They said that they are driving 100% WVO across Canada with no diesel in the past few months.
What they said below doesn't make sense as temps across Canada in the past few months have been cold to say the least.
Either they are killing their Delica, or they have a good system in place for 100% WVO start/run/stop.
driventosustain wrote:We're staying in relatively warm areas so we can start on our Oil. Plus with the added benefit of having an electric heater installed just before its injected.
They said that are driving 100% WVO across Canada with no diesel in the past few months.
What they said below doesn't make sense as temps across Canada in the past few months have been cold to say the least.
driventosustain wrote:We're staying in relatively warm areas so we can start on our Oil. Plus with the added benefit of having an electric heater installed just before its injected.
jfarsang wrote:Great news coverage.
Question please :
How are you driving on 100% WVO/SVO ?
driven to sustain has been very aloof since they wheeled out of my driveway with 200 liters of filtered and dewatered wvo
i have been trying to reach them to warn them that they are not doing enough to dewater and thus will maybe need a rebuild sooner than later. but i am sending positive vibrations their way!
I've seen several cases of the Mits green top glow plugs losing a few mm of their tips into the engine. I think this may actually be fairly common... but my sample size is too small to make an accurate statement of reliability of these units.
I use the NGK units for virtually everthing, as I have never seen one lose a tip (have sold and installed many, many of NGKs for many different applications).
~John
E4 Auto Repair Ltd.
& Radd Cruisers 4WD
Duncan, BC
250 746 8977
I use the NGK units for virtually everthing, as I have never seen one lose a tip
That's good to know thanks for the tip-tip!
I am still setting up my WVO scene I will be filtering,centrifuging and De-watering the heck out of it for sure.
The reading I have been on the WVO or SVO thing stresses the importance of good preheating!
Periodically running striaght dino and givin er is suggested on many forums.
Basically just parroting whats been said already.
Good to know some of the pitfalls that are occuring, I will hopefully
press the jump button at the right time when I get to some of these suck-holes!
Thanks guys
and Right on! (as avoiding a head replacement or worse always is!)
Luna-Sea wrote:I am still setting up my WVO scene I will be filtering,centrifuging and De-watering the heck out of it for sure.
The reading I have been on the WVO or SVO thing stresses the importance of good preheating!
Sample #1 was the original VO, sucked from dumpster with 100 mesh screen. Sample #2 was one pass though the centrifuge at 55-120F. Sample #3 was heated, mistwashed and went six passes though the centrifuge at 120-180F.
The lab results from the samples analyzed via Karl Fischer ASTM D6304 (couloumetric) were:
Sample #1 = 708ppm water
Sample #2 = 545ppm water
Sample #3 = 478ppm water
Also note that SunWizard was capturing and discarding the output when he shut off the centrifuge. This seems to be an important point as water and sediment is present in this mixture that would otherwise fall into the barrel as the centrifuge stops spinning unless it is caught and discarded.
he did lots of testing, not just the pan test but also sent the samples away to a lab to test.
but too each their own, I would just hate to see all that electricity wasted if it wasn't needed.
PS mistwast wasn't needed but used it to test how well the centrifuge would dewater.
I saw these units at CVI the other day, and without trying to sound like an ass... Some of these installs were horrifying! They looked like spaghetti all over the engine. I don't want to be negative but if you install systems like this in a choatic manner you are only asking for problems, engine fire was the other thought that came to mind.
For proper WVO install or questions relating to WVO issues and servicing, I would recommend Andrew Horvath (604) 908-4832. He's confirmed that the issues with shut down purging and the six port valves that a lot of people are using might be the main cause of failure as these valves malfunction without the driver knowing.
The most important part of the WVO system is PURGING! And if this is not done properly, serious engine failure will occur. ie glo plugs shearing, injection pump and injector malfunction, and a worst case scenario...cylinder head top overhaul, IP and injectors reservicing.
1) Glow plugs can lose tips. Nothing to do with WVO. Use good glow plugs. Best are Bosch Duraterm. We need a source for the right ones for Delicas, in Canada, if anyone wants to work on that. So far they are not available here. Some enterprising person could obtain them and supply them to the Delica community.
2) 6-port valves. We have used them for years on thousands of installations and on our own. I have never had one fail on my own vehicles, and I have been asked to replace only a few on warranty. They need to be installed in a warm place, and not fed too-hot oil. A few switches have failed on valves sold the last year or so. Switch failure is not valve failure. I don't think there is any better track record on the 3-ports, and you need at least two of them (some use 3, for a faster purge), so they better be at least twice as good, right?
It is very easy to tell if your 6-port is working. We supply them with a buzzer. You shut off the engine. If you hear the buzzer, you left it on WVO.
