There are at least three methods to run a diesel motor on biofuel using veggie oils, animal fats or both. All three are used with both fresh and used oils.

1. Use the oil just as it is-- usually called SVO fuel (straight veggie oil);

2. Mix it with kerosene (paraffin) or petroleum diesel fuel, or with biodiesel, or blend it with a solvent, or with gasoline;

3. Convert it to biodiesel.

The very first two techniques sound simplest, however, as so frequently in life, it's not quite that easy.

1. Mixing it

Vegetable oil is far more thick (thicker) than either petro-diesel or biodiesel. The purpose of mixing it or blending it with other fuels is to decrease the viscosity to make it thinner so that it flows more easily through the fuel system into the combustion chamber.

If you're mixing veg-oil with petroleum diesel or kerosene (like # 1 diesel) you're still utilizing fossilfuel-- cleaner than many, however still not clean enough, numerous would say. Still, for every of

grease you use, that's one gallon of fossil-fuel conserved, and that much less climate-changing carbon in the environment.

People utilize various mixes, varying from 10% vegetable oil and 90% petro-diesel to 90% grease and 10% petro-diesel. Some individuals just use it that way, launch and go, without pre-heating it (that makes veg-oil much thinner), or even use pure grease without pre-heating it, which would make it much thinner.

You might get away with it with an older Mercedes 5-cylinder IDI diesel, which is a really difficult and tolerant motor-- it will not like it but you probably won't eliminate it. Otherwise, it's not smart.

To do it effectively you'll need what amounts to an SVO system with fuel pre-heating anyhow, preferably utilizing pure petro-diesel or biodiesel for starts and stops. (See next.) In which case there's no requirement for the blends.

Blends with numerous solvents and/or with unleaded fuel are "speculative at best", little or absolutely nothing is known about their results on the combustion characteristics of the fuel or their long-term results on the engine.

Higher viscosity is not the only issue with using veggie oil as fuel. Veg-oil has different chemical residential or commercial properties and combustion attributes from the petroleum diesel fuel for which diesel motor and their fuel systems are designed.

Diesel engines are state-of-the-art devices with very accurate fuel requirements, specifically the more contemporary, cleaner-burning diesels (see The TDI-SVO controversy).

They're hard however they'll only take so much abuse. There's no guarantee of it, however using a mix of approximately 20% veg-oil of great quality is stated to be safe enough for older diesels, particularly in summer season.

Otherwise utilizing veg-oil fuel needs either an expert SVO service or biodiesel. Mixes and blends are generally a poor compromise. But mixes do have an advantage in winter.

Similar to biodiesel, some kerosene or winterised petro-diesel fuel blended with straight grease lowers the temperature level at which it starts to gel. (See Using biodiesel in winter) More about fuel blending and blends.