WVO Filtration?

[talltroy]

Hey ExPo Friends,

Unfortunately most (if not all) the WVO forums are completely dead, so hopefully someone here might be able to help!

I recently completed a small dream of mine, and am now the proud owner of a WVO rig! 1997 Ford F250 with the classic 7.3L, featuring a 40G aux tank in the bed for veggies. Now, before I bought a pre-made rig, I was planning on building my own and was talking to the owner of Golden Fuel Systems and what he told me is that as long as you aren't getting obnoxiously "bad" veggie oil, you can run it straight through the system and the existing filters will pick up all the gunk - all I would have to do is change the filters more often. Has that been your experience?

If not, what solutions for an onboard filtration system do you have? I would like it to be self enclosed, as I travel fulltime for work in the outdoor industry (lucky me!). I have a flippac on the truck, so there is some wiggle room with space, but not a ton.

Thanks!

 

[Coachgeo]

Burnveg.com is a great start. It also has a semi-active forum. The webmaster is a Solar guy so he also understands energy efficiency. A GREAT source altogether. Tell him Coach George sent you. (coachgeo)

 

[talltroy]

Burnveg.com is a great start. It also has a semi-active forum. The webmaster is a Solar guy so he also understands energy efficiency. A GREAT source altogether. Tell him Coach George sent you. (coachgeo)

So, I went on the website, thought it was unfamiliar, and on the first page of the Newbie section is a post I had made in 2012! I'm too young for my memory to be this bad.

 

[Darwin]

I was planning on building my own and was talking to the owner of Golden Fuel Systems and what he told me is that as long as you aren't getting obnoxiously "bad" veggie oil, you can run it straight through the system and the existing filters will pick up all the gunk - all I would have to do is change the filters more often. Has that been your experience?

Absolutely not, no way. The filters will pick up the gunk, but you will be changing them every 500 miles on the side of the road. Not even remotely possible in the winter or just cold. I always felt golden fuel systems was a pretty poor WVO set up.

If not, what solutions for an onboard filtration system do you have? I would like it to be self enclosed, as I travel fulltime for work in the outdoor industry (lucky me!). I have a flippac on the truck, so there is some wiggle room with space, but not a ton.

I honestly don't think you will find anything that will work, especially when its below 80 degrees out. You are going to have to pump it first, and that takes a pretty stout pump, I have used a gear pump attached to a gas engine with great success and also a vacuum tank. Both will take up space. When it comes to filtering on the road I don't see it being possible, 1st you will need actual 120 volt power, and quite a bit of, 2nd to really filter the oil so you are not damaging your truck, or broke down on the side of the road every 150 miles, I would recommend a centrifuge.

I drove a veggie powered Ford through Mexico, and then later a Dodge cummins, and again in same said Dodge Cummins all the way to costa rica and back, I traveled with a ton of spare oil and brought the centrifuge, didn't leave much room for sleeping in the truck, and it was always a mess anyways inside from the oil. I called it extreme recycling because I don't think most people are patient enough or have the determination to actually do it. Oh the oil, that stuff is so hard to deal with, it's not like water, when it spills it's like motor oil, stains your cloths, the ground, and is a ***** to clean up. It doesnt just evaporate.

I live a mobile lifestyle for work now, and have sold that Dodge and the ford and moved on, it's nice to have a truck that doesn't have the fuel system all hacked up, and I believe I had one of the best out there. I still have the Centrifuge, it spins at 6,000 rpms, and also the gear pump, located in Colorado if you are interested. I have saved it for maybe the future, but not sure I will get back in the game. I found my time and the time I spent on everything to be about a wash all said and done. The good news is, I am sure it's probably a little easier to get oil these days, back when I was under the radar with it in the waning years of this adventure, restaurants thought their oil was worth gold. There was a guy in SLC selling oil at like 3.50 a gallon, kind of an arrogant prick to, I wonder if he is still around?

Edit:
If you still really want to do it, buy a trailer and live with the trade offs, it's the only possible way of making the "holy grail" in the veggie oil world work. Life on the go with WVO.

