veg oil filtering questions.

[muddle]

I'm in the last stage of filtering veg, I think.....

I filtered it with j cloths to remove big stuff, then left it for a month, gave me time to get proper filters.

Today im filtering it to 1 micron through a big bag filter thing, its definitley doing the trick, got a before and after glass of it and I was suprised with the difference.

Now then, can I use it as soon as I have filtered it, or do I need to filter it again or let it settle before use. I hope 1 micron is good enough.

Thanks for any help.

[DavidB]

I'm in the last stage of filtering veg, I think.....

I filtered it with j cloths to remove big stuff, then left it for a month, gave me time to get proper filters.

Today im filtering it to 1 micron through a big bag filter thing, its definitley doing the trick, got a before and after glass of it and I was suprised with the difference.

Now then, can I use it as soon as I have filtered it, or do I need to filter it again or let it settle before use. I hope 1 micron is good enough.

Thanks for any help.

Yep that's what I filter mine down to. I let the collected oil sit for a few days, and then pour through a sieve into a 5 micron sock, which sits on top of an upturned plant pot (bottom cut out of it) inside a 1 micron sock which hangs into a 40 gallon drum. You can get the filter socks off this guy http://myworld.ebay.co.uk/filterbagm...84.m1543.l2533

[muddle]

Yea thats the bags I got, have a point at the end which is handy. So can I use it as soon as it is filtered?

[DavidB]

Absolutely.... At the minute (ie winter), I pump 20 litres straight out into a 25 litre drum, and mix 2 litres of petrol and 3 litres of diesel, and shake well. Pour it into the tank and then top up with more diesel.

I guess I am using about 35-50% vegoil in a full tank at the minute. It varies based on the length of the journey I have to do eg: tomorrow I have 2.5hour drive to a site, so will put in more vegoil and let it warm up really well in the morning.

In the summer I was using only 20 litres of vegoil with 1 litre of petrol.

I definately notice the difference in lack of oomph between vegoil and diesel, but hey ho I drive a 2.4, so once your used to not overtaking it doesn't matter!

[muddle]

Excellent, but why mix with petrol, I was going to just run 40veg 60 diesel.

[gilly-06]

currently im running 100% veg oil (fresh) 10l for £9.99

mines seems to run really well with it even with the cold weather and haven't noticed any power loss

my friends have an isuzu bighorn and the other has an l200 and dont like the codl weather with veg

we did a test the other night 5/6 lt veg oil in a clear bottle with 2lt of diesel and 2 lt of petrol

and the veg stayed on the bottom then diesel then petrol on top even shoot it about and didnt seem to mix at all

[DavidB]

To be honest mixing the petrol comes via recommendations from other longer users of vegoil from both this forum and vegetableoildiesel.com. The reason is that it dilutes the vegoil much thinner than the same volume of diesel does.

For a full year I didn't bother with petrol as an additive, but then had to replace the injectors this spring, because of fairly loud 'knocking'. The mechanic tested the old injectors in his workshop and said the spray pattern was pretty poor compared to new ones. Equally this may have been due to old age, but others have said the injectors aer fairly tough in the Surf, so I assumed it was down to the vegoil.

To try and ease the wear and tear on them this year so have been using the petrol mix since then. I did do a comparative test in the spring of mixing 10% petrol to vegoil and the same using diesel in separate containers. After letting them sit for weeks, I showed them to a random neighbour who agreed that the petrol mix was definately more runny....

But I havent done it again in the cold weather to see if they separate, but they definately mix initally when I shake them in my 25 litre drum - I actually checked that this happened at the weekend. Maybe Gilly's test results, occured at zero or below, and I have yet to experience it not mixing.

Its freezing here now and I have to top up tonight, so I'll report back....

[gilly-06]

To be honest mixing the petrol comes via recommendations from other longer users of vegoil from both this forum and vegetableoildiesel.com. The reason is that it dilutes the vegoil much thinner than the same volume of diesel does.

For a full year I didn't bother with petrol as an additive, but then had to replace the injectors this spring, because of fairly loud 'knocking'. The mechanic tested the old injectors in his workshop and said the spray pattern was pretty poor compared to new ones. Equally this may have been due to old age, but others have said the injectors aer fairly tough in the Surf, so I assumed it was down to the vegoil.

To try and ease the wear and tear on them this year so have been using the petrol mix since then. I did do a comparative test in the spring of mixing 10% petrol to vegoil and the same using diesel in separate containers. After letting them sit for weeks, I showed them to a random neighbour who agreed that the petrol mix was definately more runny....

But I havent done it again in the cold weather to see if they separate, but they definately mix initally when I shake them in my 25 litre drum - I actually checked that this happened at the weekend. Maybe Gilly's test results, occured at zero or below, and I have yet to experience it not mixing.

Its freezing here now and I have to top up tonight, so I'll report back....

yes please do report back with the results could have well been below 0 out side but not certain we were all confused when it didnt mix as you said near everyone we have spoken to says the same it thins the diesel down but you may be onto something with keeping the wear to a minimum on the injectors cant be cheap for a new set/reconditioned

[DavidB]

Well everything mixed fine, though the air temp wasn't quite down to freezing point - I didn't let it stand for long, but I could see that the colour density was the same top to bottom with the headlamp shining through it....

[kamaangir]

10% petrol reduces the viscosity by about 50%. This helps the cold veg get pumped when you are starting. I have found that having a small percentage of diesel along with petrol helps when you start. I used to get really bad hunting and rough idling when on 100% veg in cold weather.

Adding 10% petrol also winterises your veg, this means that your liquid veg will stay liquid down to lower temps, adding a bit of diesel also helps as diesel has stuff added to it that suppresses the forming of wax (solid fats in case of veg).

When running veg you have to do quicker oil changes, (4-5k) rather than 10k, also keep an eye on blowby or high crank case pressure which may lead to polymerising of sump oil and dead engine (I did kill a vw like that a few months ago)

Try to avoid too many cold starts and short journeys, every now and then get the engine nice and hot and give it a blast on an A road (aka Italian tune up). I have water injection on my current car, this will get rid of ring gumming and subsequent issues.

Having said all that the 3.0 surfs (the ones I had) are pretty tolerant and tough engines. Injectors are a service item that need to be looked at every 100K or so anyway, but running 100% veg does seem to coke them up more than diesel.

On the other hand since late 2010 I think I have only put 2 or 3 full tanks of fuel in my car.

As for filtering go to asda/tesco and buy cheap pillow cases stick them inside your sock filters and when they start to fill up with solid fats just chuck them. Makes your filters last much longer.

Have a look at biopowered.co.uk for more filtering ideas and some tech info on veg and bio.

[Surfboy]

Settle your collected oil for a week or so, pour it off the whites and other crud at the bottom.

Add 10% petrol and in 48 hours, all the suspended water and smaller particles will have dropped.

Pour this off again into your pillowcase inside a 5 or 1 micron bag and then into vehicle.

The petrol makes the oil nice and runny and so it goes through the filters quickly.

I also add approx 1000:1 Vegiboost and the same quantity of acetone, which both [apparently] aid in combustion and spray pattern.

I used to do the whole heating thing, multiple filters etc but I have settled on the above method which works fine for me.