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

If you make it from used cooking oil it's not just cheap but you'll be recycling a frustrating waste product. Best of all is the GREAT feeling of flexibility, self-reliance and empowerment it will offer you. Here's how to do it-- whatever you need to understand.

Straight grease fuel (SVO) systems can be a tidy, efficient and economical option. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you have to customize the engine. The best method is to fit a professional singletank SVO system with replacement injectors and glowplugs optimised for veg-oil, along with fuel heating.

With the German Elsbett single-tank SVO system for instance you can use petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any combination. Just begin up and go, stop and switch off, like any other vehicle. 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 need to begin the engine on regular petroleum diesel or biodiesel in one tank and then 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 details on straight grease systems in my blog site.

3. Biodiesel or SVO?

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

it's backed by many long-term tests in numerous countries, including countless miles on the roadway.

Biodiesel is a tidy, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it's reasonable to state that numerous SVO systems are still speculative and require more development.

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

But the large and quickly growing around the world band of homebrewers don't mind-- they make a supply every week or when a month and soon get used to it. Many have actually been doing it for many years.

Anyway you have to process SVO too, particularly WVO (waste veggie oil, used, cooked), which many individuals with SVO systems use since it's low-cost or free for the taking. With WVO food and pollutants and water must be eliminated, and it most likely should be deacidified too. Biodieselers say, "If I'm going to need to do all that I may as well make biodiesel instead." But SVO types scoff at that-- it's much less processing than making biodiesel, they state. To each his own.