Dual Tanks

[POPEYE]

Old thread revival!

Popeye did you get all this working in the end?
Couple of questions 1-this seams a very complicated setup,why do you need the extra rad,
2-is there also a need for the extra wvo fuel pump?as wont the standard pump continue to pull the wvo fuel through?
3-what electric waterpump do you recomend?
4-back to the fuel pumpfor the wvo, would it be ok to just use an intank pump?

This is open to anyone to answer to
cheers rob

Hi Rob, again sorry for the late reply,
no i did'nt finish it, the price of veg oil went so high i lost heart, it was nearly don tho, all that was left was to replace the cheapo switchover valve for a decent one, pipe it and wire it, and sort out the second tank filler,

no you dont need the extra rad, it's just my overheating paranoia,

i'd reccomend a 12v pump from the states, still cheaper than here, i'm running on an old bus 24v pump so it's running half speed, just never got round to replaceing it,

not sure about the in tank pumps tho i dont see why not, it's just the tank i got (110 defender) did'nt have one so was going to fit an in line one

[aviator]

couple of ideas...

So I just found this thread so these ideas may be too little too late but here you go anyway...

1) Instead of using a coil preheat system you might consider a Tanis heat system similar to what is used in aircraft they have several different sizes of "stick-on" radiant heat elements that are used in a number of applications from engine block pre-heat to cabin pre-heat. They are simply attached to the out side surface of the block or floor under the carpet and they really work.
By placing say... 2 on the lower surface of the fuel tank they would heat the whole tank body turning it into a large heatsink... which would be much more efficient then a single point submerged heater and all the issues it causes.
They are 120V powered so you'd need to have an inverter on board to be able to run them on the road. The amp draw is next to nothing so your alternator should be able to handle it and you could plug them into the house at night, the amp draw would be even less at the 220v? 240v? that is used in UK/EU system and is an inductive load so hertz diff. 5[0/60 cycles] means nothing...


Thay are available from most aviation parts sources incl. Aircraft Spruce in the US and on-line for only a few 100 dollars for a complete system.

Aircraft Spruce has a version of what I was talking about called EZheat listing for @177.00USD for a 240v sys.

Tanis systems can be found at tanisaircraft.com. IMO the battery preheat system could be adapted to a tank pre-heat system if one of the engine pre-heaters was not to your liking...

2) Speaking of Aircraft sources has anyone looked into adding Prist (jet fuel anti-icing additive) to the VO mix to prevent icing/gelling?

Hope these ideas helped Aviator

[POPEYE]

Hi, although i've no knowalage about the heaters your talking about i know what you mean, however "over here" i'd imageine it would be pretty dam expensive to obtain aircraft parts, so the next best thing (cheaper) was to use the engines coolant to warm things up, of course this is not much use till the engine warms up hence the two tanks, run it up to temp on diesel then switch over to veg, you can speed up things by useing glow plugs to heat a small tank of veg (swirl tank) sited as near to the injector pump as possible, also you can get "heated tape" that you wrap along the lines to the injectors and fuel lines to and from the tank, also lagging the veg main tank will help,

i remember wanting to "lowrider" the rivera some time back and reading all i could find on the subject (that was before the internet tho) and guys in the US got their parts from aircraft "graveyards), nowt like that here so that was that, too expensive to get it shipped,

good idea of yours tho, cheers

[johnsiddle]

Twin Tank

Hi Popeye
Happy New Year.
Its been a while since I spoke to you last.
I have just fitted my Landy tank in a similar position to yours and today I spent all day plumbing in the water supply from the rear heater to the coil (15mm copper) in my tank.
How ever I did a couple of miles test run and the water at the tank connectors was still cold, I loosened a connector thinking an airlock might have stopped water from getting in but after getting soaked in antifreeze water I decided that the normal pump just can not reach that far back, the pipes to the rear heater are only about 10mm diameter anyway.

Did you have that problem or did you fit your water pump right from the start.
Where did you get your pump???

I got rid of the 2.4 I had after fixing the overheating problem and now have 95 3ltr, much faster car. The problems I had with the Japanese Landair tyres not sticking to the road seems to have gone now I have 50 ltrs veggie to hold them down, I have also learnt how to drive a rear wheel car again after 25+ years in a front wheel drive.