You can periodically check the valve itself very easily. Turn on the key, hit the valve switch, listen for the distinctive "clonk", it is quite audible. If you do not hear it, check things. In almost all cases of a supposed valve malfunction on these valves, the problem has been a bad connection made by the installer, a blown fuse, low voltage to the valve, something like that, very seldom the valve itself. Once in a while someone will send one back, swearing they have tested them per my troubleshooting tips, and I hook it up to a battery, run the leads back and forth (it's not a solenoid, it's a polarity-reversing motor), and the thing works perfectly, seals perfectly. For $89 for a 6-port valve with buzzer, you can afford to carry a spare. They are easy to install and change. The last VW I had had the same valve on it for over 5 years, and I know lots of people who have used them that long and longer, no problems.
That being said, if you really feel you want to use two or three 3-ports, we sell them. They can be wired in a variety of ways from simple-setup (both valves on one simple toggle switch), through to a 2-valve toggle switch with purge setting, through to using a timer relay (our MFT), to "stagger the purge" (for those worried about the **virtual non-issue** of "cross contamination", through to using a full blown controller like the VOController (which we also sell).
3) Elsbett: Someone mentioned them....They also sell 2-tank since they know that single tank is only good for some applications. If you need help figuring out their difficult instructions, good luck, they are notorious for not responding. A lot of wiring, glow plug changes, injector changes, etc. just to still be running blends a lot of the time and be running cold oil through a pump at startup (nothing in their kit pre-heats the injection pump itself and they're not built for that high viscosity). The Elsbett single tank kit is meant for new SVO - specifically new rapeseed (Canola) oil that meets the DIN 51605 spec. Used cooking oil is most often a LOT thicker, especially when you get down to freezing or below.
4) Blends - the highest blend percentage that I know of to be shown in research literature to be ok is about 15%. That's not a lot of savings. Higher percentage Blends have a bad habit of not staying suspended. Park it too long, the WVO drops out, and you are trying to start on WVO. Mixing in gasoline aka "RUG", solvents, "dieselsecret", terps, kero, white spirit, etc. etc. creates its own problems (again related to things not staying mixed).
Basically, the problem in all this is to avoid running too-thick fuel past the injectors especially into a too-cold combustion chamber or running a blend that had come unblended. In the former case, you risk injector coking, and that leads to a downward spiral of stuck rings, loss of compression, etc. It takes time. You might not see the symptoms for a while, and you might miss them, and then it's too late. Or, you simply snap a shaft on the pump, accelerating a bit too hard on a cool morning, with fuel a bit too thick in the pump. In the latter case, your engine tries to burn something a lot more volatile than it's intended to - bad news.
So, the safest approach, IMHO, for the Canadian climate, for WVO use, since the topic is "WVO, is it safe?" is to select the best WVO you can find, make sure it is decently clean and free of water, run a good two tank system, and monitor it, check things to be sure they are working. Like once in a while check the valve(s), and the electric heater, and the coolant level, check the oil level in the crankcase, that sort of thing. And if it is a DI engine, go further on these things than if it's an IDI engine like the Delica has. If you do things right you can have a great deal of success using WVO. If you take too many shortcuts, you can cost yourself aggravation and money. So, educate yourself, get good gear, install it properly or hire someone who can, and use good oil.
Edward Beggs
PlantDrive.ca
Salmon Arm BC
SVO/WVO Kits, Components, Conversions, Consulting, since 1999. plantdrive.ca@gmail.com
PlantDrive wrote:
3) Elsbett: Someone mentioned them....They also sell 2-tank since they know that single tank is only good for some applications. If you need help figuring out their difficult instructions, good luck, they are notorious for not responding. A lot of wiring, glow plug changes, injector changes, etc. just to still be running blends a lot of the time and be running cold oil through a pump at startup (nothing in their kit pre-heats the injection pump itself and they're not built for that high viscosity). The Elsbett single tank kit is meant for new SVO - specifically new rapeseed (Canola) oil that meets the DIN 51605 spec. Used cooking oil is most often a LOT thicker, especially when you get down to freezing or below.
yes they do make 2 tank systems, but for the Delica they recommend the single tank. there is no heat in the kit to apply directly to the IP no, but there is an aux pump to make sure it doesn't have to work that hard. if you filter your oil well it shouldn't be all that different from SVO when it comes to viscosity, blending most of the time? not in Victoria, we don't hit -10 here that often. I respect that they are competition for you but lets not get carried away :) I also don't care if people use the Elsbett kit or not, I don't mind being the only one, and I have also though about adding some line heaters to the injection lines and perhaps on the IP that I can switch on for 10 seconds or so before start up. I just take exception to people always talking about WVO and purging and second tanks like that is the only way to do it, people should know they have options. there are people in another thread saying that they wont go WVO till they get a spare tire mount so they can put the tank there. Also I never hear of anyone using the stock tank/s for WVO and a small 20L tank tucked up some where for dino, if your just starting up and shutting down on it you should need 65/75 litres of it . ok ok I;ll stop ranting and go to bed now.:)
I'm sorry if I sounded too much as if I was here to bash good competition, that is not my intention.
