What is the cost of Diesel where you live? $6.57 gallon for diesel fuel here in Connecticut on 5/13/22. Over $3200 to fill our 500 gallon tank for our trucks.
Is anyone near $7.00 yet?...
I have an unlimited supply of firewood and woodchips available year round for free. Starting to think about wood gas instead of my diesel generator. Hurricane season is less than a month away,hopefully diesel will drop alot by then..
Yes, diesel fuel is certainly costly. Same here in Canada.
I suspect we will rapidly see renewed interest in alternate fuels.
WVO, WMO, Biodiesel, Blends of all types, and BioGas too.
Maybe our "Alternate fuels" section will get busy again :-)
Keith, Thanks for giving the heads up. I just called the oil company where I buy off road diesel and at this time off road and on road diesel is the same price at $5.80 a gallon.
I went to the out of the way place that sells off road and I got it for 4.79 a gallon. It's a place that does not sell much off road diesel so their prices might be a little behind the current rate.
In 1992 off road diesel used to be sold right next to on road diesel in East Haven, Branford, Old Saybrook, New London and other places on the coastline. Mostly near the marinas.
It looks like we could be in for rough times. This is hurting truckers badly. My guess is delivery shortages could get worse than what it is now. And prices on everything is going to skyrocket.
Truckers are likely to revolt. Its probably going to be a huge mess very soon.
Quote from: veggie on May 14, 2022, 08:26:52 AMYes, diesel fuel is certainly costly. Same here in Canada.
I suspect we will rapidly see renewed interest in alternate fuels.
WVO, WMO, Biodiesel, Blends of all types, and BioGas too.
Maybe our "Alternate fuels" section will get busy again :-)
I would think people are going to get fed up very soon with what's happening and start doing somthing to combat the cost of high fuel prices.
History proven that a little bit of unity with like minded hard working people helped correct situations in the US, our neighboring countrys and other countries around the globe.
One thing to consider is propane. I just paid $3.52 a gallon. It stores for a long time, and a 500 gallon tank is available in most areas.
Fuel efficiency can be boosted on converted conventional gasoline engine such as a honda or honda clone engine by boosting the compression. Another thing is wet stacking would not be an issue. So running a propane generator at 25% load or lower should not be too much of a problem.
Henry
They are definately talking disruptions on the east coastIMG_2499001.jpg
What is scary is nobody but a few are saying anything about this and it could become a big time problem. No coverage on the news nothing... strange
Quote from: Henry W on May 14, 2022, 02:38:05 PMOne thing to consider is propane. I just paid $3.52 a gallon. It stores for a long time, and a 500 gallon tank is available in most areas.
Fuel efficiency can be boosted on converted conventional gasoline engine such as a honda or honda clone engine by boosting the compression. Another thing is wet stacking would not be an issue. So running a propane generator at 25% load or lower should not be too much of a problem.
Henry
Interesting idea Henry,
Interesting because we can also run our diesels on 70% Propane/30% Alternative fuel as pilot ignition engines without any modification. As you stated, propane stores for a very long time.
WVO
Diesel
WMO
Biodiesel
... can all be used for pilot ignition.
That's correct Veggie, thanks for bringing this up. I have to start look into Propane and diesel as a pilot once again. I forgot all about this. Years ago we were discussing this. I think part of it is the older we get, we start forgetting some important stuff.
And with the Kubota EB300 engine, the intake manifold already has a 1/8" NPT tapped threaded hole for the cold start fuel enrichment pump nozzle. A simple tee would make easy hookup for propane.
Now were getting someplace.
I have to figure out nozzle size for propane, regulator size and how many inches of water column (pressure) will be required.
One thing I would be concerned about is: Will the comperssion have to be dropped on the EB300.
I do have a generac
GTH-990 engine that was used on one of those home generators.It is setup for propane and makes about 32 horsepower at 3600 rpm. Thinking it should make 15hp at 2000 rpm. I was going to convert to gasoline for a tractor project. I hate propane though. I know it has alot of advantages just do not like it. But it would probably make a nice belt driven generator engine. Plus it has the high compression pistons in it for propane.
i know my s195 will run just fine on waste motor oil
and as we know the ash content accelerates cylinder wear, however
with prices of highway diesel about $5.40 locally, my argument for using
waste oil factoring in engine overhaul costs, waste motor oil makes a lot of sense.
the modern diesels all require low ash oils, so using waste oils from my local truck fleets
look to be an alternative.
