Running on SVO

[Xaccers]

I've got a Citroen Xantia with an XUD turbo diesel engine, and I'm thinking, given the price of diesel around here being just under £1/ltr, and having access to costco with bulk quantities of vegetable oil, and duty of 47.1p/ltr (unless the goverment gets overturned and then it's back to 27p/ltr), and the enviromental impact of it being CO2 neutral, it may be worthwhile running a diesel/SVO mix (rather than paying the £1200 for a conversion to run on just SVO) as I do nearly 30,000 miles a year.

Has anyone got any experience of running a XUD (peugeot/citroen indirect injection engine) on SVO?

If so, what oils/diesel mix have you used and with what results?

this guy seems to know what he is on about

http://www.veggiepower.org.uk/page701a.htm




<edit> better article here

http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_svo.html

- just bear in mind that glycerine is used in the film industry for fake tears

Originally Posted by Xaccers

I've got a Citroen Xantia with an XUD turbo diesel engine, and I'm thinking, given the price of diesel around here being just under £1/ltr, and having access to costco with bulk quantities of vegetable oil, and duty of 47.1p/ltr (unless the goverment gets overturned and then it's back to 27p/ltr), and the enviromental impact of it being CO2 neutral, it may be worthwhile running a diesel/SVO mix (rather than paying the £1200 for a conversion to run on just SVO) as I do nearly 30,000 miles a year.

Has anyone got any experience of running a XUD (peugeot/citroen indirect injection engine) on SVO?

If so, what oils/diesel mix have you used and with what results?

Just throw used vegetable oil in it won't hurt your engine, the Taxi drivers round our way have started using it.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Nidge

Just throw used vegetable oil in it won't hurt your engine, the Taxi drivers round our way have started using it.

I'd rather not, used veg oil is more acidic and contains rather a lot of water, unless you refine it to remove these things.

Tempted by the Elsbett single tank conversion kit for €800 if I had the money.
Now if the goverment would only see sense and allowed SVO or even WVO to have the lower duty rate, I'd definitely be there!
I mean, here's a product which is CO2 neutral (the CO2 released is what was absorbed from the atmosphere in the first place by the vegetables so you're not adding any) which would really help us hit our Kyoto targets, but the goverment, in order to get more money, is making it as expensive as diesel!

Might just go an see what oils costco have.

[handyman]

Can you not see what weaste oils you can get from local chippies and restuarants?

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by handyman

Can you not see what weaste oils you can get from local chippies and restuarants?

I don't have the filtration equipment to make that safe for the engine.
Apart from the "bits" you get floating in used oil, apparently it is more acidic and contains quite a bit of water, so will eventually do some damage.
Incidently, proper biodiesel can corrode the lining of fuel tanks which can come off and block your fuel lines. Lovely.

SVO really needs to be heated to about 180C to have the same viscosity as diesel, most inline heaters take it up to 80C so the pump is still under a bit more stress than with diesel.
The Elsbett kit replaces the normal injectors and glow plugs (amongst other things) so they can handle the thicker SVO properly.

I've done quite a bit of research, I'd just like some first hand experiences so that I don't make any mistakes which could cost me a couple of hundred quid which I don't have.
Need to find out what fuel pump I have for starters as if it's the wrong one, then there's no point.

[Shaun]

There's some interesting pdf file here:

http://www.biodieselgear.com/documentation/index.htm

I guess it all depends which route you want to take - free oil from the catering industry and a biodiesel reactor or costly new oils with the new injector kit.

Guess you'd need to set yourself up a spreadsheet to work out the costs

Good luck with it mate - definitely sounds like it's worthwhile.

[Tuftus]

A Breif look over here http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/groupee/forums

Might let you know what you need, IIRC from the old Andyspares forums you may have problems if you have a specific fuel pump, cannot remember which one though Bosch or Lucas.

[Gareth]

Lucas, I believe.... a mate has converted his car, and I remember him talking about the Lucas pumps, and I'm pretty sure it was in relation to this.

An added bonus which you've not mentioned yet, is that your car's exhaust will eventually start smelling like you're constantly cooking doughnuts!

[Escapee]

One of the guys I worked with ran his Pug 205 non turbo on various stuff. I know he ran it for about two years on central heating oil, and mixed engine oil to get the correct viscosity. He said the viscosity varied from batch to batch when he ordered heating oil, so he had to use a viscosity cup for each new delivery. Once he had mixed the first lot he knew the measures to use.
He ran it for the two years covering about 50K without any problem, and only stopped because the Tax and exise men were dipping the tanks on farmers cars in the rural area he lived in, to look for red dielsel.

He also used old cooking oil and new oil at one stage, he did give me the full description and I seem to remember you need some spare space a few containers and a bit of patience. I think he filtered it first and then let it stand for so many weeks to seperate the useable fuel, water and thick unusable stuff. I know he ran this about 50/50 mixed with a tank of normal diesel with no ill effect for over 12 months.

He also told me and showed some photos of an LPG type conversion he did many years ago for a bit of fun. He had a Fiat 126 and access to "free" propane, he had a propane bottle on the back seat and started on petrol then switched over to the propane. Apparently some engines will start on the LPG or propane but others will not.

There is also a mechanic down my local who's brother has been using cooking oil for a number of years in a 306 diesel, he says the engine still sounds good.

I also have a feeling "Car Mechanics" ran an article about cooking oils etc around two years ago. It may be worth looking if the have a website and possibly a back issue on the article.

[Xaccers]

Well, mine seems to love running on just Tesco vegetable oil (rapeseed oil)
Although it takes a bit to get started if it's been cold over night

[Chris]

Originally Posted by Xaccers

Well, mine seems to love running on just Tesco vegetable oil (rapeseed oil)
Although it takes a bit to get started if it's been cold over night

Wot, you just poured a few bottles of it in your tank?

[Gareth]

Yep, you can do that (note: only on diesel cars... I accept no responsibility for petrol-powered car owners completely screwing up their cars!). Otherwise you can buy kits as well.

[Xaccers]

Originally Posted by Chris T

Wot, you just poured a few bottles of it in your tank?

Yes, need to contact HMCR to work out how to pay the duty (47.1p/ltr because they're a bunch of money grabbing anti-enviromentalists)

Was running pretty much 100% SVO which apparently XUD's run fine on during the hotter summer months.

I've bought some KTC vegetable oil (unfortunately it doesn't say which type) to try as this worked out cheaper, and apparently works well too.

Also I've added some Redex diesel treatment stuff.

---------- Post added at 17:06 ---------- Previous post was at 17:05 ----------

Originally Posted by Gareth

Yep, you can do that (note: only on diesel cars... I accept no responsibility for petrol-powered car owners completely screwing up their cars!). Otherwise you can buy kits as well.

Yeah if I had a spare £500 I'd buy the Elsbett kit which replaces your injectors and heats the oil on a single tank (rather than a 2 tank system) so you can run with 100% SVO all year round.

[Chris]

I'm getting seriously interested in this now (will be buying myself my first privately-owned car for some years within the next couple of months).

Are you really saying you can just dump veg oil in the tank and it will work? Doesn't the engine get clogged or need extra cleaning or anything?

I have to say, if I could get a Citroen Berlingo with a diesel engine and then run it on vegetable oil, I'd be laughing. I have a Makro card.