Regards John

[POPEYE]

Hello John, happy new year to you too, bet it's nice driveing the 3lt, wish i could swop sometimes,
regarding the pump i fitted mine as part of the initial set up as i already had it and thought the engines pump would be hard pushed to get it to the back and back if ya see wot i mean, the pump i used however is a 24volt bus pump i liberated from somewhere and as i could'nt afford a 12v one i stuck this in after testing it on 12v in a bucket of water, it's prob running at half speed but still seem'd to pump water fairly well and it does move water round the system ok, keep meaning to replace it with a 12v one but aint got round to it yet, their quite expensive being at around £100 + mark, a bit cheaper from the states but your lible to get hammered for import duty i'd guess, so scrapyard or a caravan pump (if they can deal with continious hot water use), check ebay etc, for 12v car electric water pumps, i think some cars have em, not sure,
post some pics of the new truck and the tank mod when you can!!

just a though but i plumbed mine in at the front heater connections, i think the rear heater pipes are smaller bore, might make a difference!
cheers ian

[johnsiddle]

Heater pipes

Hi Popeye.
Yes the pipes to the rear heater are indeed only about 10mm, what I found today is that if I turn off the the rear heater ie: set to cold the hot water gets to the tank heater good.
Obviously the rear heater is shorting the system out. Not a big problem I hardly ever have anyone in the back seats and if I do it would only be for a short time and the tank probably would have warmed up by then.

The tank heater is really only to help the intank fuel pump that came with the tank
I have also fitted a separate Stainless Steel fuel filter around which I wrapped about 10 turns of 10mm copper pipe and this gets really hot, put some super lagging on left over from my Solar Panel installation.
This in addition to the foot of 28mm copper pipe with a 10mm pipe running thro the middle carrying the fuel as a last heater before the injector pump. I may consider removing this heater since its output is not filtered before it gets to the injector pump, either that or put a small inline filter in with a clear case so I can see whats going on.

I am well into building a centrifuge to finely filter my oil, currently I am waiting for some HTS-2000 alloy brazing rods to braze a lip to the top of an ally saucepan I nicked from the wife. Its being driven straight off the shaft of a washing machine motor and should spin at up to about 5000 rpm, shakes a bit tho.
I will upload some picks when its done and workin.
If it works it should filter to about .5 micron

Regards John

[POPEYE]

Centrifuge eh!! sounds highly techinicle, are you a scientist? you been reading that BJ Blaster link aint ya, he did several methods of filtering and his dad i believe owned a wast oil company which helps, plentiful supply on hand!!!, i'm waiting for some filters from these guys---
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk:80/ws/eBayISAP...B:EOIBSA:UK:11

two with 50 and 10 micron elements in em, got the two cans set up ready, their actually two "aeroplane brand" mango chutney barrels from the indian, they hold around 30 lt's each, all plumbed up with sight glasses and garden taps i can then draw off as i want and stick it straight in the truck or store it in some 20 lt containers, i'll stick a pic up when it's all finished,

if the second tank warms up ok by just turning off the rear heater fine, saves you buying an expensive water pump, only used mine cos i already had it,
when i built my water system for this set up some of the idea was to cool the water as much as poss on it's way back to the engine to help the old "get's bl00dy hot" 2,4 so once it had delivered it's heat to the exchanger and then the tank it's slowed down and cools on it's return, hence the rad over the rear sus and the 2mt lenght of 22mm tube, seems to work along with the fan mod,

saw loads of small inline filters on eblag, just the job, are you connecting the fuel return back into the feed to the IP? or switching it back to the individual tanks? look forward to the pics mate, well done

[johnsiddle]

Re

Hi Mate.
Well my centrifuge is now ready to move to Mk3 spinning pot.
the first one, two stainless steel dog bowls brazed together and a hole cut in the top one was too flimsy. Mk 2 was an alloy saucepan nicked from the kitchen with an ally ring brazed to the top with HTS-2000 worked for about 50ltrs then went a bit wobbly, turns out the base is not too strong.

