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Getting rid of my gear due to having to move house... and no longer owning a diesel of any description. :(

It's not a high volume setup. Does about 70L a batch. 180L settling drum.

Have...

You're looking at exactly the same problem as storing fuel. [Methanol is fuel technically]

Check your insurance... if you can't store fuel on the premises, you can't store methanol.

I've found Oily's gypsum wash is pretty good.

Circumvents the whole tedious process and has no water involved.

The only advantage of NaOH is that it is usually easier to get... ;-)

It produces solid glcyerine... which isn't usually an advantage.

Methanol is much cheaper bought in either 20L or 200L drums.

I don't see how KoH can 'expire' unless it is allowed to absorb water. Is it sealed? If so, is probably Ok.

If you have water in...

Heck, for small amounts you could use an old urn and a couple of decent 20L drums...

Bad time of year for starting out unfortunately. The cold weather complicates things. Some of my mixes I go...

The frytol I did last week will gel at about 15 deg... so I'm keeping it for summer.... the really hot days in summer... not that we get many of those.

If you let it settle out in the reactor... yes. It'll gum it up.

Options are to pump it out into a settling tank... or use KoH instead.

KoH = Potassium Hydroxide.

NaOH = caustic soda [sodium hydroxide]

If its the same blue bottle I once had, its near 100%.

I used to filter before reaction... then I tried the same stuff with all the crap left in...

Couldn't see any difference.

Water is a problem if there is a significant amount pooled at the...

Running a straight mix works fairly well. Colder the weather, higher the ratio of diesel.

Also depends on what feedstock you use. Frytol, animal tallow, or olive? oil all have high gel points...

I leave it in the sun to warm up a bit... then pour it through some old flyscreen.

If I'm feeling enthusiastic. :cool:

Would suspect you'd need an open flame. Typical fluro or incandesent globes should be ok..

Wouldn't like to be in there though. Bad for you.

Install an exhaust fan maybe?

Well, that depends on the price. :cool:

If you hear of any others I'm starting to have problems sourcing it too. :rolleyes:

Both steel and stainless will react... but much slower than aluminium.

I've been using a copper container and the reaction merely makes it look clean. I can't see any reduction in thickness...

Nice!! Thanks for the update.

1. The cheapest.

2. The one with the highest gel point.

IMHO anyway.

Apparently if you remove the methanol from the bio after you remove the glycerine... the soap falls out without water.

I'm going to test this tomorrow for viability.

Oooh. Good point. ;)

One can't have something overengineered just for fun? :rolleyes:

But seriously... a sealed unit totally contains any vapour. Predetermined level of oil + methoxide at 70 - 80 deg causes some...

Bingo!!

I already do similar, but manually. Pressures are relatively low... but it doesn't take a lot to increase the usable temperature range... and a 10 - 20 deg increase in reaction...

Thinking an old gas bottle is the go.

Can pressurise to allow higher temp reactions without Methoxide boiling off.

Can put under vacumn to remove methanol after reaction.


Wonder if bottles...

Old hot water systems or the larger gas bottles aren't too bad.

Saw a 5 foot gas bottle at the recyclers at the Margate tip today.

Would have grabbed it if I'd had the 4WD.