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Bio-Diesel

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  • 28-02-2006 2:00am
    #1
    BeardyGit
    Closed Accounts Posts: 3,946 ✭✭✭


    Hey eco-warriors.

    Looking for some advice here. I drive a couple of big, old-ish, rather un-green Landrovers. One is a classic (really, 35 years old) which is a hobby - More time maintaining than driving and the other I use occasionally in the evenings and weekends when I have a legitimate reason to drive a 4x4. I have a little 1.1 Litre Peugeot 106 for driving around town and longer journeys.

    Both the Landrovers are diesel. Yeah, smokey old diesel. 2.5 litres of sulphur emitting fossil fuel guzzling diesel engine in each. But like I said - one does around 2k per annum and the other does maybe 6-8k for essential and genuine reasons. Both vehicles do around 28-35MPG on average - Equally as good as a friends 2L BMW 3 series.

    I spend a lot of time in the countryside, hillwalking and the like so I'm aware of the impact my actions can have on the immediate environment around me. I can also fully understand the concerns many of you might have about 4x4 or perhaps more accurately SUV use. A combination of reasons has led me to investigate the possibility of running the landrovers on Bio-Diesel and mechanically this shouldn't be a problem. I know that I can reduce my fossil fuel consumption by 30% and of course reduce (albeit by a very small ammount) the costs for fueling. To be honest, it's quite a hassle to mix this fuel myself, store it and arrange to pay duty (I have to keep everything above board legally) but I'd be willing to do it if it helps reach a balance between necessity and responsible motoring.

    What I'm looking for is some sort of idea whether or not this is a move the Green Machine would welcome? The problem is that I've recently been the victim of verbal abuse which very nearly escalated into physical abuse. This followed me returning to the car to find the tyres had been stabbed and a couple of punks were standing nearby with smug grins on their faces. It's not the first time - The same truck was recently targeted in a car park where I'd stopped off to pick up some parts on my way back from the hills. In the first instance a Greenpeace designed poster had been STUCK to the windscreen. Unfortunately the latest tyre stabbing event will have to be categorised as a similarly motivated attack because of the shouts of abuse from who I believe were the two offenders as they ran away from me. The cost of this latest attack (which my Insurance won't cover) was almost €500 which I've had to pay out of my own pocket to make sure the vehicle is available when I really do need it.

    In the UK, legitimate 4x4 drivers have had to suffer this sort of abuse for quite some time. It's so very disappointing to encounter the same problems here in Ireland - I thought we had more sense to be honest. But hey, that's the way it works I guess. Is there any way that an understanding could be reached between those of us who would gladly modify our vehicles to run greener fuels so that our vehicles would have some sort of protection against what appear to be ever more militant activists? Some sort of sticker? Anything?

    I'm willing to do my bit - But not if I have to keep paying out for repairs after mindless acts of vandalism.

    Gil

    [edit: typo]


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    #2
    CJhaughey
    Registered Users Posts: 14,906 ✭✭✭✭CJhaughey


    That sounds like two ****.
    I would hesitate to describe the action of car vandals as militant activists.
    I don't really think that anythiong you do would placate these kinds of individuals, If people really thought about cars they would realise that most of the energy that a vehicle consumes in it's lifetime is actually in the manufacturing of the vehicle itself, not the running of it.
    So in actual fact the greenest thing that you can do is to run your old LR'sas long as possible.
    Have you spoken to Greenpeace about the vandalism? I would definately make them aware that literature belonging to them was stuck to your vehicle, and make noises about compensation/legal action etc. For all you know it could be a Greenpeace statement.
    I would think that a shotgun filled with rocksalt would probably be the best deterrent for acts of mindless vandalism, but thats a solution that many wouldn't agree with.


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    #3
    Evergreen
    Registered Users Posts: 254 ✭✭Evergreen


    Hello,

    I have spent a lot of time in Austria with my business and they are an extremly eco friendly bunch of people over there. During our many discussions we encountered the idea of running your diesel on rape oil, 100% rape oil not 30% bio diesel mix.

    You can get your landrover converted here in Ireland but it costs an arm an a leg to do so because of the high tech equipment that is required to allow your engine to run on vegtable oil. The thing is though that you don't need to go to this expense, you can do the conversion yourself and at a very resonable cost.

    The reason why vegtable oil does not run smoothly in a diesel is due to it's viscosity at ambient temperature. The trick is to heat the oil up to 80° C before it enters the engines fuel filter and pump, at this temperature the oile flows and burns pretty much like diesel. Installed systems are expensive because they put in heating elements that heat the oil from cold each time you get into your car or truck.

    The homemade way of doing this is to have two fuel tanks, a small one full of diesel and a normal sized one full of veggie oil.

    What you do is you use the engine heat to bring the veggie oil temp up to 80° C either by bolting a small metal container (approx 0.5L) to the engine. The veggie oil flows through this enroute to the fuel pump and uses conduction rather 12 v to heat the oil. Or you route the engine coolant in such a way that it heats the veggie oil feed line before it reaches the fuel pump.

    However, for this to work you need to have a hot engine, therefore you need to start it on diesel and switch to veggie oil when it becomes hot enough.

    When you have it running you then put a sticker on you back window to say it runs on vegtable oil, this should save your tyres.


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    #4
    Nukem
    Moderators, Entertainment Moderators Posts: 4,082 Mod ✭✭✭✭Nukem


    Seen a D4D avensis converted over to rapeseed oil and it worked grand but it was expensive. The guy was from meath i think and he made his own as well.
    On the other hand only know of one place selling bio-diesel and unfortuanetly its in Cork - but if ya ring them they may know of a seller in Dublin area. Its a small petrol station South of Charleville (the name escapes me) will let ya know Sunday il be driving through there again!