There is nothing wrong with the Elsbett kit except the following:
- it's not at all fun to install. The English instructions, as I understand it, even from their dealers telling me so, are quite poor, tech support often non-existent (BTW, how long have you had your kit, how much did it cost, how long did it take to arrive after ordering, and have you installed it yet? Just curious)
- it is not meant for WVO (which IS very often considerably more viscous even for lower mainland / island use, even in summer, compared to new SVO), -you are advised by Elsbett to use new oil and to blend in diesel when it gets at all cold.
- the IP is not preheated and is therefore strained at every startup
- the WVO filter is not very large, and will therefore plug sooner than a larger capacity one, unless the oil is really well filtered before it goes in the tank. We routinely get 5000 km or more on a filter element using WVO that has only been settled a few weeks. If you have a filter element that is quite a bit smaller, that number will be less.
I was not getting carried away, I was pointing out a few facts about running that setup that people should know about before making a decision.
As for line heaters, nobody has yet shown, that I know of, that they actually heat the flowing oil, just that they heat the lines. Heating the outside of a steel line does not necessarily add much heat to moving oil inside the line. Yes, a lot of people have stuck this resistance wire onto their engine's fuel injection lines thinking it does something, but the only data I have seen of a type that seem to do something worthwhile is the induction type, and they are quite expensive. This would not be that hard to check...just check the return fuel temperature with them on, and with them off (and with the lines insulated, in both cases, for apples to apples comparison).
Sticking a bit of resistance wire onto an injection pump for 10 seconds or so will not heat the mass of metal and oil that is an injection pump. Best bet if you want to use single tank and take care of the pump is to also use an engine heater and keep things nice and warm (spring, fall, winter, even on the coast and Island)
Good luck with the Elsbett kit. Certainly, if used within their limitations, and once you get past the install, they work fine, and are a better idea than blending with all the weird stuff, IMHO, but be aware of the limits outlined above is all I am suggesting to anyone comparing - and if you use the van at temps well below freezing in winter, and/or make longer trips, the better heating/starting/range of a 2-tank setup will be appreciated.
You mentioned the idea of using the original tank - my understanding is there is a paint in the Delica original tanks which vegoil can loosen. Also it is not so easy to install a tank heater in them, in cases where one is needed. I am not sure if this paint issue is real. Maybe someone can tell me? I would be quite happy to use the original tank for WVO on a conversion, if someone wanted to, and use a small tank for diesel, if that is what the owner wanted, but I don't want problems with paint coming off the inside of a tank and blocking filters for a long period of time.
Then of course, there is the issue of range - since good WVO can be hard to obtain/process on the road, a lot of people do like the idea of a larger WVO tank, and still have the largish original diesel tank(s) full and available, in case they run out of filtered WVO or at least WVO that they feel they can trust.
Anyway, everybody have fun, just be careful with the solvent-blending, primarily; and try to be well informed enough not to have problems with starting, filter plugging, or worse later on. Do things well, however you do it, and you will have lots of success with WVO, I have, many others have.
Edward Beggs
PlantDrive.ca
Salmon Arm BC
SVO/WVO Kits, Components, Conversions, Consulting, since 1999. plantdrive.ca@gmail.com
PlantDrive wrote:
You mentioned the idea of using the original tank - my understanding is there is a paint in the Delica original tanks which vegoil can loosen. Also it is not so easy to install a tank heater in them, in cases where one is needed. I am not sure if this paint issue is real. Maybe someone can tell me? I would be quite happy to use the original tank for WVO on a conversion, if someone wanted to, and use a small tank for diesel, if that is what the owner wanted, but I don't want problems with paint coming off the inside of a tank and blocking filters for a long period of time.
Then of course, there is the issue of range - since good WVO can be hard to obtain/process on the road, a lot of people do like the idea of a larger WVO tank, and still have the largish original diesel tank(s) full and available, in case they run out of filtered WVO or at least WVO that they feel they can trust.
BCDelica had the paint in the tank problem. i have looked inside of two tanks, one from my '93, and one from an unknown year that i traded from ccglen so as to prepare it and swap it with mine. neither tank had paint.
as for range, i added a tank in the spare tire area ( a tank from a '89 gmc tracker) and plumbed it to the stock rear tank, leaving the front stock tank for diesel. i get about 600km...
That filler looks nice, and pretty straightforward, really. Thanks for the info on the paint. I wonder if the "paint" was actually some black algae that loosened up from the tank walls once running the WVO....that happens all the time when you use the original tank for veg, we expect it when we do a single tank Mercedes, for example.
Edward Beggs
PlantDrive.ca
Salmon Arm BC
SVO/WVO Kits, Components, Conversions, Consulting, since 1999. plantdrive.ca@gmail.com
. ok ok I;ll stop ranting and go to bed now.:)