tacwelding

Ok, I am committed to doing this. I have access to good veggie oil and a truck, so hear is what I'm trying to do. The system starts with a heated 65 gallon tank in the bed of the truck, the heat is supplied by a loop from the engine coolant line into a pipe welded into the tank. This should get the oil up to 140f. The fuel line goes threw a Raptor pump, 5 micron filter and then a Racor water separator filter. I would like to run 100% but would be ok with a 75% mix. I will also have a hot start system like Kats that will pre heat the engine and will also pre heat the veggie tank. Lastly I will have a switching valve to be able to switch between striate diesel tank and veggie/diesel tank so I can purge the engine at the end of the day. any suggestions or comments are welcome.

solfish

I'm using the Golden Fuel Systems kit. Kit is good quality, my only problem has been not using clean enough WVO and clogging the Racor filter on WVO kit. I need to improve my filter setup and it will work well.

tacwelding

Try using whole house filters. My system for my old Isuzu was something like this:

1. Pump from restaurant to 55 gal drum in back of truck
2. Pump from truck to another 55 gal drum with a 200 micron drum filter.
3. Let settle for 3 weeks
4. Pump only the top oil into two 55 gal drums toped with a 100 micron
drum filter. Both drums are connected at the bottom with a 2" hose.
Both drums have heating elements from a water heater. A pump is
used to pump from one tank into a set of whole house filters, the first
filter is 20 microns and the next is 10 microns. after the filters the line
goes into the first tank and completes a loop. Make sure your oil is at
100 F to 150 F while filtering.
5. Filter in till you can pump for at least 2 hours, in till the 10 micron filter
restricts flow, then change to a 5 micron filter.
6 I filter the 5 micron for at least 24 hours.
7. Add a golden rod filter to the end.

This might not be the best way but it did work, I have a new truck now and I'm going to be a little more scientific on how I filter from now on, so if anyone has any advice, I would like to hear it.

p.s. I will try to upload photos when I get time.

dieselluvr

Well I'm almost done installing my WVO conversion in my 93 and I can tell you if I could do it over again I would just install a Hot Fox heat exchanger into the diesel tank (installs like the fuel sender unit). I bought a toolbox tank and it's cool and I got a hell of a deal on it but I think the hotfox is a better choice because it heats around the inlet tube in the tank and you can use a tube in hose design like I built to keep the fuel line heated from the tank to the engine compartment.

There is also a company on ebay that sells heat exchanger/filters using marine remote fuel filter housings and VW/Audi oil coolers as heat exchangers with optional glow plugs for additional heat in cold climates. He can build the unit for almost the same price I can so me being inherently lazy I opted to just buy the unit.

You will want a separate fuel pump also so you basically have two complete fuel systems just incase one clogs up or fails you can use the other. Keep an eye on this forum for my pics and parts list when she's up and running... I have about 4 billion hours of research into this... well seems like anyways.

tacwelding

Here are some pics of my tank that I am building. You can see the large pipe that is in the tank, this is where I am going to run the engine coolant to heat the oil. I also have two openings for a heated circulation pump (like the fox you have). At night I am going to hook up a heater to keep the oil and engine hot.

dieselluvr

Good idea but don't forget that WVO ages quickly when exposed to heat and sunlight so if you can thermostatically control it to say a maximum of 60 degrees F. I don't have a hotfox tank heater. I bought a toolbox tank with the heating tubes heat exchanger before I found out about the Hotfox. Hotfoxes only heat the WVO around the suction tube so it don't heat the whole tank full of oil, only the stuff your going to need while driving which helps minimize oxidation of the oil from repeated heating/cooling cycles not to mention condensation during cold weather.

tacwelding

Thanks Dieselluvr, I had not considered or even heard about WVO aging. When I let the oil settle in some drums out side, I know they get worm in the sun and they do sit out there for at least 2 to 3 weeks. As for the Hotfox, I also did not know that it did not heat the whole tank and engine (as you can see I know little of what I am trying to do). I was wondering, if I use a small tank that was fed by the main tank, and in that tank I could have a heating element from a hot water heater (just like the tanks I have for filtering). If the element is the right size and the tank is the right size, it could heat enough oil to feed the engine and I would not have to heat the whole main tank of oil.

jhuntsman

I just bought an 06 2500 and will be converting it to WVO so I'll be following your progress. I've been using wvo in an 87 Mercedes for the past couple of years and its saved us a lot of money. I supply the restaurants with 5 gal. steel pails with locking covers which allows them to pour the hot oil directly into the pail. I find the Asian restaurants use the best quality oil. I quit collecting from the pizza places as they use the hydrogenated oils. My filtration system consists of 55 gal. drums which have a cleanable plastic screen that fits over top to get the large particles out. I let the oil sit for a couple of weeks and then transfer it into a heated plastic tank at about 115 F. I am in the industrial pump and filter business so I spent more money up front on a bag filter and took an old gear pump out of the warehouse and put a 900 rpm motor on it along with a pressure relief valve and some three way valves. I can use it to pull oil into my heating tank from the collection tanks and also pump and filter through a 100 micron or 10 micron double length bag and through a final 5 micron pleated filter to the storage/IBC tank. There are probably better ways to do it but it has worked for me. Does anyone running WVO have a chip/programmer? Jim

dieselluvr

I'm sure there are as advancing your timing some will improve the efficiency of burning WVO. Sounds like you got a good setup. I use an immersion heater in 5 gallon buckets to heat the prefiltered oil to 240 degrees (to dewater)and then pour into a 55 gallon barrel with a series of Duda-Diesel barrel screens that filter it down to 75 microns where I wait till it's full then run that through a series of filters down to 1 micron to either my fuel tank or 55 gal. poly barrels for storage.

My goal is to come up with enough money to buy a WVO-Designs centerfuge. But for now this works.. I also built a 7 gallon bucket and lid as a vac tank that I hook up my shop vac to for sucking the settled oil off the tops of jugs which has reduced my (hard) labor greatly.

jhuntsman

I guess I'm lucky but I don't run into any water in my oil. I heat it to about 115 just to make it easier to filter. If you have a chance send me a link to the Duda screens. I'm curious if they are the same thing I'm using as I think mine are 200 micron.

dieselluvr

Here's that link. http://www.dudadiesel.com/choose_item.php?id=fs5

They are also for sale on ebay. How do you know you don't have water in your oil? Do you do the pan test? water in your fuel is really hard on the internals of your engine. It can cause damaged injectors and pistons.