There are at least 3 methods to run a diesel engine on biofuel using vegetable oils, animal fats or both. All 3 are utilized with both fresh and used oils.

1. Use the oil just as it is-- typically called SVO fuel (straight veggie oil);

2. Mix it with kerosene (paraffin) or petroleum diesel fuel, or with biodiesel, or blend it with a solvent, or with gas;

3. Convert it to biodiesel.

The first two approaches sound most convenient, however, as so often in life, it's not quite that basic.

1. Mixing it

Vegetable oil is a lot more thick (thicker) than either petro-diesel or biodiesel. The purpose of mixing it or blending it with other fuels is to decrease the viscosity to make it thinner so that it flows more freely through the fuel system into the combustion chamber.

If you're blending veg-oil with petroleum diesel or kerosene (like # 1 diesel) you're still utilizing fossilfuel-- cleaner than the majority of, however still not tidy enough, many would say. Still, for every gallon of

vegetable oil you use, that's one gallon of fossil-fuel conserved, which much less climate-changing carbon in the atmosphere.

People utilize numerous mixes, ranging from 10% grease and 90% petro-diesel to 90% veggie oil and 10% petro-diesel. Some people simply use it that way, start up and go, without pre-heating it (which makes veg-oil much thinner), and even utilize pure vegetable oil without pre-heating it, which would make it much thinner.

You may get away with it with an older Mercedes 5-cylinder IDI diesel, which is a really hard and tolerant motor-- it will not like it however you most likely will not kill it. Otherwise, it's not wise.

To do it properly you'll need what totals up to an SVO system with fuel pre-heating anyhow, ideally using pure petro-diesel or biodiesel for starts and stops. (See next.) In which case there's no requirement for the blends.

Blends with various solvents and/or with unleaded fuel are "speculative at finest", little or absolutely nothing is understood about their effects on the combustion attributes of the fuel or their long-lasting effects on the engine.

Higher viscosity is not the only problem with using grease as fuel. Veg-oil has different chemical residential or commercial properties and combustion qualities from the petroleum diesel fuel for which diesel motor and their fuel systems are created.

Diesel motor are modern machines with really exact fuel requirements, particularly the more modern-day, cleaner-burning diesels (see The TDI-SVO controversy).

They're tough however they'll just take so much abuse. There's no guarantee of it, however utilizing a blend of up to 20% veg-oil of good quality is said to be safe enough for older diesels, especially in summertime.

Otherwise using veg-oil fuel needs either an expert SVO service or biodiesel. Mixes and blends are usually a . But blends do have an advantage in winter.

As with biodiesel, some kerosene or winterised petro-diesel fuel blended with straight grease lowers the temperature at which it begins to gel. (See Using biodiesel in winter) More about fuel mixing and blends.