washing bio - Diesel Forum

Crosscountry bound · 10-26-2009, 08:58 AM

OK folks, discuss.... I've got over 2000 gallons of raw oil I'm starting to process and I'm OK on the process end... moving along quickly, but it all bottlenecks at the wash station. I like power washing (I just set the hose spray to 'blast' and mix until I have 1/3 water to 2/3 fuel - it settles out with good separation) which has worked well and a bit faster....but I still have to do it 3 times and wait for settling. Anybody got ideas/experience in washing faster? I wash 3-4 50 gallon batches together in an IBC tote. I'm all ears(eyes)

Thanks!

Dirtcheap · 10-28-2009, 10:49 AM

im doing a mist wash... i usually takes 2 cycles, sometimes 3.... 35+galllons/wash cycle... works pretty good...our water has a high iron content

Crosscountry bound · 10-29-2009, 08:19 AM

Do you bubble on the 2nd or 3rd too? Tried misting but took a long time for 100 gal of fuel

Dirtcheap · 10-29-2009, 02:15 PM

i use the bubbler to dry... it takes 1-3hrs to wash... i let it sit for 15-20 min between wash cycles unless im at lunch or out doin something then it sits til i get back to it... if i get busy i can make 3 (40 gal)batches a day..4 if i get upearly and stay up late (and dont go anywhere)

Ragdude · 11-01-2009, 10:43 AM

Personally I don't care how long the washing takes, just make sure it's washed well and then dried very well. Obviously I don't know how much fuel you burn in a week, but trying to rush the process usually does not give quality results.

behoof · 12-17-2009, 09:01 PM

Like the one fella said, I don't rush it and really don't care how much washing I have to do. BUT I have shortened the path a bit.

At the end of my "cooking" (I do 100 liters at a batch) I add 3 liters of hot water to the still mixing batch and let it mix for another 15 minutes.

This has really seemed to shorten my wash cycles considerably.

Sort of kills the reaction and for lack of a scientific way to say it, the addition of the water seems to be like a pre-wash effect.

behoof

Spencnaz · 12-20-2009, 03:47 PM

I do not wash with water. I demeth the whole batch (glycerin and biodiesel) while it's still in the tank to do methanol recovery. This process increases the rate of glycerin precipitation immensely. Also that glycerin is then ready to be turned into "Spencer's Simple Soap" or "Mr. B's Grimebuster Gel".

After that's done, I use gravity to filter the biodiesel (after it's gone through a 5 micron filter) through a column of fine sawdust. The cellulose grabs onto any glycerin and water still in solution.

The GL One Day Process, by itself does not require water washing. There are extensive threads on the biodiesel.infopop.cc website about using wood chips or sawdust for dry washing biodiesel.

The biodiesel that I've made using these systems passes 3/27 regularly. I ran into trouble with soap formation by using recovered methanol that had residual water in it (it was about 93% purity). The sawdust caught some but not all of it and cause some filter plugging problems.

baroy68 · 01-03-2010, 02:43 PM

I water wash 25 gallons at a time, first 2 mist washes and then 3 bubble washes. I use 5 gallons of water each wash totaling 25 gallons of waste water, which has become a problem as far as disposal. My biodiesel is clean clean as it could pass quality test no problem.

Iv'e been looking at dry washing to speed up the whole process, but then read up on resin disposal, which can be a bigger problem that my soapy water.
Like stated above choose quality over quantity

This site is pretty knowledgable - How to Make Biodiesel

Spencnaz · 01-08-2010, 08:01 PM

That's why I went to sawdust/woodchip dry washing. After the sawdust is all used up, it gets compressed into prestologs for the fireplace.