Micro CoGen.

There is nothing magical about a CF. Gravity and time will do most of what we do when using a CF for veggie oil processing. Waste motor oil is another story.

You don't need a vehicle to get around, and it is cheaper to walk. But most of us want to speed up the process.

A CF can save time and space. But that also comes at a price. If you have time and space to process oil a CF could be a waste of money.

Sometimes it is just fun to play with "toys" that have some value in motivating a person to improve the fuel making process. And a CF is cheaper than a bass boat 

I never used a multiple pass CF, but I do not like the idea of running clean oil back into dirty oil until you get most of the dirt. How long, or how many passes would you filter dirty water using this method before you would take a drink?

Having said that, the classic open bowl CF is not that good either. To get a good cleaning job you need to control how and where the oil enters the bowl. I spent some time playing with an open bowl to see if I was getting some visible particles splashing out of the bowl, or was the oil not staying in the bowl long enough. Turns out splashing and low retention time were both problems.

Here are some youtube clips that will show what I am talking about.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1X7Lr-gdxZY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIZT-jmyphs

In this clip the feed cone system is an older style. Even better feed systems are available now from Simple Centrifuge and other suppliers. I just happen to like the guys at Simple Centrifuge and I think they were the first to offer the feed cone.   

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fTOUHf87uHY

Building your own can be done. But it is not as easy as it would first appear.     

Propane would be my fuel of choice for long term storage and ease of use. A tank big enough to last a week or more would be the minimum. The only down side I see is it is not easy to grab few jugs and beg ,barrow, or steal fuel if an outage lasts way past normal.

On the other hand, I like diesel gensets because we grow some fuel and it is easy to move fuel.

We have a profane (propane) powered generator on the farm. It has a four cylinder Ford that screams 3600 RPM. I had to fire the thing up a few days ago and it was running just fine. About 1 hour later I found it sputtering at about 1/2 speed. If I grabed the mechanical governor that was slammed wide open and held it partly closed the engine would seem to run OK. As soon as I let go the governor would open wide open and the engine would sputter and lose speed.

So I called someone that works on gensets full time and told him to come fix the generator. He started the unit up and the said you might want to check the gas tank. WELL DUH, I should have thought of that. In my defense, I am not that smart, and most of the engines that I run, stop dead when out of fuel. And how could a 500 gallon tank ever be  empty?  To answer my own question, a freak wind storm and 6 days without power last year.

test

We have been trying to decide what 3 phase gen set to get to run a pivot irrigation system. My brother dragged this home today. It was used about one year in a off grid situation. The unit is a little big for the irrigation system, but with a set of pallet forks I can see this gen set moving about the neighborhood when the power goes down for 5 or 6 days like it did this summer.





   

I am in the western part of Virginia and we should get some wind and rain from the storm. Most of the storm will be well to the east of us. We already did the 5 or 6 days without power this year. I just hope the patch work they did holds up to the wind we could get.

I know this is not that helpful, but this could get you a drink.

http://www.lehmans.com/store/Water___Buckets___Galvanized_Well_Bucket___550202#550202

In our farming operation we have 9 generators from 2 to 55 KW. 5 are engine driven, 2 are tractor PTO driven, and 2 are electric motor driver.  2 engine driven units are automatic start with safety switches, 2 with manual start and safety systems, and a small portable. I plan to add a lister clone as a useful toy.

Fuel used........ diesel, propane, gasoline, and grid electricity.

We run 2 generators with 10 HP single phase motors to produce 3 phase high voltage power to move irrigation systems. 

All but the irrigation generators are used for emergency standby or occasional remote use.

My long term goal is to build a cogen system for my hose that will burn home grown biofuel.  There have been comments that our electricity cost will "necessarily skyrocket", so I would like to have an "emergency"  system operational IF this threat materializes. With any luck, in a few years the artificial energy crisis will just be a bad memory on the scrap heap of bad ideas. And my cogen hobby will still be just a hobby?

We had a 6 day power outage this summer. That really got me to thinking how things like the water system would need to change to live off grid.  The "need" to run a genset 24/7 would have to change.       

I am looking for a belt drive generator head to run on an 8 hp listeroid. Is the Northern Tool brand any good? I would like to find something that does not run 3600 rpm. We had a 5 or 6 day power outage and the high speed generators just seemed to be a bad idea for long term use. A ST head would be OK, but I am not looking for a wiring project with the need to rebuild half of the unit just to get operational.     

Power is on. It went off Fri. around 9 pm and came back on Thur 11:30 am.

Power is still off. One gen set has been running nonstop for 5 days. Power is on all around us. Maybe tomorrow............

All is quiet on the eastern front, except for the sound of the generators running all over the place. Day four of no grid power.

We did a generator shuffle. The gas powered unit moved to the nephews house.


And a tractor driven unit came to my house.


Generator at dairy barn
 

The power is still off. Two generators have been running 48 hours. Have you hugged your grid today?

Three farm locations plus my house. One dairy and two turkey farms. Lucky for me my house well provides water for some of the cows, so I get to run the screaming gas unit 24/7. My wife asked if they make a quieter generator. I said yes, it is called a battery. I need to get the listeroid going to run at night when the load is low.