bob g
mobile_bob,
I wonder if periodic water injection might keep the system clean enough that ash would not be a concern ?
i suspect the problem lies with the cylinder walls being relatively cooler than the ignition temperature of diesel or oil in this case. that might be the issue with the ash content sticking to the cylinder walls and being scraped up by the rings, forming a lapping compound and accelerating ring/cylinder wear.
but i don't know for sure, and never ran enough waste oil to find out for sure.
in my former life, my biz partner and i bought an old ford service truck with a 6.9 liter diesel engine
it had dual tanks and change over valve, my partner put waste oil in one tank and after startup and warmup he would switch over to pure waste oil... that darn thing continued to run for several years doing that, so i am not sure how big a problem burning waste oil really is.
the engine had north of 300k on it when we bought the truck so it was well used before we started burning waste oil.
having said that we burned only oil that we put in and took out of fleet vehicles, about 90% of which were hd diesel engine's which in the later years were using all low ash content oils.
so i am thinking maybe modern oils are not as much an issue than older ones with higher ash content to offset the higher sulfur oils? maybe?
bob g
Low ash oil, Hmmm, that is pretty much the only oil that is out there for today's diesels. And, today's modern diesels burn cleaner so there should be less contaminants in the oil.
Gas engines also burn cleaner and the oil has much less ash than oils in the past.
There are some cars that I do schedualed oil changes on.
The cars are:
Two 2005 Toyota Corollas
2011 Toyota Corolla
2013 Chevy Cruze
And, when doing the schedualed oil changes, the WMO oil looks cleaner compared to older cars from the 1990's.
You would think today's oils would slow down Spencer syndrome on pistons, cylinders and rings to a much slower rate.
I think it would be a good time to seriously consider WMO as an option if a diesel engine is simple to tear down and is able have new cylinder sleeve, piston and rings installed.
oh yes, the "spencer syndrome"
i forgot who to attribute the "oh my god, you will ruin your engine" to.
on the other hand, i would probably agree with the "spencer" thing if i owned a pristine original
lister that had low hours and a sleeveless bore. of course having one of those i would likely not use it for serious power production, but rather try to keep it as a museum piece.
i don't think of a changfa as a museum piece, i see them as work horses that i run the crap out of and accept a certain level of wear related parts replacement.
and that certain level changes with the price of pump diesel, the higher the pump diesel cost goes up the lower my acceptance level goes when it comes to my changfa engines and their associated replacement parts.
if it pump diesel gets much higher i begin to think of cylinder kits akin to fuel filters, that being consumable parts.
but that is me, and others mileage may well vary.
bob g
Bob, you are unconsciously talking yourself into another Changfa project ;D
And it's about darn time !!!
Clean off your slate, clean the shop, and pullout that old S195
I know when I was burning WMO in the listeroid, it ate through rings, liners and IP components at a prodigious rate.
I would not even consider running my Kubota EB300 powered generator on WMO. The only thing I would consider is propane. And, I dont know if the compression is too high to safety operate it.
My next project that im working on is a multi fuel engine powered generator. The engine is a Military Standard 1A08-4 made by Teledyne. They are purposely underrated at 1-1/2 hp. All these engines had one flaw. They had foam floats. So when ethanol fuel was used the floats would swell up and make the engine inoperable. My fix after researching the matter was I called Zenith carborator. And found out that they built a few brass floats instead of the foam floats. Well the government did not want to spend the money. In turn these floats have been sitting on a shelf for decades until one of the existing managers that worked on the project back in the 1970's remembered the floats. I believe I bought out the remaining stock of brass floats.
With a 6 to 1 compression ratio the engine should run on bad gas, kerosene, jet fuel and blended fuel fine. The engine also has provisions to heat the incoming air to the carburetor. The engine is a simple design that is easy to work one and, parts are available at a cheap price.
Quote from: Tom Reed on May 17, 2022, 09:02:24 AMI know when I was burning WMO in the listeroid, it ate through rings, liners and IP components at a prodigious rate.
And there you have it.. An answer from someone who has actually done it. And when I say done it I mean probably 1500 hours or more on wmo. Not a couple hours running time in the shop tinkering with used motor oil.. Seems like the guys who have actually done it say it dont work real well. It will burn and make the power.. But..Doesnt mean the engine likes it. How many have looked inside a waste oil burner? A commercial one? Take a peek after 50 hours of runtime and open it up. You will have a fine layer of light grayish ASH covering everything.
