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

If you make it from utilized cooking oil it's not just inexpensive however you'll be recycling a bothersome waste product. Best of all is the GREAT sensation of flexibility, self-reliance and empowerment it will provide you. Here's how to do it-- everything you need to understand.

Straight grease fuel (SVO) systems can be a tidy, reliable and cost-effective alternative. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you need to modify the engine. The 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 utilize petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any mix. Just launch and go, stop and turn off, like any other automobile. Journey to Forever's Toyota TownAce van utilizes an Elsbett single-tank system. More

There are likewise two-tank SVO systems which pre-heat the oil to make it thinner. You have to start the engine on normal 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 switch back to petro- or biodiesel before you stop the engine, or you'll coke up the injectors.

More information on straight grease systems in my blog.

3. Biodiesel or SVO?

Biodiesel has some clear benefits 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 likewise has better cold-weather residential or commercial properties than SVO (however not as excellent as petro-diesel-- see Using biodiesel in winter season). Unlike SVO,

it's backed by lots of long-lasting tests in many countries, including millions of miles on the road.

Biodiesel is a clean, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it's fair to say that many SVO systems are still speculative and need more advancement.

On the other hand, biodiesel can be more costly, 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 upon where you live). And unlike SVO, it has actually to be processed initially.

But the big and rapidly growing around the world band of homebrewers do not mind-- they make a supply every week or as soon as a month and soon get utilized to it. Many have been doing it for many years.

Anyway you need to process SVO too, particularly WVO (waste vegetable oil, utilized, prepared), which lots of people with SVO systems use because it's cheap or totally free for the taking. With WVO food particles and impurities and water should be removed, and it probably must be deacidified too. Biodieselers state, "If I'm going to have to do all that I might as well make biodiesel rather." But SVO types belittle that-- it's much less processing than making biodiesel, they state. To each his own.