Anybody can make biodiesel. It's easy, you can make it in your kitchen-- and it's BETTER than the petro-diesel fuel the big oil companies offer you. Your diesel motor will run better and last longer on your home-made fuel, and it's much cleaner-- better for the environment and better for health.

If you make it from used cooking oil it's not only inexpensive but you'll be recycling a problematic waste product. Most importantly is the GREAT sensation of flexibility, 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 tidy, effective and cost-effective option. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you have to customize the engine. The best method is to fit an expert singletank SVO system with replacement injectors and glowplugs optimised for veg-oil, along with fuel heating.

With the German Elsbett single-tank SVO system for example you can utilize petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any combination. Just launch 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 likewise two-tank SVO systems which pre-heat the oil to make it thinner. You need to start the engine on ordinary petroleum diesel or biodiesel in one tank and then change to SVO in the other tank when the veg-oil is hot enough, and change back to petro- or biodiesel before you stop the engine, or you'll coke up the injectors.

More details on straight veggie oil systems in my blog.

3. Biodiesel or SVO?

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

it's backed by many long-lasting tests in lots of countries, including millions of miles on the roadway.

Biodiesel is a tidy, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it's fair to say that numerous SVO systems are still experimental and require additional advancement.

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

But the big and rapidly growing around the world band of homebrewers do not mind-- they make a supply each week or when a month and soon get utilized to it. Many have actually been doing it for many years.

Anyway you have to process SVO too, especially WVO (waste grease, used, prepared), which lots of people with SVO systems utilize since it's low-cost or totally free for the taking. With WVO food particles and impurities and water need to be gotten rid of, and it probably must be too. Biodieselers state, "If I'm going to have to do all that I might as well make biodiesel instead." But SVO types scoff at that-- it's much less processing than making biodiesel, they state. To each his own.