Hi guys.

I'm about to join the masses and try blending WVO with my normal "dino diesel". Over the past few weeks, I've collected about 50 gallons or so of the sweet nectar. I haven't filtered it yet. I have let it settle, and it has seperated into two main tiers, or levels. The top level tends to be clearer and more liquidy. The bottom level is a bit more dense and cloudy, almost lending toward a white-ish color. My questions are:

---Is the thicker, cloudy stuff what is normally called "tallow"?
---Do you use both of the levels of oil, or just the top, clearer stuff?
---Is it overambitious to blend 4 to 5 gallons of filtered WVO with
about 10 gallons of diesel?

Thanks for your input.
Damon

__________________
1984 300TD Wagon--Astral Silver--Retired
1983 300TD Wagon--Dark Blue--Retired

Best to ask such questions Maui Green SVO Forums

BTW The 617 is one of the best engines to run WVO in.

__________________
"If anyone knows other lessons I need to learn, please tell me. I'm tired of learning them the hard way".
by JerryBro

The Glow Plug Wait: This waiting period is a moment of silence to pay honor to Rudolph Diesel. The longer you own your diesel the more honor you will give him". by SD Blue

My normal daily life; either SNAFUed- Situation Normal... All Fouled Up, or FUBARed- Fouled Up Beyond All Repair

62 UNIMOG Camper w/617 Turbo, 85 300SD daily driver- both powered by blended UCO fuels

The lower level your seeing is settled out water and or particulates.

You can use that but you'll still need to filter it. Down to about 5 microns or so. I'd drain of the clear oil then heat the rest up to around 100F or so to burn off the water. (Be wary of steam explosions... i.e. Don't stand over the heated oil watching it).

Then filter it after you've let it cool back off.

I'd recommend against just mixing it with fuel, however there are people who do that.

I use a 2-tank system. I start and warm up on dino, once I reach 80C on the engine I switch to 100% filtered WVO. When I get near my destination I switch back to dino for 5-10 minutes to clean the WVO out of the IP and injectors.

There are alot of places you can get more info..
http://www.greasecar.com/forum_view.cfm?frmID=1
http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/eve/ubb.x?a=frm&s=447609751&f=159605551

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'84 300CD Turbo 132k (Anthracite Grey) - WVO - My daily driver - Recently named coo-coo-coupe by my daughter.
'84 300D Turbo 240k (Anthracite Grey) - Garage Queen
'83 300D Turbo 220k (Orient Red) - WVO - Wifes daily driver

I'm not a certified mechanic, but I did stay at a HolidayInn Express last night.

Solidified oil is more dense than the liquid oils, Tallows, Palm oils and hydrogenated oils solidify before the higher melting point oils. These solid oils and any water, food scraps etc, tend to accumulate on the bottom of containers.Depending on your proposed usage, you could use both layers, or only the liquid oil. If you use a 2 tank system with a heated tank and fuel lines, you could use solid oils all year around.Again this depends on many factors, minimum overnight temperatures, heating the fuel line etc, can make a marginal blend work well. I recommend starting with a 20% blend and increase gradually until you get starting problems, then back off the oil by 10% or more. Better still, install a heated fuel tank, HiH or HoH fuel lines and a decent heat exchanger in the engine bay. A heated fuel filter and change-over valve will allow you to use tallow all year long.BTW, I just commissioned my 2 tank WVO system on my '84 NA 300D. Photos of the installation are on the Infopp Forum
As I live in a mild climate, no tank or fuel line heating is used, only a coolant/fuel heat exchanger in the engine bay.

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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.

Basics have already been said. My experience is:

2 layers of oil - the clear stuff is best, little or no water or junk. Filter it anyway. I you get a submersible tank heater you can heat the whole barrel together for a few hours to drive off the water. Then let is settle again. Filter everything, clear or not.

I've had a 2 tank system in my 300D for a few years, works fine all year long. I filter the oil through a 10 micron fuel filter bag. It's plumbed to flow through a MB prefilter, a VW diesel fuel filter, then the lift pump and stock MB filter.

Since it's hot now I'm just running filtered WVO in a blend in the stock fuel tank on my 300SD. I've started several long highway trips with 80% WVO/20% diesel. Idle's a little rough until everything's good an hot. Return trip is down to about 50% WVO (don't want to carry 20 gallons). Idles and runs normally at this blend now. Will have a second, heated tank like the other car by fall.

Filter the WVO before you put it in the car and life will be much easier!

fmb

How have you collected it? I had one no go with a local restaurant. I need to get something going. Got any tips to help me.

I live in a smaller town, and I think that has added to the ease of my gathering WVO. I have approached 3 restaurants, and all of them have been more than willing to help me out. I go straight to the back door in the morning, when the prep cooks are getting there day going, and they're not that busy. Keep it really simple; no need to lay the whole schpeal on them. I've just said that I'm starting a project with my car, using old Veg oil as a fuel, and would they mind the next time they change out there oil to set it aside for me. I also ask how often they change there oil. Obviously, the more frequent they do, the cleaner it should be. I haven't talked to any waitresses, owners, hostesses, etc. Just talk to the guys in back that really don't care about much of anything, especially what they do with what they consider to be garbage. They put it in the same 4.5 gallon containers that they get the new stuff in for easy transportation. Hope that helps!

