WVO preperation

jgra1 · Post by **jgra1** » 07 Dec 2011, 15:16

chaps, I have been offered 300L of wvo later on.. it is 'settled' and has had a basic filter.. dont know how fine, think cotton..
it's not cheap, but still a lot cheaper than Derv..

what should I do with it now? (I normally buy WVO already 'done')

It is not supopsed to have much water in..
Should I,

filter 5 and then 1 Micron
heat it
add cetane?

many thanks
John

Dommo · Post by **Dommo** » 07 Dec 2011, 21:33

jgra1 wrote:chaps, I have been offered 300L of wvo later on.. it is 'settled' and has had a basic filter.. dont know how fine, think cotton..
it's not cheap, but still a lot cheaper than Derv..

what should I do with it now? (I normally buy WVO already 'done')

It is not supopsed to have much water in..
Should I,

filter 5 and then 1 Micron
heat it
add cetane?

many thanks
John

Id take a couple of samples, stick it in a saucepan and heat to over 100 degrees C, if it starts spitting and so on there IS water inside, if it doesn't there isn't water in. I only ever filter as far as 5 micron and have only changed my fuel filter twice in 3 years, and one of those wasn't needed as there was an air leak in the fuel lines which turned out to be the diesel primer (which I thought it was a blocked filter).

I've never bothered adding cetane to it, just run it at a low WVO/diesel concentration this time of the year, I'd not go above 50/50 to be honest with you!

jgra1 · Post by **jgra1** » 08 Dec 2011, 12:43

thanks Dommo, will try that test..

John

Post by **CitroJim** » 08 Dec 2011, 19:44

Can you actually buy Cetane (Hexadecane) then?

It's great stuff as it has a cetane rating of 100 and an octane rating of -30

It's normal use is as a calibration fuel for determining the centane value of a fuel sample...

addo · Post by **addo** » 08 Dec 2011, 20:36

Is it made from cetaceans?

4 tankfuls (the 300 litres) sounds like a good sized trial batch for refining. I'd be tempted to see if a storage type hot water heater could be hacked up to preheat the oil and aid pumping through filters...

jgra1 · Post by **jgra1** » 09 Dec 2011, 16:27

I ended up buying 400L on Weds eve..

and in a rush at lunchtime I poured 40L in - 20L was crystal clear, the other barrel was murky, and definately had some sediments in the bottom, which I left behind where possible...

I will do the boil test over the weekend..

one day I am going to scoop the bottom of the tank, just to see what is on there..

thankfully I have two new filters in the boot.. got to drive a few miles around the area tonight and tomorrow morning,,,

think I will carry a sleeping bag in the car from now on........

Post by **CitroJim** » 09 Dec 2011, 16:49

jgra1 wrote: think I will carry a sleeping bag in the car from now on........

And enough tools to swap a filter John

You'll be OK

jgra1 · Post by **jgra1** » 09 Dec 2011, 16:59

jgra1 · Post by **jgra1** » 10 Dec 2011, 17:19

well...

sure enough the yellow light of death appeared, about 40 miles in..
i got to my destination ok, and did a filter swap. at that point I noticed the primer bulb was sucked in

In an effort to get home ok, I got my mate to blow back from the bulb to tank, then (too late) made the classic mistake of opening the filler cap

WVO showers (with some atomisation) are greasy

I got home fine, and pulled the pick up filter system out and apart.. and it was not that bad... although I guess if there was something blocking it, it was long gone back into the tank now..
I blew compressed air and got everything nice and clean..

I looked into the tank, I dont know what i was expecting to see, maybe the bottom, but no chance

looked like gravy!
a quick scrape of the tank bottom revealed nothing..

The friend (who normally supplies my WVO) made an interesting point.. In his opinion, even if the WVO has been filtered, when it is cold stored, it can and will reglobulate..

I am seriously thinking I need the fuel up to 70C before it even gets to the filter, if I am going to persue Winter WVO as I always have..

J

Post by **CitroJim** » 10 Dec 2011, 17:34

Sorry John, the description of the WVO shower did make me laugh

You surely do need to get a good fuel heater going along with a twin-tank system perhaps? Otherwise it's back to DERV for the winter...

