anyone here have experience making biodiesel, would love to talk!?
If you put that together, invite me please… 
Always wanted to try it
No experience in making it, just experience in using it in some vehicles.
Gotta love 50mpg without the use of batteries
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If we made some would you use it? I dont have a diesel motor, I would like to teach a class on making it though.
If someone has an old Diesel generator or something to test it on would be ideal.
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I have three ish diesels
the oldest would be ideal for it - it is a 1980 4cyl na diesel truck
the others are later turbo diesels - and yes, the one that uses a traditional injection pump works great with biodiesel
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Fair warning: commercially available BioDiesel eats gaskets. Maybe there are some blends that don’t, but I worked in the diesel shop at Texas A&M where they run bio in warm-weather months (in College station that’s March-November). It destroyed gaskets. We were regularly taking things apart to replace gaskets that weren’t generally considered wear items. Also, it seemed to collect a lot of water. I would carefully consider the side effects before running biodiesel in anything I wanted to keep. The good news is it caused gaskets to swell, so they worked great until they didn’t.
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Would you mind defining the material that your dailing “gaskets” were made of?
I’ve yet to have or hear of a problem with biodiesel, or b100, b200, refined waste veggie oil or just filtered waste veggie oil (in a twin tank system) create gasket or seal issues in coworkers and or other cars, most of which were Mercedes Benz, VW, Volvo, Audi and a BMW from the mid 1980s
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I can’t say with certainty. I would say it was some sort of rubber. Like an O-ring. This was a B20 blend of unspecified origin.
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Don’t most manufacturers have recommendations for nothing more than B10?
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That may be true. I know it voided the warranty on some of our vehicles, most of the rest were outside of warranty or made by a manufacturer who was in bankruptcy proceedings. We were the only sale they ever made and we didn’t even order the vehicles. They were built for a municipal transportation system in New Jersey. Upon delivery of the demo units, they cancelled their order.
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This blurb sums up nicely the “concerns” over BioDiesel and your fuel system’s seals:
https://biocubeco.com/faqs/will-biodiesel-damage-seals-and-other-components/
For something a bit more “scientific”, if slightly slated, check out the “Effect of biofuels on elastomers” section of this article:
http://www.dupontelastomers.com/apps/autofocus/a7/af7.asp?article=biofuel
In short, newer vehicles can usually cope, as they are built for biofuels, even if the manufacturer won’t warrant it. Older vehicles may have issues, depending on the types of seals they used. In virtually every case, however, you can (with relative ease, and less expense than you might think) replace older technology with newer (right down to the o-rings and seals in your diesel injection pumps).
Of course, there are other “issues” to Biodiesel use that one should be aware of (careful with the PH, watchful for contamination, you have find a place to dispose of your left-overs, such as the glycerin, the “final product” should really be washed, then de-watered, etc. This would be a great place to “mythbust”, or prove, those claims that it’s “just that easy”)
Here was the last time I remember this being discussed on Talk, along with a nice little video showing how easy it is…
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That’s right. Raising this zombie thread.
Anyone still want to make BD?
You might have an interest…
https://dallas.craigslist.org/ftw/zip/d/biodiesel-processor/6555455485.html
I have significant experience with biogas. 
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Another rig up for grabs. I desperately want, but have no place to put any of it. Maybe you can use it…
They make drugs for this problem! 
Andrew,
I’ll ask a good friend and diesel(tdi) car owner if he would be interested in making space in his shop for this set up.
He has the room - but would need help in re-organising to make it fit plus the set up…
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I know a few people who ran home(self) made bio-diesel made from used fast food oil back in the early 2000s. I don’t recall them mentioning any seal issues. The only issue, if at all, was the viability of running them in modern high pressure direct injection engines.
I’ll pitch in the setup & moving(time permitting).
Back when diesel hit over $4.50 a gallon my wife would drive down towards Ft. Worth and get B100 for our 06 TDI Jetta. It purred like a kitten with that stuff. It was smooooooth - like a Barry White song.
Direct injection - depends on the system and the quality of the end product of fuel.
Direct injection as found on 96 to 03 VW models with injection pumps are typically bulletproof
Common rail injection - not so much
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Yup, the common rail was what I was referring to.
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