On the firing stroke of a diesel engine on wmo, when that oil ignites and explodes during combustion the oil on that stroke has turned into ash and sprayed right onto the sticky cylinder walls like 2500 grit sandpaper.It is embeded in the cylinder walls every power stroke..
On the other hand two stroke engines burn oil as well, it has been a low ash oil for decades. Maybe because it is new clean low ash oil designed to burn, compared to dirty old lower ash oil. I dont know. Pretty sure motor oil is meant to lube and not as a fuel in a combustion engine. What ever the reason is, I am not reading any threads on here or the lister forum about success stories using it. Only issues. And I have read probably every related thread here and there. burn it in your furnace for awhile before you burn it in your engine.
Quote from: mobile_bob on May 16, 2022, 04:34:51 PMso i am thinking maybe modern oils are not as much an issue than older ones with higher ash content to offset the higher sulfur oils? maybe?
bob g
You wont know until you try it.
Quote from: keith71 on May 17, 2022, 01:39:33 PMQuote from: Tom Reed on May 17, 2022, 09:02:24 AMI know when I was burning WMO in the listeroid, it ate through rings, liners and IP components at a prodigious rate.
And there you have it.. An answer from someone who has actually done it. And when I say done it I mean probably 1500 hours or more on wmo. Not a couple hours running time in the shop tinkering with used motor oil.. Seems like the guys who have actually done it say it dont work real well. It will burn and make the power.. But..Doesnt mean the engine likes it. How many have looked inside a waste oil burner? A commercial one? Take a peek after 50 hours of runtime and open it up. You will have a fine layer of light grayish ASH covering everything.
On the firing stroke of a diesel engine on wmo, when that oil ignites and explodes during combustion the oil on that stroke has turned into ash and sprayed right onto the sticky cylinder walls like 2500 grit sandpaper.It is embeded in the cylinder walls every power stroke..
On the other hand two stroke engines burn oil as well, it has been a low ash oil for decades. Maybe because it is new clean low ash oil designed to burn, compared to dirty old lower ash oil. I dont know. Pretty sure motor oil is meant to lube and not as a fuel in a combustion engine. What ever the reason is, I am not reading any threads on here or the lister forum about success stories using it. Only issues. And I have read probably every related thread here and there. burn it in your furnace for awhile before you burn it in your engine.
Also the tip of the injector would get a ball of carbon on it which would mess up the spray pattern. This happened every 6 hours.
Quote from: Tom Reed on May 17, 2022, 03:36:57 PMAlso the tip of the injector would get a ball of carbon on it which would mess up the spray pattern. This happened every 6 hours
Happens on a waste oil furnace as well. After a 100-200 hours the deposits start collecting on the burner spray nozzle and screw up the spray pattern. And that is spraying into a red hot fire box at like 2000f. You would think the nozzle would self clean but it does not . It just grows bigger by the day until it wont fire anymore. It is hard to get wmo to flow easily even when heated to 165f right at the nozzle. I f you do not preheat it it does not want to atomize correctly. People say add 50% diesel to thin it out. But why defeats the whole point of free oil.
I wonder if a rolachem pump would help by injecting water in the intake. I'm not sure if it would work very well on an IDI engine but, it might work on a DI engine. They can be purchased and set up to flow rates up to 77 gallons per day. They are easy to maintain, and very easy to adjust the flow rate. I've worked on them for over 5 years and never seen a motor or drive assembly fail. The only thing that needs replacement is the pump hose. And they last a long time. I feel rolachem is the best and most reliable one on the market.
This might be a good project for someone.
Here is a link:
https://www.rola-chem.com/pro-series-300-peristaltic-pumps/
Been looking at some low volume peristalic pumps. I could not remember the name type of Rolachem pumps. And they are a peristalic pump.
There there are lower volume pumps available from other manufacturers.
Here is a link of one and there are probably others that are cheaper.
https://www.coleparmer.com/i/masterflex-low-flow-peristaltic-pump-manual-control-variable-speed-0-06-to-1-9-ml-min-12-vdc/7316010
I'm using a peristaltic pump in my pellet production line. If the sawdust is to dry, the pump injects water at the beginning of the auger. IIRC it was an ebay chinesium special. Works good so far, but I try to use it as little as possible and blend dry wood with wet wood to have wine as the residual moisture in our pellets.