Vegetable as Fuel for Diesel Cars

Stan 10

Been listening to Pat Kenny talking to some one about using Vegetable Oil as fuel instead of diesel. He says it works well but costs €1600 to convert anyone tried it yet?

Stan

iregk

this was done in the early 90's in england during fuel price wars. Tt works but apparently you have to put up with the smell of a chip van!

ciarsd

a taxi man was filling me in on his project over the weekend - converting an old VW Passat diesel to run on used vegetable oil from the local chippies.
if he's successful he will convert his daily driver also. his main worry now is the supply of oil from the chippies

he's already got the container etc out the back for holding his supply

Stephen

I thought that was illegal (or at least, not strictly legal) here, i.e. if customs dipped your tank and found anything besides normal diesel (i.e. something you don't have to pay ridiculous tax rates on) they'd 'do' you for it.

I may be talking through my hole btw, this was picked up from some posts here from months ago

Our man in Havana

Stephen wrote:

I thought that was illegal (or at least, not strictly legal) here, i.e. if customs dipped your tank and found anything besides normal diesel (i.e. something you don't have to pay ridiculous tax rates on) they'd 'do' you for it.

I may be talking through my hole btw, this was picked up from some posts here from months ago

Yep Stephen, you are right. You must pay fuel tax on the fuel in a road vehicle, be it white diesel or chip oil. They would prosecute you for the same offence as using green diesel.

The UK went thru a chip oil as fuel phase but HM customs and excise soon but a stop to it. The same will happen here too.

prospect

I thought the Irish government recently lifted the tax on 'bio-diesel'.

There is a website about this, if i find it i'll post it up.

prospect

here is a thread about it from the green issues forum:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=285676

opto

Check out http://www.dieselveg.com/ they have a lot of info and kit prices, Also there are a few people starting to supply biodiesel.

ciarsd

interesting article in this mornings irish times on this topic.

Here's a useful site for contacts also:
http://www.ecocar.ie/

Ratchet

http://www.greasecar.com/

cashmni1

I belive that the conversion will work fine and you will be able to run on the oil but the engine will be down on power. (so much so that the idea never took off before)

Dilbert75

In reality, while the calorific value (energy per litre) of biodiesel might be lower than mineral diesel, the effect is negligible to most drivers. Not sure what this difference is in the case of PPO but in esterified Rapeseed and Sunflower oils, the calorific value is something like 5 or 10% lower than mineral diesel. But drivers notice little difference in day to day use.

And in actual fact, the smell from the exhaust is not too bad. In an inclosed space, chipper smells beat the hell out of diesel smog.