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

If you make it from used cooking oil it's not only inexpensive however you'll be recycling a troublesome waste item. Best of all is the GREAT feeling of flexibility, self-reliance and empowerment it will provide you. Here's how to do it-- whatever you need to know.

Straight veggie oil fuel (SVO) systems can be a tidy, effective and economical option. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you have to customize the engine. The very best way is to fit an 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 example you can use petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any mix. Just start up and go, stop and turn off, like any other vehicle. 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 normal petroleum diesel or biodiesel in one tank and then switch 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 information on straight grease systems in my blog.

3. Biodiesel or SVO?

Biodiesel has some clear benefits over SVO: it operates in any diesel, with no conversion or adjustments to the engine or the fuel system-- simply put it in and go. It also has better cold-weather properties than SVO (however not as excellent as petro-diesel-- see Using biodiesel in winter). Unlike SVO,

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

Biodiesel is a tidy, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it's reasonable to state that numerous SVO systems are still experimental and need more development.

On the other hand, biodiesel can be more expensive, 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 upon where you live). And unlike SVO, it needs to be processed first.

But the large and rapidly growing around the world band of homebrewers don't mind-- they make a supply every week or as soon as a month and soon get used to it. Many have actually been doing it for years.

Anyway you need to process SVO too, specifically WVO (waste grease, used, cooked), which lots of people with SVO systems use since it's low-cost or complimentary for the taking. With WVO food particles and pollutants and water need to be removed, and it probably should be deacidified too. Biodieselers say, "If I'm going to need to do all that I might too make biodiesel instead." But SVO types discount that-- it's much less processing than making biodiesel, they state. To each his own.