Will help you convert to WVO for free

Howdy,

I just finished converting my Mercedes 300D to run on waste veggie oil. I remember when i was trying to learn about this i wanted to find a place where i could just take the truck (also have a diesel truck that im getting ready to convert) and have someone show me.
So I figured, if you have a diesel and want to convert, it's cheap and easy. I'll tell you what parts to get (it'll cost around 500-600 dollars in parts), you bring them and I'll teach you how to do a custom install yourself. (Don't buy a kit)
I am in Corvallis, Oregon, and have a place you can stay for a few days while you're here. Gotta buy your own food and be a good houseguest and all, and of course willing to wrench on your car, cause I'll show you but I wont do all the work. All I ask is that you pass on what you learn. And I always accept veggie oil donations.
Kalanu

 

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Yeah, we never renewed www.veggie-fuel.org, but the site is still up at http://www.windrift.us/dreamerbiofuels. It's a bit out of date. So don't order kits right now. I've moved to Canada, am on the road and can't make them for mail-order right now.

I am working on updating the site at www.dreamerbiodiesel.125mb.com

I will still help out for free, but I am on the road and can't get into the states, so anywhere in canada...

 

I thought you could just pour veggie oil into a diesel engine and it would run ok - some people in Britain do it but its illegal I think

 

If you live in Florida and have a Mercedes you can pour veggie in and go no problem. The quick history is this: Rudolph Diesel invented his engine to run on veggie oil. After his mysterious death, oil companies found a way to make 'diesel fuel' using petroleum by-product. Diesel fuel as we know it now is thinner than veggie oil, so in order to make veggie oil run in a modern diesel engine you need to thin it. This is either done chemically, through transesterification (removing the glycerine=biodiesel) or mechanically, rigging your vehicle so that that oil is at 150 degrees when it hits your injectors. This is what SVO/WVO conversions are. We use a variety of ways to add heat to the oil. We tap into the coolant fluid, which absorbs heat as it passes through the engine, and we run veggie lines nestled up against these coolant lines, absorbing the heat from the coolant fluid. There are fuel filters that are electrically and coolant heated, there are coolant heated heat exchangers, and 12v inline heaters.
the system also involves a second seperate tank for veggie, and switches to control where you feed your fuel from. You start on diesel or biodiesel, this heats the engine up and heats the veggie oil up, then you switch to veggie oil after about five minutes. Before the vehicle shuts down you switch back to diesel to purge the veggie oil out of the engine, otherwise the oil gels and clogs everything.There are kits you can buy and have installed or you can put the system together from scratch yourself. It could cost you anywhere from $400-4000, depending on how complicated your system is and who does it for you. The veggie oil just needs to be pre-filtered before you put it in the engine and de-watered if it has water in it. This is done before you put it in the vehicle, unless you have one of the complicated systems I mentioned. You don't need to be a mechanic, but it helps to be mechanically inclined and to read lots and lots of information online so that you know what you are doing.

 

Does this mess up your car at all? Or make it wear out sooner?

 

If you always filter properly and always keep water out of the oil and always keep it up to the proper temperature you shouldn't have problems. As for wearing out sooner, it's hard to say. No two cars wear out at the same time. When they do it's often hard to say why. One other possible problem in coking of the injectors, but using biodiesel should clean this coking out.

 

why arent there more people doing it if its so good and why arent there like filling stations for veggie oil?

 

because diesel engine cars/small trucks are fairly uncommon in the united states.
and people are lazy, they'd rather just spend 10 minutes and 50 dollars rather than an hour or two and save fifty.

 

1) corporations have billions invested in making and selling petrol products ...why would they want to switch to alternatives...even if it saves the planet

2) it does require vehicle modifications to be able to use veggie oil, that deterrs alot of people..that and a general lack of knowledge on the subject

3) our society does not practice what is "good" ...people look for quick, and easy, most of the population practice what they are told by the corporates...they tell them how to think and what to buy...most are just mindless purchasing zombies

4) to really reap the benefits of waste veggie oil, it needs to be out of the main stream.....you collecting and filtering the oil for your personal use saves you money and lessons you carbon load output on the enviroment.......once the corporates take over and demand grows, it will lose alot of its benefits for people and the enviroment ...

 

purple-moss has it right, but I agree with #4 the most. The current demand for biodiesel, which is still small, is already rocking the soy and canola markets, causing the prices to go up, and creating the need for more agricultural land to be cleared to grow these crops. And that's not good. Some days I regret that SVO and biodiesel technology exists. What this society needs is NO ALTERNATIVES, so that they just have to give up their driving addictions.
I said I would help people convert for free, but if you are a yuppie with a 2007 Jetta looking for a 'green' way to justify driving out to the ski slopes every weekend or commuting an hour to work every day, then forget it.
I am biased and elitist in my own way, but I'd rather this technology stay with a fringe group of lower income people.