Use Vegetable Oil If You Have A Diesel Car

Strapped

We have a very old Volvo which is fine for scraping around the country lanes in, and we do use cooking oil in it (usually 50/50 with diesel though). Wouldn't dream of putting it in the newer car.

Around here, there's lots of bootleg red diesel available though.

GarethK

My Xantia runs very happily on 90-95% SVO even this time of year. For all the non-believers, keep disbelieving because it will stop the price of SVO going up even more than it has done in the past couple of months!!

Willsnarf1983

i thought u had to declare that u were using cooking oil so u could be charged the tax?

also what does more to the mile, veggy oil or diesal?

Will

GarethK

Willsnarf1983 wrote: »

i thought u had to declare that u were using cooking oil so u could be charged the tax?

also what does more to the mile, veggy oil or diesal?

Will

No the rules changed in june/july you can use 2500L before you have to declare using it. Thats enough for 20k for most people.

Diesel will do more to the mile, it is thinner and atomises easier particulary this time of year, 3-4mpg difference is common, but if you can get hold of SVO for 55p a litre its half the price, a few MPG less isnt a concern when your saving 30-35 quid per tank of fuel.

bartman

C32AMG wrote: »

There is a lot of rubbish on this thread!

Yes, there is, and your excellent letter explains the true position very clearly!

I've reduced the veg oil in my old Seat Ibiza (VW engine, Bosch fuel pump) to less than 10% now that the cold weather's here - but it was happy running on over 50% in the "summer".

It's a pity the price of vegatable oil is increasing though.......

BAILIFFCHASER

C32AMG wrote: »

There is a lot of rubbish on this thread!

Basically, cooking oil (SVO) CAN be used in MOST diesels WITHOUT a kit.

However.

New diesels (common rail) operate under very very high pressure and are NOT suitable for SVO with or without a kit. If you try this, it'll work initially but you WILL have to replace components on the car which will be very, very expensive. Think £1000's .

Older diesels can (in the main) run on SVO provided that the fuel pump has been tested OK on SVO. Lots of Peugeots & Citroens have fuel pumps that run well with SVO, but some other cars don't fare so well.

In all cases, SVO has to be mixed with diesel at a ratio which is dependant on the time of year. SVO is a lot thicker than diesel and needs to be 'thinned' down - very few cars will run on 100% SVO and even these will work properly in the summer. During the colder months, the ratio for diesel:svo is higher, as SVO will 'wax' badly and needs more diesel to thin down. During very cold spells, any SVO at all is not really advisable.

The 'conversion' kit for SVO is basically a seperate tank and a pre-heater. It is not always needed and is pretty expensive.

Best case is to check with your mechanic or someone knowlegeable first, as all different cars will react to SVO differently, depending on a number of issues. Just because your friend runs SVO in his ageing Peugeot 405 1.9D doesn't mean you can use it in your brand new £45k twin-turbo BMW 335D.

Why am i thinking nobody on these boards is rich enough to be thinking of common rail engines ?

GarethK

BAILIFFCHASER wrote: »

Why am i thinking nobody on these boards is rich enough to be thinking of common rail engines ?

Common rails have been out for ages and are not the preserve of prestige brands, you wont many cars under 5 years old that still use basic mechanical fuel injection because they do not comply with emission regulations.

The PSA (Peugeot/Citroen) HDI 2 litre is a common rail and has been in use since 1998, first fitted in the Xantia/306. You can get these cars for less than a grand. Problem is they dont like SVO, bio-diesel in some amounts are ok though.

C32AMG

BAILIFFCHASER wrote: »

Why am i thinking nobody on these boards is rich enough to be thinking of common rail engines ?

You can buy cars with common rail diesel engines for 2-3k now (High mileage Mondeo TDCi's, for example), so I don't think you need to be particularly rich to be able to afford that!!

Paul_Baldwin

Hi,
So how many of the people in this thread running cooking oil have tried pouring their used engine oil into the tank?

Paul.

oldagetraveller

itsnever2lateisit? wrote: »

Herr Rudolf Diesel first demonstated his invention burning peanut oil, so in fact it WAS designed to burn Bio rather than Mineral fuel.

No he didn't, and it's Dr Diesel. He used coal dust and his first engine no. 0 blew up because there wasn't a relief valve fitted to the cylinder cover. One of his assistants was killed. He even tried gunpowder as well!!
Two of the subsequent engines are in the M.A.N. factory in Augsburg (where they're, or were allowed to drink beer at work). One of them in the museum ( I have a photograph of myself and M.A.N.'s training school boss stood next to this engine ) and the other at the entrance to the works canteen. There is a memorial at the spot where the first engine had it's catastrophic failure.