    Nukem

    EDIT:also see here http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=285676&highlight=bio-diesel


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    #5
    Evergreen
    Registered Users Posts: 254 ✭✭Evergreen


    There are lot's of places selling rape oil now, two off the top of my head are Rathdrum in Wicklow and Gorey Co Wexford. Approx price is EUR 0.70 per litre


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    #6
    Takeshi_Kovacs
    Registered Users Posts: 1,115 ✭✭✭Takeshi_Kovacs


    Evergreen wrote:
    There are lot's of places selling rape oil now, two off the top of my head are Rathdrum in Wicklow and Gorey Co Wexford. Approx price is EUR 0.70 per litre

    Is rapeseed oil getting dearer though? A few months ago you could get oil from lidl for 63 cent a litre, now it has gone up to 69 cent (not a huge increase, still an increase though..). Also i tried a local cash and carry for a 20 l drum (which i thought would be cheaper). They were looking for 85 cent a litre, it seems buying in bulk is dearer than buying in small quantities:confused:
    Also there is the option of getting free fuel, by collecting waste oil from restaurants,chippers etc, which i wouldn't mind doing (even with having to collect it, clean it, dewater ), but down near me, nearly all of it is collected by some company that sends it up the north to be processed i think.

    Still there is the messy option of using animal fats as fuel... not sure how much that would work out per litre though)


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    #7
    Evergreen
    Registered Users Posts: 254 ✭✭Evergreen


    I was in Lidl the other day and they are selling vegge oil at 62 cent per litre, cheaper than anywhere else except you have to buy it in 2 litre plastic bottle :(

    Actually using waste cooking oil from chip shops is the easiest to use, you filter out the food particles by pouring the oil though a doubled over sheet or something similar. Then add about 5ml of white spirit for every 25 litres of oil and give it a good mix around.

    Becuase the waste oil has been heated and reheated many times it has in effect become more refined and therefore thinner. As a result you can use this oil in your car without making any modifications or additions to the engine. However, if you drive a HDI then you should try it out with a small amount of oil first - the problem with HDI (High Density Injection) engines is the size of the gap in the fuel injector that atomizes the fuel, it may not be large enough to handle this oil.


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    #8
    Takeshi_Kovacs
    Registered Users Posts: 1,115 ✭✭✭Takeshi_Kovacs


    I was in Lidl the other day and they are selling vegge oil at 62 cent per litre, cheaper than anywhere else except you have to buy it in 2 litre plastic bottle :(
    Actually using waste cooking oil from chip shops is the easiest to use, you filter out the food particles by pouring the oil though a doubled over sheet or something similar. Then add about 5ml of white spirit for every 25 litres of oil and give it a good mix around.
    The only time i heard of this mix was when top gear attempted to make their own biodiesel, and used white spirit to supposedly thin out the oil, in order to burn in the engine. Looked it up and all the experienced biodiesel'ers agree that this is not good for your engine, white spirit will not turn veggie oil into biodiesel..
    Becuase the waste oil has been heated and reheated many times it has in effect become more refined and therefore thinner. As a result you can use this oil in your car without making any modifications or additions to the engine. However, if you drive a HDI then you should try it out with a small amount of oil first - the problem with HDI (High Density Injection) engines is the size of the gap in the fuel injector that atomizes the fuel, it may not be large enough to handle this oil.

    Never heard this statement before man, waste oil does not become more refined or thinner from repeated use, in fact it is a much poorer purity than virgin oil, mostly from free fatty acids (next time you are changing the oil in your own chipper pan, pour the used oil into a glass container, and let it settle for a few days. You'll be surprised by the amount of sludge that will settle out...).
    And you would be very foolish to poor this into your fuel tank without proper mods to the engine (unless its an old merc engine which will burn practically anything..)Firstly your injector pump could give up the ghost (especially if it is a lucas) as the unheated oil is not viscous enough.
    Secondly there is a high chance that the standard injectors will not be able to fully atomise the oil into a fine mist inside the combustion chamber, instead they will spurt out droplets of oil onto the sides of the piston chamber where they will not burn, instead they will form a greasy layer like that you see on a chip pan, which could eventually cover up the injector itself (not good).

    You should google biodiesel e.t.c. and you will get all the good websites describing how to safely use veggie oil as fuel for the diesel engine...
    That price you got in lidl looks good though. The 2 litre bottles would be annoying though (i guess there would be lot of trips to recycling depot..)


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    #9
    Evergreen
    Registered Users Posts: 254 ✭✭Evergreen


    Takeshi_Kovacs wrote:
    Never heard this statement before man, waste oil does not become more refined or thinner from repeated use, in fact it is a much poorer purity than virgin oil.

    Agreed, I probably used the wrong thermanology there, just making the point that the oil would be thinner.

    I have seen this on Top Gear also the guys filtered the oil and added white spirit then ran a merc onit for a few hours. It was also on another show on RTE just this week or two gone by, can't remember the name, they gave the waste veg oil the same treatment and used it to pour a VW golf


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    #10
    Keeks
    Registered Users Posts: 2,199 ✭✭✭Keeks


    Check out this http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel.html

    Bascially everhything you need to know about making home made biodiesel


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    #11
    Seagull76
    Closed Accounts Posts: 5 ✭Seagull76


    "Have you spoken to Greenpeace about the vandalism? I would definately make them aware that literature belonging to them was stuck to your vehicle, and make noises about compensation/legal action etc. For all you know it could be a Greenpeace statement."

    Good luck with converting your car to a more greener fuel.

    Well, just to reply to the above, even if the people attacking your car was using a GP poster, GP DO NOT use vandalism in their actions, so it cannot have been them.

    Good luck and maybe you want to join a virtual journey around the World http://oceans.greenpeace.org


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