Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

[overdriver Biofuels Forum Newbie Find all posts View Profile Close overdriver]

My Hiace appears to be using engine oil a little. It has an Elsbett conversion. Has anyone else had issues with piston rings etc? I did get a bad batch of SVO recently, which made it run very poorly - lots of black smoke, shaking at idle, the works.

[Fitian Was here Find all posts View Profile Close Fitian]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

I do not sure what you mean by bad oil but I do not thing it would make the car roughly idle. Have you check for air in the system? how old is your filter or filters? Any bent hoses?

Keep us updated please

Fitian

[Captain Echidna Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Captain Echidna]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

If the oil had contaminats that did not burn well, and inhibited combustion, then its possible.
how has the oil bad? was it just the way it performed (in which case, perhaps its another factor that happened at the same time as you filled up) or was it thick, goopy, smelly etc?

If your hiace is a two tank conversion, and not properly flushed, then it is possible for weird spray patterns to happen, squirting oil onto the rings, where they can stick, leading to oil consumption. Perhaps pulling an injector and looking for buildup on the end could be a starting point?

[overdriver Biofuels Forum Newbie Find all posts View Profile Close overdriver]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

Thanks for any replies, folks, much appreciated. I say the oil was "bad" because it was thick, cloudy and, upon closer inspection, appeared to have particles floating in it. The van ran poorly from that fill up. That may have been the temperature, in part, as we went to the UK, where there was snow. Adding diesel didn't help, but when I got home, I filled up with my usual vegy oil, and it was much much better.


I will have a look at the injectors. i'm not hugely mechanically minded, but every day's a school day, right?

[tbird650 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close tbird650]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

Hi overdriver

See my posts for in depth discussion on Hiaces, injector coking, u name it. My Hiace has evolved over a period of time. Later posts are of cause more up to date.

Good luck....or ask me for help on any point.

[Tony From West Oz Vice Chairperson of WARFA Find all posts View Profile Close Tony From West Oz]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

Thanks for any replies, folks, much appreciated. I say the oil was "bad" because it was thick, cloudy and, upon closer inspection, appeared to have particles floating in it. The van ran poorly from that fill up. That may have been the temperature, in part, as we went to the UK, where there was snow. Adding diesel didn't help, but when I got home, I filled up with my usual vegy oil, and it was much much better.


I will have a look at the injectors. i'm not hugely mechanically minded, but every day's a school day, right?

This sounds like an advert for filter bags
It also sounds like you need to set up a fuel filtering station to ensure that your fuel has no 'particles floating in it'.

If you 'cold filter', you will remove any oil which is solidifying at the filtering temperature. This is not critical if your fuel system is FULLY heated, but hot filtering of oil which will solidify after filtering will cause problems in your car once the oil cools down.

Regards,
Tony

[overdriver Biofuels Forum Newbie Find all posts View Profile Close overdriver]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

Thanks Tony.
As I'm buying oil new, in bottles, I didn't think I'd neeed to filter. but the supermarket changed their oil supplier, and I didn't notice. I live in the city for now, and don't really have the room to filter noe, but I'm moving to a larger place in the country in the summer. I'll be using WVO then.
Thanks for replying.

[overdriver Biofuels Forum Newbie Find all posts View Profile Close overdriver]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

UPDATE:
I spoke to my mechanic, who thought that the mineral oil I was using might've been burning out. He suggested I use a semi-synthetic, and run on dino for a week. I changed the oil and the filter,topped it right up and went for a 200 mile spin. No sign of any oil usage yet.

I also put 5L of umleaded petrol (is that what the ULP I see here means?) in with 30 litres of dino. I may add petrol to me vege oil in future. Anyone here do that?

[tbird650 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close tbird650]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

I also put 5L of umleaded petrol (is that what the ULP I see here means?) in with 30 litres of dino.

Just go careful adding ULP to dino because dino is only borderline to having enough lubricity. If you have some vege in that mix as well, then it would have more than enough lubrication for your IP.

Incidently, I spoke an oil rep recently, who said that adding ULP to our vege, lowers the flash point. When I asked what harm that could do, he said ....."Well, you could get pre-ignition/pinking". I told him that if it was a problem, I'd know about it by now. I've done 20,000km in this Hiace and much more in another 2.4 Hiace.

My theory here is that he is confusing petrol's "spark initiated combustion" with diesel's "compression-ignition". With the latter, the combustion only occurs once the charge has been sprayed into the chamber with the piston at around TDC. Whereas with petrol, the fuel mixture gets more of a chance to create all kinds of havoc as it gets compressed.

Theories are wonderful things....but it's what works in the end that counts.

[overdriver Biofuels Forum Newbie Find all posts View Profile Close overdriver]

Re: Hiace on SVO using Engine Oil

Will do, 650. It wasn't meant to be a regular thing. I was advised to thin the vege with dino, but it seems lots of people her are using ULP, which hadn't occured to me before now.

As always, thans for the advice, guys.