Make your own Biodiesel Part 1
There are at least three methods to run a diesel motor on biofuel using veggie oils, animal fats or both. All 3 are used with both fresh and used oils.
1. Use the oil simply as it is-- generally called SVO fuel (straight grease);
2. Mix it with kerosene (paraffin) or petroleum diesel fuel, or with biodiesel, or blend it with a solvent, or with gas;
3. Convert it to biodiesel.
The very first two techniques sound easiest, however, as so typically in life, it's not rather that basic.
1. Mixing it
Vegetable oil is much more viscous (thicker) than either petro-diesel or biodiesel. The function of mixing it or blending it with other fuels is to lower the viscosity to make it thinner so that it streams more freely through the fuel system into the combustion chamber.
If you're mixing veg-oil with petroleum diesel or kerosene (like # 1 diesel) you're still utilizing fossilfuel-- cleaner than most, but still unclean enough, lots of would say. Still, for every gallon of
vegetable oil you use, that's one gallon of fossil-fuel saved, which much less climate-changing carbon in the environment.
People use various blends, ranging from 10% vegetable oil and 90% petro-diesel to 90% grease and 10% petro-diesel. Some individuals simply utilize it that method, launch and go, without pre-heating it (which makes veg-oil much thinner), or even utilize pure veggie oil without pre-heating it, which would make it much thinner.
You might get away with it with an older Mercedes 5-cylinder IDI diesel, which is a really tough and tolerant motor-- it won't like it but you most likely will not kill it. Otherwise, it's not wise.
To do it appropriately you'll need what totals up to an SVO system with fuel pre-heating anyway, preferably using pure petro-diesel or biodiesel for starts and stops. (See next.) In which case there's no requirement for the mixes.
Blends with various solvents and/or with unleaded gas are "experimental at best", little or nothing is understood about their impacts on the combustion attributes of the fuel or their long-term effects on the engine.
Higher is not the only issue with utilizing grease as fuel. Veg-oil has different chemical residential or commercial properties and combustion qualities from the petroleum diesel fuel for which diesel motor and their fuel systems are designed.
Diesel engines are high-tech machines with extremely exact fuel requirements, particularly the more contemporary, cleaner-burning diesels (see The TDI-SVO controversy).
They're tough but they'll just take so much abuse. There's no assurance of it, but utilizing a blend of up to 20% veg-oil of great quality is stated to be safe enough for older diesels, particularly in summer.
Otherwise utilizing veg-oil fuel requires either an expert SVO solution or biodiesel. Mixes and blends are normally a bad compromise. But mixes do have a benefit in winter.
As with biodiesel, some kerosene or winterised petro-diesel fuel blended with straight vegetable oil lowers the temperature level at which it begins to gel. (See Using biodiesel in winter) More about fuel blending and blends.