 

[talltroy]

Absolutely not, no way. The filters will pick up the gunk, but you will be changing them every 500 miles on the side of the road. Not even remotely possible in the winter or just cold. I always felt golden fuel systems was a pretty poor WVO set up.


I honestly don't think you will find anything that will work, especially when its below 80 degrees out. You are going to have to pump it first, and that takes a pretty stout pump, I have used a gear pump attached to a gas engine with great success and also a vacuum tank. Both will take up space. When it comes to filtering on the road I don't see it being possible, 1st you will need actual 120 volt power, and quite a bit of, 2nd to really filter the oil so you are not damaging your truck, or broke down on the side of the road every 150 miles, I would recommend a centrifuge.

I drove a veggie powered Ford through Mexico, and then later a Dodge cummins, and again in same said Dodge Cummins all the way to costa rica and back, I traveled with a ton of spare oil and brought the centrifuge, didn't leave much room for sleeping in the truck, and it was always a mess anyways inside from the oil. I called it extreme recycling because I don't think most people are patient enough or have the determination to actually do it. Oh the oil, that stuff is so hard to deal with, it's not like water, when it spills it's like motor oil, stains your cloths, the ground, and is a ***** to clean up. It doesnt just evaporate.

I live a mobile lifestyle for work now, and have sold that Dodge and the ford and moved on, it's nice to have a truck that doesn't have the fuel system all hacked up, and I believe I had one of the best out there. I still have the Centrifuge, it spins at 6,000 rpms, and also the gear pump, located in Colorado if you are interested. I have saved it for maybe the future, but not sure I will get back in the game. I found my time and the time I spent on everything to be about a wash all said and done. The good news is, I am sure it's probably a little easier to get oil these days, back when I was under the radar with it in the waning years of this adventure, restaurants thought their oil was worth gold. There was a guy in SLC selling oil at like 3.50 a gallon, kind of an arrogant prick to, I wonder if he is still around?

Edit:
If you still really want to do it, buy a trailer and live with the trade offs, it's the only possible way of making the "holy grail" in the veggie oil world work. Life on the go with WVO.

Thanks for the input! Where in CO? I went to school in Fort Collins and head back to Boulder on the 16th to do a month of training with my new company. I'd potentially love to take that centrifuge and pump off your hands. Also, if you wouldn't mind, I'd love to pick your brain on the WVO process.

Some people in SLC get crafty ideas, and others are just plain dicks. Hard to tell which is which sometimes.

 

[Coachgeo]

Problem with WVO in reality is Big names got into it. It is actually hard to find.. least in the US. It's a major business now and resturants etc. have contracts with vendors. For longggg journy Im considering a trailer that has an WVO recycle AND Pyrolysis (plastic to fuel recycle) but have no intention of using it for huge chunk of driving fuel (maybe some blending at 5-20%) but mostly.. for say winter floor hydronic heating. Will use higher blends possible with my diesel motoryclce(s) cause they have much cheaper engine's to repair.

BTW... burnveg's filtration discussions that are on that discussion board are some of the best. The Dieselcraft type is discussed a lot there. It is the most compact. While not a "true" centrifuge (it has characteristics of several forms of dewatering along with some characteristics of centrfuging) it does the job. It is the route I will go when get to it. BTW.. dieselcraft WVO side spawned from the same design units used to take engine lube to higher filteration standard while on the road to improve longevity of engine by keeping the lube in tip top shape. Lube is not used for fuel..... it just helps lube do its job better and longer. They are mounted on Big rig trucks and filter the engine's lube on the go as one drives. Seperate house of Dieslecraft sells the engine oil filtration units.

 

[Darwin]

I used a Dieselcraft centrifuge, it worked only okay for me, I later sold it. I switched to the bowel style and got much better results. But maybe for what Coechgeo is doing it might work better? I ended up with a WVO designs, that turns 6000 RPMs, it's single pass vs. multiple passes like the dieselcraft.

 

[talltroy]

I gave up, bit the bullet and got a centrifuge setup! Conned a buddy into giving it a home in his garage in Park City. So, that'll be my veggie home base. Lets hope it isn't too miserable getting back there often.