Suitability of my car for using Biodiesel.

SeanW

Hi everyone, I just bought my first car today (perhaps not the greenest thing to talk about on an environmental forum, but what the hell
I'm feeling pretty happy) :D:D:D:D

For 4 reasons, two related to performance and two related to environmental "footprint" concers, I wanted a diesel and searched hard to find one in my price range and in good shape.

I found it today (well yesterday now) down in Tipperary of all places, a 99 Toyota Avensis with 180,000-odd miles on the clock. As an aside, I got the whole way from Tipp back to Longford on about €7 in fuel, so that's another reason for me to .

There is a place over in Meath someplace that sells biodiesel of some sort to the general public, and I would like more details on whether I should use this in my car.

I read a few things about changing over from dino-diesel to biodiesel and there are some things that need to be watched, for example cars with natural rubber hoses (very old I think) can't use biodiesel and some of those Common Rail Diesel yokes don't seem to like it either, but that affects new(er) cars.

What concerns me most though is that I read biodiesel has a solvent effect, so if you've got lots of gunk in your fuel tank from years of using dino-diesel, which this car most likely has, you have to get your fuel filters changed frequently, since the biodiesel will semi-dissolve that gunk and bring it into the fuel supply.

Has anyone done anything similar (switched an older diesel car from fossil to bio diesel) and have any experiences to share?

SeanW

Could a Mod please move this thread to an appropriate Motors forum?

mike65

Just copy the text over, it'll be quicker!

On a side note, maybe its me the whole bio-diesel thing/excitment appears to have died on its arse.

djpbarry

Moved from Green Issues - mods, do as you will.