I know of a couple people doing it in MT, some others from ALaska and Canada. No problems for them in the -20 or lower temps if the system is done right. If your really interested, i can get you hooked up and your geographical location won't be an issue.

 

This is something I am really interested in but right now my plate is kind of full. I would like to do it right when I get serious about it. The main focus for my rig at the moment is tranny upgrades.

When you heat the oil for filtration what do you use? I imagine some sort of drum with an electric heating element??? Seems like a person could build a sort of refiner that could heat, seperate and filter the oil in one pass.

 

I have a hot water heater piped into a barrel with a pump, also piped to a big filter. I pour the oil through a strainer into the barrel, pump it into the hot water heater, tun on the electric heat for 4-5 hours to 160 degrees, let settle and cool the next 24 hours, drain off the bottom 2-3 gallons ( thats where the crap settled too) and then pump it though the 5 micron filter and into my 90 gallon truck tank. This all onlu takes about 15 minutes of my time for a 50 gallon batch.
Heres a picture of my "meth lab" - as my buddies call it.
The blue filter housing can be seen on the left and the pump is also on the left sitting down on the platform.

 

Thanks for the info. Slightly complex but not too intimidating, looks good.
One more question for now if that's alright. Is the filter element disposable? if So how long does it hold up and what sort of costs involved?

 

the sock filter is a $3.95 item i order in bulk, It easily disposes and reinstalls into the filter housing. The longevity of the filter is dependant on the quality of your oil as well as your heating/cooling/settling time. Settling lets alot of garbage sink to the bottom of the tank and that gets drained off. I can usually run 300-400 gallons through one filter...sometimes more.

 

That's pretty inexpensive. This is sounding more like a good idea all the time. Thanks

 

I can basically show you a drawing on how to build this thing - cost you a little money to build but it starts paying for itself the first time you use it. A 50 gallon batch of vegi oil is 140 bucks worth of free fuel (@2.75 per gallon).
The truck conversion cost a chunk too but figure it will be payed for in 20k miles of using vegi oil...about one year for me. I have had mine just about 20k miles now so its payed for and the rest is gravy.

 

That 50 gal of fuel would currently be about $156 bucks up here and I put down about 4100 miles/month. Yikes!!!

I am thinking later this summer I'd like to go for it and set this up.

 

Just keep in mind that when your engine breaks, it was because you put vegetable oil into it..

Make biodiesel.. its safe, recognized and it can be run in ANY diesel engine with no modifications.

 

Comments like this have absolutely no merit....simply blind conjecture. Please offer some facts to back up what your saying Murph. I have done my research and can back what I am saying, can you?
Theres nothing wrong with Bio-D if you want to go that route, it just wasn't for me. What I am doing is easier but has a lot more up front cost to start.