I had thoughts of using an Eberspacher as a fuel heater but the big problem with those is they're fussy little tykes and will only run reliably on pukka diesel. They're no good on SVO and they don't even like biodiesel apparently...

jgra1 · Post by **jgra1** » 10 Dec 2011, 17:46

what about this Jim?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SVO-WVO-DIESE ... 41604aee9f" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

i wont stop wvo, until it stops me

Post by **CitroJim** » 10 Dec 2011, 18:16

jgra1 wrote:
what about this Jim?

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/SVO-WVO-DIESE ... 41604aee9f" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;

John, forgive my skepticism but I really cannot see how one smallish glowplug in an alloy block can possibly help matters...

I see it like this. Switch on and yes, the glowplug will indeed heat a small amount of cold WVO in the block but what about all the cold oil in the tank and even more to the point, how about the considerable amount of very cold oil in the injection pump. It's not going to touch it. Now, given that the engine starts, as soon as the injection pump lift pump starts to circulate oil, any vaguely warm oil from the heater will go straight back to a cold tank and this piffling little heater will be confronted with a considerable flow of very cold oil which it just hasn't got the power to heat instantly or at all. Net result - a drain of 170W from your battery to achieve nothing at all.

As i see it, the only answer is a twin tank where you purge all oil out of the injection pump at the end of a journey and replace it with DERV. When you restart you restart on DERV and whilst running on DERV have another pump start up which circulates the WVO from the main tank running through a biggish plate heat exchanger running off the cooling system. In this way, the WVO in the tank will be warmed up and when you switch over to WVO it'll be nicely warm and will not immediately be cooled as the injection pump will be nice and warm by then.

To warm potentially 60 l of WVO in the tank will take some power. The little Eberspacher on the HDi is a 3KW water heater heating some 7 l of coolant and it's by no means instant.

How about having a small electric heater in the WVO tank, say something like a fish tank heater, that keeps the WVO warm overnight? But you'd also need to still twin-tank as there's no easy way of keeping the oil in the injection pump warm unless you could somehow wrap it in heating tape perhaps...

Bottom line, the WVO has to be heated before you can use it and that means circulating it through a heat exchanger that's up to the job...

jgra1 wrote:i wont stop wvo, until it stops me

Good

I really do like that attitude

lexi · Post by **lexi** » 10 Dec 2011, 18:22

The best thing to do with it is heat the 300 litres till smoking and then throw in a very large cow..........it will feed family for a month

Having done the whole Bio diesel thing I don't know how you can be bothered. It don't matter what or how.......like s*x it ends up a messy business.

jgra1 · Post by **jgra1** » 10 Dec 2011, 18:25

you may not like it Jim when I have to beg for help stuck in some wiltshire village

re: pre heating...

well i was thinking more about giving my filter a longer life, and an easier time?

I have been running (virtually) nothing but WVO for the last 3 years, and really cant say anything bad has happened.. just the odd filter change..
the car starts well with the cold WVO in the pump..

it was just the comment today about cold WVO reforming into larger compounds, (over a period of days/weeks in a barrel ) - even if it was filtered at 1Mc.. I just thought that even applying some heat to the fuel before the filter would help? I can carry on like i am, and I should survive another winter ok

famous last words.,.

regarding the cold fuel issue, I know some folks like to route the leak off back into the inlet, in the engine bay, rather than that perilous cold journey back to the tank?

lol Lexi

its not Bio, it's an old xanty that has ran very happily for 60,000 miles on WVO

I think it has cost me 10 filters and that's it?

edit..

to reiterate

:

I have been buying WVO from the oilamn for a few years, and never had any major problems.. I dont have any strict regime regarding DERV/Unleaded or anything else to add.. I often just pour WVO in and off I smell - i mean go!

I dont touch the stuff in terms of making it myself

Post by **CitroJim** » 10 Dec 2011, 18:39

jgra1 wrote:you may not like it Jim when I have to beg for help stuck in some wiltshire village

I'll never forget that adventure John

Even now I carry a spare filter in the car just in case I get the call

Ahh, right, I see where you're coming from

So, the fuel is below the cloud point and plugging the filter...

Now, how about a coolant heated pre-heater? Something like this from a Landy perhaps?

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