__________________
1984 300TD Wagon--Astral Silver--Retired
1983 300TD Wagon--Dark Blue--Retired

Thanks, that does help. I like your approach, the fewer people involved, the better.
Since I last posted, my first restaurant came through, I have a start.
Talked to the manager at Krispy Kreme, they don't throw oil away, the donuts soak it all up. Yuk, I knew I shouldn't eat those, 30% oil by weight. When I saw all of that oil I thought I had found an endless supply for my car. Instead I was looking at the end of my arteries, better to burn it than to eat it. I will wait for someone else to devise a car that runs on donuts.

TwitchKitty you sure know how to ruin an old fart's day. :p 30% oil by weight on my KK's. I'm sick to my soles.

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'10 Chrysler T&C Stow-N-Go White. Grandpa's ride.

'13 Chrysler 200 Touring Candy Red. Grandma's ride.

Age and cunning will always over come youth and vigor.

I've tried a few restaurants, the only one I had good luck with was the one that was a local owner type restaurant where I talked to the person in charge of it. She couldn't believe I actually wanted it, but said feel free to help yourself to any out there....

For now I'll just be mixing it into my main tank, hopefully I'll be running on 100% soon. I have yet to get my processing unit setup and have only tried ~10gallons of it so far but with a 50/50mix the car seemed peppier and started easier (even cold).

Yea the stuff on the bottom has a high water concentration so I'd rather not put that in my tank. I filter to 1 micron figuring that the main filter on the car filters to 2 and I'd rather plug my sock filter than main spin on filter! If I were to let the oil settle more before filtering it do you think I could go longer before having to change filters? Just seems like it fills up with some pretty thick fatty crud pretty quick with my WVO source.

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Jeff M.
Mercedes W123 DIY pages are now located here.
1983 / 1984 300D Sold
2000 CLK430 Cabriolet ~58k Sold
2005 Avalanche 4x4 ~66k

BoostnBenz the OEM fuel filter's are as follows, prefilter 40 micron, spin on cartrage filter is 5 micron nomanal and 20 micron absolute. That means about 50% of the crap 5 to 20 micron in size will pass through the OEM spin on final filter.

If you are using a 2 micron drip filter then you have nothinging to worry about when it comes to WVO causing a plugged filter. If by chance you do like a friend did, and run it though two spin on filters under pressure you may have the same problems he did. The one filter was a 5 micron and the other a 10 micron filter, but both were only 20 micron absolute. All that big crap in the 5 to 20 micron was hitting his 2 micron Cat filter and it was plugging rather quickly. But like I told him, better plugging a $10 filter then that crap heading for IP and injectors on his VW Passat TDI.

By the way that VW TDI just went past 300,000 miles. No major repairs, (one clutch) and the injectors are original and never been out of the engine.

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'10 Chrysler T&C Stow-N-Go White. Grandpa's ride.

'13 Chrysler 200 Touring Candy Red. Grandma's ride.

Age and cunning will always over come youth and vigor.

Wow I've always been told they filter 2 microns but it seemed a little fine for a spin on, 5 nominal and 20 absolute is pretty coarse.

I can't imagine their IPs as being cheap to replace but the injectors could just be bombed one step further with some new 257s.

Wow that is a lot of trouble free driving, did they have many TDI Passats before 96-97 or did he actually drive that much?!

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Jeff M.
Mercedes W123 DIY pages are now located here.
1983 / 1984 300D Sold
2000 CLK430 Cabriolet ~58k Sold
2005 Avalanche 4x4 ~66k

5 & 20 is industry standard for industrialized world for fuel filters on diesels, but will probably change before much longer. I doubt the IP pressure and tolerance for our 123's is any where near the current VW's in the last 7 or so years. My Jetta is a 19,000 psi IP and the new PD engines are at 29,000 psi. Our IP's in the 123's are only running new at about 1500 psi and injectors break at 50-60 psi.

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'10 Chrysler T&C Stow-N-Go White. Grandpa's ride.

'13 Chrysler 200 Touring Candy Red. Grandma's ride.

Age and cunning will always over come youth and vigor.

Yes they are significantly less than the Jetta. It doesn't really matter but for future reference new injectors pop around 2100psi (143bar) and the service limit is 1765psi (120bar). I guess for those who look this up the POP adjustment spec is also +/- 5 bar.

19ksi, wow. How much pressure are common rail systems?

__________________
Jeff M.
Mercedes W123 DIY pages are now located here.
1983 / 1984 300D Sold
2000 CLK430 Cabriolet ~58k Sold
2005 Avalanche 4x4 ~66k

Search my posts for details of my unheated blending in 1980 300TD. Right now I've backed off from near-100% WVO as I was experiencing severe occasional loss of power on hills and level ground at high speeds. Never a problem starting. I think the problem is the viscosity of the WVO in the small-diameter fuel line, but I'm also wondering if the temperature-dependent thickening of the whitish stuff could be a factor too. Most of this is taken out by my T-shirt or other fabric pre-filter and my 0.5 micron bag filter. I settle and filter at ambient temperature. I'm planning to build a heating system and use two tanks to make maximum use of WVO even in "winter" when it actually gets down as low as 30F or so (above 0) here in California. Email me if you want more boring details. Steve