I am now going smaller, (Mk1 was 10in dia and Mk2 was 8in dia) I am now looking for a stainless biscuit barrel about 5in dia and push the rpm up to about 5k rpm.

The greanteam are pretty good, I have one of the inline filters with a 5 micron filter inside, I bought a pack of three, I use a central heating pump to push things around. Buy a 1 or 5 micron washable filter much more efficient.
Dont buy any of the sock filters unless you are going to filter really hot oil, they clog too easily.

Just added an additional heater to my system, an 11in immersion heater fitted inside a smallish ally Oxygen cylinder I bought with an oxy/accet system but then found I could'nt get the tank refilled (I use oxy from Adams Gas now).
It is fitted just above the pump and heats the oil as it is pumped around, cheaper than heating the whole tank up first. Also if you forget to turn the heater off in the main tank whilst pumping and the oil level drops below the heater you get oil burning in your tank and lots of smoke ( done it twice).
This way as long as oil is pumping then things are OK and if it does catch fire it is contained inside the oxy cylinder which has walls 10mm thick.

Still have not plumbed the the oil part of the second tank as yet.
In fact I wished I had the other day, I was nearly out of veggie so went to the farm where I keep stocks and put 50ltrs in my original tank.
Then found the engine wouldnt start. Thinking it was cuz I was parked on a hill I rolled down to the flat and eventually I started, about 1 mile down the road I ran out of steam, I also noticed my guage was still reading empty, I thought the float had stuck so ignored it and after pumping the fuel filter I got going again for about a mile same thing. this happened twice more finally packing in at the end of my road.
Decided the filter must be blocked and then flattened both batteries the wife brought her citoen c3 and I got it going again. Got home and thought I will just put another 20 ltrs in to loosen the float, the guage went up to quarter full with 70 lts in... No way. I had inadvertantly put the first 50ltrs into the 2nd tank, you remember I have a branch to the second tank in my filler tube.

Was I sick I wasted a whole morning on that escapade... Deeep Joy.

I will take some pics of the project so far tomorrow and post them here.

I was wondering about the return fuel, I thought I would let it pump into the main tank but I do not know the quantity of fuel that gets returned. I guess I will pipe it back into the supply line via the second port in my change over valve and keep the two fuels separate.
By the way I am still using 100% veggie (I was putting 5% diesel or anything else I had lying around but ran out,) and apart from a bit lumpy on start up is working fine, only the one water heater working at present.

going to bed now speak again soon
John

[johnsiddle]

BJ Blaster

I hadnt heard of him before but just found his website.
Will spend most of the day looking at it now.
Thanks
John

[POPEYE]

Hehehe, only prob with haveing two tanks feeds in one filler i guess, bet ya dont do that again,have you fitted a second tank gauge so you can see wots in the veggie tank? i got one for a land rover 110 off ebay,
your really going to town with this filtering, sounds bl00dy complicated, i dont get enough used stuff to justify all that, at the moment i'm just gonna filter it through the greenteam filters and mix with derv, speaking of "greenteam" they aint in my good books, been waiting two weeks and still aint got em, and their not answering my email, i know i paid by cheque but sodding two weeks!!!
think i linked bj blaster's site earlier in this thread, thats where i got the idea for a swirl tank which i though was a good idea but could'nt find out how to controll the level reed switches, since found out about diods which might solve the prob, ie switch need to start an electric pump and keep it pumping till the high level reed is activated switching off the pump, he also ran his return to this tank, it's the electronics that bugger me up
look forward to the pics and if i ever manage to get a ready supply of wvo i'll be asking you questions i think
cheers ian

[johnsiddle]

Centrifuge

Well I have mostly plumbed my tank in.
The Landy intank pump wouldnt pump the veggie but luckily I bought a Lucas fuel pump from a Jag off Ebay before I got the tank and have stuck this in series with the intank one it works a treat. I proved today that the missing 50ltrs deffo went into the wrong tank.

I took the fuel return pipe off and started the engine to see how much returns and it is a lot so I think I will feed it into the veggie supply line. I wont be using much Diesel so a little bit fed in with the veggie wont hurt.

I was wondering what to do about a fuel guage, did you just get the dial bit from a Landy or was there other bits as well.

