Anybody can make biodiesel. It’s simple, you can make it in your kitchen area-- and it’s BETTER than the petro-diesel fuel the big oil companies sell you. Your diesel motor will run much better and last longer on your home-made fuel, and it’s much cleaner-- much better for the environment and much better for health.

If you make it from utilized cooking oil it’s not only inexpensive but you’ll be recycling a problematic waste item. Best of all is the GREAT feeling of flexibility, independence and empowerment it will offer you. Here’s how to do it-- whatever you need to know.

Straight grease fuel (SVO) systems can be a clean, effective and cost-effective choice. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you need to modify the engine. The very best method is to fit a professional singletank SVO system with replacement injectors and glowplugs optimised for veg-oil, as well as fuel heating.

With the German Elsbett single-tank SVO system for example you can use petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any combination. Just begin up and go, stop and turn off, like any other vehicle. Journey to Forever’s Toyota TownAce van uses an Elsbett single-tank system. More

There are also two-tank SVO systems which pre-heat the oil to make it thinner. You need to begin the engine on ordinary petroleum diesel or biodiesel in one tank and after that switch to SVO in the other tank when the veg-oil is hot enough, and change back to petro- or biodiesel before you stop the engine, or you’ll coke up the injectors.

More details on straight veggie oil systems in my blog site.

3. Biodiesel or SVO?

Biodiesel has some clear advantages over SVO: it works in any diesel, with no conversion or adjustments to the engine or the fuel system-- simply put it in and go. It also has better cold-weather homes than SVO (but not as excellent as petro-diesel-- see Using biodiesel in winter season). Unlike SVO,

it’s backed by numerous long-term tests in lots of nations, including millions of miles on the road.

is a tidy, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it’s fair to state that many SVO systems are still experimental and require additional advancement.

On the other hand, biodiesel can be more pricey, depending just how much you make, what you make it from and whether you’re comparing it with new oil or utilized oil (and depending on where you live). And unlike SVO, it has actually to be processed first.

But the big and quickly growing worldwide band of homebrewers do not mind-- they make a supply each week or as soon as a month and soon get used to it. Many have been doing it for many years.

Anyway you need to process SVO too, especially WVO (waste veggie oil, utilized, prepared), which lots of people with SVO systems use due to the fact that it’s inexpensive or free for the taking. With WVO food particles and impurities and water need to be eliminated, and it most likely must be deacidified too. Biodieselers say, “If I’m going to need to do all that I might too make biodiesel rather.” But SVO types scoff at that-- it’s much less processing than making biodiesel, they state. To each his own.