Running my Vauxhall Astra on veg oil

patman99

When I get a house with a garage or shed, I intend to build my own bio diesel plant. Having seen !!!!!! Strawbridge build one from an old emmersion heater, some pipe, a central heating pump & a filter, it looks easy & will produce diesel grade fuel (especially if you remember to add the magic ingrediant).
Be able to run both my car and van for about 30p/ltr.

interstellaflyer

I have an 06 plate Astra i.3 CDTI (ecotec engine) can I use Vegie oil? or at least mix some with deisel in the tank.

Rolandtheroadie

interstellaflyer wrote: »

I have an 06 plate Astra i.3 CDTI (ecotec engine) can I use Vegie oil? or at least mix some with deisel in the tank.

NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!


The C in CDTI normally signifies common rail. If you go anywhere near it with veg oil, you WILL break it. I believe some manufacturers wont (or didnt when I last looked) cover properly made bio diesel in a common rail either (although anyone I've asked says it would be fine). Sorry for the bold, large font capital letters, it's just incase you missed it lol.

interstellaflyer

scotsman4th wrote: »

NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!


The C in CDTI normally signifies common rail. If you go anywhere near it with veg oil, you WILL break it. I believe some manufacturers wont (or didnt when I last looked) cover properly made bio diesel in a common rail either (although anyone I've asked says it would be fine). Sorry for the bold, large font capital letters, it's just incase you missed it lol.

No need to be sorry, a mistake here could be extemely costly, I'm very gratefull that your answer was so in the face.

patman99

It's funny when you think that diesel engines were originally designed to run on vegetable oil. If only the Englishman who invented it had had sufficient funds to put it into production, Diesel (who at the time was working for a major German oil producer) would never have shown interest as a potential invester, then promptly steal the idea for his own use.

patman99

Seems like you can use vegetable oil if your car has a Lucas/Cav pump. You need to fit an oil heating kit between the fuel tank and the pump though.

Check out dieselveg for a list of products and vehicles (including a couple of common rail engines)

Rolandtheroadie

patman99 wrote: »

Seems like you can use vegetable oil if your car has a Lucas/Cav pump. You need to fit an oil heating kit between the fuel tank and the pump though.

Check out dieselveg for a list of products and vehicles (including a couple of common rail engines)

Heres a quote from a firm that sells conversion kits.

Some vehicles are not compatible with vegetable oil use, namely those fitted with lucas, CAV, delphi or transdyne injector pumps. Our database shows that these types of pump have a high rate of failiure (25%) and so should be avoided altogether. Solutions would be to either sell the vehicle or exchange the pump for a bosch

Thats before you even get into common rail or not, theres a 25% chance it will fail.

Rolandtheroadie

Just had another look at the common rail setup at dieselveg. Coincidentally, thats the guys I emailed asking for a price to convert my tdci Mondeo when I had it. Price is still the same going by their website at £1600.
So the simple answer is no, a common rail diesel wont unless you spend around £1600 on it.
I have not altered my car at all to run veg oil, but the forum I got my info from do a self install kit (minus the diesel tank needed for starting fuel) for I believe £180.
A lot of people just use a heat exchanger or heated fuel filter. I'll need to look into something perhaps for this winter.

patman99

If you pre-heat the veggie oil, then you can dispense with diesel altogether.

The reason that veggie oil is a problem in common rail & High-pressure Direct injection (HDi) engines is due to the viscosity of the veggie oil compared to diesel. As veggie oil is much thicker, it is going to pressurize at a different psi to diesel, so the engine sensors would be sending wrong info to the EMS, thus in turn the engine would either receive to little fuel, or way to much. Neither of which will do a modern engine any good at all.

The only way to use veggie oil in these engines is to buy it from a bio-diesel plant where they can offer you the correct blend (RON rating), not all make stuff suitable.

housesitter

I preheat the veg going into my bosch IDI pump.
It doesn't hurt to make it a wee bit thinner.

You can do common rail systems, you just need to do a lot of research before hand on your own not taking the advice of one or two people on a money saving forum rather than a car forum.

The prices for twin tank systems are insane. Again, this is where reading some info would come in handy for your wallet too.