I saw the swirl tank on BJ's I had wondered what it was when you mentioned it.
Will give it some thought but I am short on space under the bonnet, may have to put it on the otherside over where the turbo is.
A swirl tank would be good for getting rid of air and also water, because my veggie is pumped all the time the engine is switched on there is a supply and return line but when I switch off the veggie runs back into the tank so I get air pumped up when I first start which does clear but would be better to get rid of before the valve switches over. (I have a 50 degreeC thermal switch mounted on my fuel filter heater coil).

The cooking tank is lagged with B&Q plastic loft insulation covered with black plastic. It keeps hot for about 10 hours.

I have posted the pictures of my centrifuge, self explanitory I think, also my cooking tank.

If you need any help with electronics give me a shout I started life as an Electronics Engineer in the RAF before going into computer repair in civvy street

[johnsiddle]

Swirl tank

The reed switch would close when the float and magnet reaches it.
It would then switch a relay on (the relay can handle the current required by the pump) and so switch off the feed to the electric fuel pump.

easy peasy. I can help you if you have a problem.
John

[POPEYE]

What a piece of kit mate, excellent, i dont pretend to know exactly how it works as once the price of svo went up i more or less gave up, as i said i dont get enough wvo to make it worthwhile me doing what you have, i though twice about ordering the filters etc from greenteam (phoned em btw and it's being sent) that was £44!! just got sick of useing the five funnel and bog paper method, anyway hats off to ya for your work there, your a man after bj blasters heart
the land rover fuel gauge was just the gauge nowt else, not even a wireing diag but Andy (M25A30), user name, but i think i got the roads wrong) had a defender and helped me out there, the back connections are marked and if i remember one is 12v live (ign) one to the tank sender, and one earth, i can check i think if you need more info, thanks for the offer of help and if i should decide to finish it i'll give you a call, i would really need to junk the "pollak" changeover valve and replace it with the supposeidly much better "prevokil" german one, a bit expensive but the best around i'm told, got the pollok from the US, cheap and it looks it,
cheers ian

[johnsiddle]

Swirl Tank

Had a good thought about the swirl tank whilst lying in bed this morning (nothing else to do in bed) and decided to make one.
Went to the local breakers looking for a landy guage and spotted the ideal swirl tank, an expansion tank from a metro. I saw some others and ended up bringing home two types but one is too big. Also got some tops off of various brake fluid resevoirs (never cuold smell) one was just right with a reed switch built in.
So now I am building some electronics to drive a relay. So with some hole cutting and some hotmelt glue fixed the reed assy in place. Got some relays as well.
I love this retirement job, I can do what I want when I want.

I am only getting about 25 ltrs of veggie free at present but that equates to £25 a week so well worth the effort. I went to birmingham just before xmas and bought 750 ltrs of veggie at 40p ltr got about 200 left but thats kept me going I use about 50ltrs a week running a taxi for my grandaughter to/from the local night clubs.

Will post pics when finished.

Looking at the landy wiring diagrams on the net thefuel guages are wired the same as the surf so I am going to see if I can see the yellow/red wire from the surf tank and cut it and fit the landy sensor in via the contacts on my pollock valve. I can use the built in guage for both then.

John

[johnsiddle]

Swirl Tank

Finished my swirl tank today.
Originally had all the waste oil returned to the swirl tank but before the engine had heated up and switched tanks the swirl tank overflowed.
Had to drive around until the heater switched the veggie tank on.
I have changed it now, all the waste from the engine goes thro the pollak valve, the raw diesel gets sent down the return pipe to Tank1 and the waste veggie gets sent back into the swirl tank, helps to heat the incoming veggie oil.

Had to block off my return pipe to tank2 cuz I lost too much pressure going thro the inline filter. Will remove it completely tomorrow

The metro expansion tank works a treat. Just the right size and even looks as tho it was designed to be there and has all the right pipes, the outlet has to be reduced from 15mm to 10mm tho, easy with copper fittings.
The lid is perforated at the top to stop tank pressure build up.

Made a solid state relay but it could not handle the current for the pump so did a second one with a normal relay and a transistor to buffer the reed switch contacts. Perfect.

Will concentrate on the fuel guage wiring tomorrow.

Regards John