what method do you use?

 

Currently I use the pressurize heat and spray method and I dont like it much. I might try it with a spare water heater and try spraying inside that. Better containment of the oil mist that comes out.
Other thoughts I had were using a vacuum pump on a big propane tank with the stuff in it, or even the water heater if it can withstand that kind of vacuum. lower the boiling point of the water in there and flash it off.
the centrifuge method sounds decent but its like 200$ for the centrifuge and you need to be picky about the flow and pressure. =(.

 

I heat the filtered WVO to about 100-120*f for 4-5 hours then let it cool back to room temp,like overnight. the water falls to the bottom and the good oil remains on top. Check out www.Frybrid.com for more answers look into the forum.
Ken Gardner

 

Ive got a vacuum pump coming via ups but I was fiddling a couple nights ago with this idea to dewater washed biodiesel and veggie oil. I put my washed fuel back into the reactor and heated it to 150F and installed an air chuck on the front of the appleseed where the methanol usually goes in. Ran the compressor up to 120psi and used a regulator to 5psi on the reactor. close the valve a little to restrict the flow and youve got air bubbling up from the bottom of the tank to help the stuff circulate and vaporize water off which is then pushed out by the air pressure.
I collected a glass of water from 55gal that had already been heated and sprayed!
Needless to say Im itching to try this with fresh filtered WVO. Ive got some spare parts and plan to plumb a second appleseed for drying wvo.
Ill probably try the vacuum idea too once my stuff comes in and I buy gauges.

 

I would be curious to run some of your "newly" dewatered WVO through a centrifuge and see how much more water you could get out. Just to see how efficient your new method was. I'm trying to learn as much as I can about all of this. I read soooo many stories on how "this" way or "that" way is fine. I want to do it right and avoid all of the damages that doing it "wrong" can cause!

 

hopefully no one will make my mistake of making a 55gal batch of nasty soap

 

Ditto on that, Im also very curious to see how this stacks up against other methods. Thing is I dont know anyone up here that does biodiesel to test against.
Im real happy with this method so far, its shown it can pull more water than my heat and spray method and its safer since I can vent the fumes outdoors easily with a hose. The air pushes it out. Might be a way to recover methanol in the first step too, before the water wash.

55gal of soap? how much lye did you use? wow. Ive added too much before and it made a glop at the bottom, but never that much.

 

what happened was the veg oil was loaded with water. i did this on my first batch made. part of it was my fault, i was all hyped on "cheep" fuel and in a rush when doing my initial testing of the oil

 

wow.. must have been a LOT of water to do that. Ive used wet oil and had some glop since you get an underreaction, but nothin like that.