Nissan Patrol 4x4 (Africa)

Still loving the diesel

Sad news today, they cannot keep up with demand.
Seems its time to put up my own plant

I see on gumtree you can buy a plant for about R75K and they give you everything you need to make the first 300L except the cooking oil. But it seems they can also supply that as well. The plant can make 300L at a time and they say you could make it for as cheap as R2.50L

Now back to the initial investment of R75K....

yeah, I think it is more a speed to make the bio diesel than actually them running out of bio diesel.

In the winter months when it is cold it takes a lot more time to process the old oil into Bio Diesel. To give you an interesting insight to Bio diesel. Did you know that to clean the diesel during the process, the manufacturers wash the diesel with water....hahaha.... the common enemy of diesel, however this washing/scrubbing is to remove impurities and is then drained off and the Bio diesel is heated up to remove all the water. When it is cold this takes much longer as the oil is also thicker in winter. You will find that supply is no problem in the summer months.

I'm going on for tank 3 at the moment and the Iron Maiden is running like a dream !!!, still on the old diesel filter too.

Couldn't get in time either so paid R2k for 126L yesterday, could have gotten a lot more chippy juice for that money.

Yeah ... I'm hoping to get 75L tomorrow. They are just battling to produce the quantities needed in the colder weather. I think I'm going to try build up a stock pile, so I'll always be one delivery ahead...haha.... then I'll be in chip top shape...hahaha

Cedric, water works a treat to remove the fine particles in the oil. Fine spray of water over the oil, and as it settles to the bottom, it picks up the rubbish on the way down. Then you just drain off above the water level. Then run it through another water trap at a good temp. I used to set up black PVC pipe out in the sun to heat mine up, then feed it through a very small pipe through a normal water trap of identical spec I have in the car. The water separates easily. It's just time consuming when the oil can only run that fast for the process to be effective. Push it too fast and the fine water droplets could still be in suspension in the oil. My home made setup used to take close on a week to filter 40 liters. All gravity fed, and when it's cold, sometimes the oil would just come to a standstill. Then I have to move it into the sun, or perch a heatgun on the filter housings to get it to flow. But that kinda defeats the object when the fuel is virtually free, but you have to spend money on the electricity to heat things up.

I need to get Parys, I have 40 liters of oil waiting to be picked up now. At least most the gunk has settled nicely over the 3 weeks it has been standing.

Yeah, my brother in law ( Process Engineer ) built a small plant with pumps and heaters and water washers. Washing the diesel with water sounds so absurd though.....hahaha .... but it works 100%

So have you got fuel for tomorrow Cedric?

That will be the test...

Ok... so this morning at +1 deg C, I cycled the glow plugs 3 times to make sure they are still warm. Motor started first time, was a little rough idling for 2 - 3 seconds. There was a bit of white smoke ( un-burnt diesel ), but when i gently pressed the accelerator down the rough idling slowly decreased till I got a smooth idle. this took all of about 6 seconds

The smell so early in the morning was.... exhilarating...

Bear in mind also there is no wind chill factor on the car so I would guess that the +1 degC temp was fairly accurate. Also, I have a mix in the tank of 75L Bio Diesel and 20 L garage Diesel. This also has a huge impact on the gel point of the Bio Diesel. Maybe someone else can give some feedback.

Upside:
engine runs smoother / quieter
no issue with engine start (up to now)
smell
cost

Downside:
fuel leak around injector return lines.
need to possibly replace fuel lines (on my vehicle) with synthetic lines / Viton lines
cost of replacing fuel lines

any advice were to get synthetic fuel lines / Viton lines