Take a peek at the system in the trunk of a Mercedes sedan.
Powers prefers getting his oil from Asian restaurants because he feels it's better than fast-food oil. "The number one thing is to use really clean, grade-A oil," Powers advises. "Inspect it to make it sure it's not hydrogenated. You can run hydrogenated oil, but you'll run into more problems clogging filters and fuel injectors." Powers has a set route of restaurants where he collects oil and uses a manual, hand-crank pump to pull as much as 14 gallons per minute. He also sells excess oil he filters to fellow veggie oil enthusiasts for $1.50 per gallon. He claims his custom-fabricated filtering setup can handle as much as 500 gallons day.
There's an onboard filtration system for Woolf's Dodge Ram.
The only hurdle he's encountered was some thick oil in a filter during cold weather, but he recently installed a 300-watt fish tank heater in his tank and hasn't had a problem since. He points out that an engine block heater might work equally as well. Powers has been running on veggie oil for about six months, and since he drives more than 30,000 miles year, he figures he saves about $1,000 per month. Speaking of money, let's say you drive 15,000 miles in a year on veggie oil and burn an average of 15 mpg. That means you've consumed 1,000 gallons. At $3 or more per gallon for No. 2 diesel, you'll save at least $3,000, not counting the cost of replacing filters every 3,000 miles. So, theoretically, a $2,000 unit from Veg Powered Systems can pay for itself in a matter of months.
Don't forget your veggies! Just pull up to a restaurant for free oil.
How about the long-term effects of using straight vegetable oil in a diesel engine? Few, if any, formal studies have been done on the subject-and likely not by any big petroleum companies-but there are a lot of articles on the chemistry of using vegetable oil as a fuel. In general, they point out that some vegetable oils are better than others: Palm and hemp oils are preferred; linseed or hydrogenated oils are not recommended. They also note that certain diesel engines are more suitable than others, such as older, '80s-era Mercedes, in particular, work well. Also, some injection pumps work better than others. Whatever the type of engine or fuel system on your vehicle, ensuring the quality and cleanliness of the vegetable oil is obviously a key factor in the reliability and performance of a conversion system.
Even with those cautions, given the skyrocketing cost of diesel fuel, having the option of running on free vegetable oil still has considerable appeal. We'd be interested to hear from any readers who are currently running vegetable oil in their diesels and what sort of experiences they've had. We'll let you know what we find out.