Anybody can make biodiesel. It's simple, you can make it in your cooking area-- and it's BETTER than the petro-diesel fuel the huge oil business sell you. Your diesel motor will run much better and last longer on your home-made fuel, and it's much cleaner-- better for the environment and much better for health.

If you make it from used cooking oil it's not only low-cost but you'll be recycling a frustrating waste item. Most importantly is the GREAT sensation of liberty, independence and empowerment it will give you. Here's how to do it-- whatever you require to know.

Straight grease fuel (SVO) systems can be a clean, reliable and affordable alternative. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you have to customize the engine. The very best method is to fit an expert singletank SVO system with replacement injectors and glowplugs optimised for veg-oil, as well as fuel heating.

With the German Elsbett single-tank SVO system for circumstances you can use petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any combination. Just begin up and go, stop and turn off, like any other car. Journey to Forever's Toyota TownAce van uses an Elsbett single-tank system. More

There are also two-tank SVO systems which pre-heat the oil to make it thinner. You have to begin the engine on common petroleum diesel or biodiesel in one tank and then switch to SVO in the other tank when the veg-oil is hot enough, and switch back to petro- or biodiesel before you stop the engine, or you'll coke up the injectors.

More details on straight grease systems in my blog site.

3. Biodiesel or SVO?

Biodiesel has some clear benefits over SVO: it works in any diesel, without any conversion or adjustments to the engine or the fuel system-- just put it in and go. It also has better cold-weather properties than SVO (but not as great as petro-diesel-- see Using biodiesel in winter). Unlike SVO,

it's backed by lots of long-term tests in lots of countries, consisting of countless miles on the roadway.

Biodiesel is a clean, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it's fair to say that lots of SVO systems are still speculative and require additional development.

On the other hand, biodiesel can be more pricey, depending how much you make, what you make it from and whether you're comparing it with brand-new oil or used oil (and depending on where you live). And unlike SVO, it needs to be processed initially.

But the large and rapidly growing worldwide band of homebrewers don't mind-- they make a supply each week or once a month and quickly get used to it. Many have actually been doing it for several years.

Anyway you have to process SVO too, specifically WVO (waste vegetable oil, used, cooked), which lots of people with SVO systems utilize since it's cheap or free for the taking. With WVO food particles and pollutants and water need to be gotten rid of, and it most likely should be deacidified too. Biodieselers say, "If I'm going to need to do all that I may also make biodiesel instead." But SVO types scoff at that-- it's much less processing than making biodiesel, they say. To each his own.