Anybody can make biodiesel. It's easy, you can make it in your kitchen area-- and it's BETTER than the petro-diesel fuel the huge oil companies offer 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 just low-cost however you'll be recycling a frustrating waste item. Best of all is the GREAT sensation of freedom, independence and empowerment it will provide you. Here's how to do it-- everything you need to know.

Straight grease fuel (SVO) systems can be a tidy, reliable and economical choice. Unlike biodiesel, with SVO you need 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, in addition to fuel heating.

With the German Elsbett single-tank SVO system for example you can utilize petro-diesel, biodiesel or SVO, in any mix. Just launch and go, stop and switch off, like any other vehicle. 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 start the engine on regular 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 advantages over SVO: it works in any diesel, without any conversion or adjustments to the engine or the fuel system-- simply put it in and go. It also has better cold-weather residential or commercial properties than SVO (but not as great as petro-diesel-- see Using biodiesel in winter). Unlike SVO,

it's backed by lots of long-lasting tests in lots of nations, consisting of countless miles on the road.

Biodiesel is a tidy, safe, ready-to-use, alternative fuel, whereas it's reasonable to say that lots of SVO systems are still experimental and need additional development.

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

But the big and rapidly growing worldwide band of homebrewers don't mind-- they make a supply weekly or once a month and quickly get utilized to it. Many have been doing it for many years.

Anyway you have to process SVO too, particularly WVO (waste grease, utilized, cooked), which lots of people with SVO systems utilize due to the fact that it's inexpensive or totally free for the taking. With WVO food and pollutants and water should be removed, and it probably should be deacidified too. Biodieselers state, "If I'm going to need to do all that I may as well make biodiesel rather." But SVO types belittle that-- it's much less processing than making biodiesel, they state. To each his own.