuter
1981 300SD 188k (Hans) Killed by a deer

I used to pour in a gallon at a fillup (about 5%). I filtered with a bag filter down to 1 micron. Never hurt anything, but then I started running wvo and there was no need for it.

__________________
1984 300Sd 210k

Former cars:
1984 300D 445k (!!) (Strider) Original (and not rebuilt) engine and transmission. Currently running on V80 ( 80% vegetable oil, 20% petroleum products). Actually not, taking a WVO break.
1993 300d 2.5 275k. Current 120/day commuter
1981 300SD 188k (Hans) Killed by a deer