Fuel/Energy alternatives.

[tony]

Mythbusters just ran a show on waste vege oil as a fuel, and a couple weeks ago someone here was talking about how they run their truck (diesel) on it. Something about a heated fuel cell and filter is all you need? This was the first I had ever heard of it.

[Freebore]

Originally Posted by tony

Mythbusters just ran a show on waste vege oil as a fuel, and a couple weeks ago someone here was talking about how they run their truck (diesel) on it. Something about a heated fuel cell and filter is all you need? This was the first I had ever heard of it.

I don't know if it is quite that easy. I have seen some info on biodiesel, and it looks like it takes some work to gather, and refine the stuff to a point that it is a reliable fuel. Maybe it could be marketed as a blended fuel, kind of the the gas/ethanol fuels that are offered. If you go out and buy a new diesel powered truck, and want to run it on biodiesel, I'd recommend that you check into any warranty restrictions. It is still a promising alernative fuel, but it's just an emerging option that's not really "full grown" yet.

[tony]

I don't know for sure, only what I saw. But they took an old diesel mercedes and disconnected the fuel line to the fuel injection and replaced it with a canister filled with filtered used cooking oil (maining it in to the fuel injection or throttle body??) And drove it around. My father just sent me a video today of a company that is making prototypes for the military's HumV that runs on gas or WATER, The guy invented a welder that runs on water, I guess it turns it into hydrogen gas. I'll try to get a link here.


Here is the site [Only registered and activated users can see links. ]

[yarro]

Bio desiel sucks if you try to use it when it gets cold. My brother is a mechanic at a trucking company and they had to use it for one of their contracts last winter as the customer wanted their products shipped as green friendly as possible. They had to give the drivers extra fuel filters as they could not make the 450 mile round trip without changing it once. Even then during a real cold period they had drivers not make it using only one replacement filter. The stuff gels up when cold. It doesn't have the same shelf life as fossil diesel either. If the demand for biodiesel gets high enough, the price will go up. Restraunts won't give it away anymore and the price for soybean, canola, and other oil producing plants will go up. Using our farm land to produce fuel doesn't seem like a great idea to me. I can't wait for politicians to be investigating price fixing in the farming industry when the prices go up and voter start complaining.

-Yarro

[leatherzombie]

from what I have gathered a desiel engen can run on filtered cooking oil without any mods as long as it is up to is normal runnig temp but if not then the cooking oil must be heated up .So you can use 2 tanks one small one with desiel to start and heat up the moter than swith over to your cooking oil (if you are in a cold part of the world you may need to use some of the heat that is made by the moter itself to heat up a copper line going to your cooking oil tank)the main thing to remember is the hotter cooking oil is the easyer it is ot fire.

[gunbug]

there's a website that sells a kit, basically a second fuel tank and fuel line replacement and a switch. You run the car on normal diesel on start, the coolant warms up and gets the SVO or greasel or whatever up to operating temperature, then you switch over. You have to remember to switch back to diesel to purge the line prior to shutdown or you'll have trouble on next startup (how severe, I don't know). For "free fuel" though, it could be an option.

Brazil seems to have eliminated their dependence on imported oil with sugar cane. I think saw grass(?) offers even more energy per acre?

[sniper69]

Originally Posted by gunbug

Brazil seems to have eliminated their dependence on imported oil with sugar cane. I think saw grass(?) offers even more energy per acre?

there is a type of grass that can put out more ethanol production than, for example, corn. There is some being tested at one of the universities in Alabama.

As for Brazil and the sugar cane - there are a percentage of ethanol only cars and many others run on both gas and ethanol. Brazil's dependence on foreign oil was lessened by their discoveries of oil in Brazil. About 2 or so semesters ago,in one of the classes I took, we all had to write research papers ( each paper was done by a team of 5-6 people) and two of the teams wrote about Brazil, ethanol, etc. there is a lot of very interesting information about ethanol.

As for me - I keep hoping that zero point energy will become a reality. http://www.zpenergy.com/ and http://freeenergynews.com/Directory/ZPE/ could give some information.

[hobbsbk]

I plan on burning immigrants for heat and having a team of a dozen pull my SUV

immigrants

[nkluksda]

The biodiesel industry has a big image problem, because a lot of folks don't realize that biodiesel is different from waste vegetable oil (WVO). WVO will solidify in cold weather, and burning it gives a 'french fry' smell. Biodiesel is chemically processed - the processing removes glycerine and changes some of the longer polymer chains, so it is not as difficult to use as WVO. There are several co-operatives around the country that are producing biodiesel, both from processed waste vegetable oil and from virgin vegetable oil.

You can buy a kit to burn filtered WVO, but you will have cold-weather problems. Or you can process vegetable oil into biodiesel.

Interestingly enough, you know why everyone was saving fat and grease during WW2? Because the same process that makes biodiesel will precipitate glycerine out of oil, and glycerine is a valuable ingredient in things-that-go-boom (nitroglycerine based explosives, smokeless powder, etc).

[Lt762x39]

I remember seeing an article on how to make bio fuel with cooking oil and you have to mix chemical one of which kills all the nerve endings of any skin that it comes into contact with I said oooooooooh heeeeeeellllllllllll no!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It aint worth the risks to my health