Since Sunwizard's jewel is still shining how about one more thread in honor of the green option: have any of you used an alternative to the water heater element?

The reason I don't want the element is for the juice; I'll soon be using solar and it's just enough to supply the 6.4A my old Westinghouse 1/3hp motor will take.

Yes I have used a parabolic solar panel to heat the VO before the CF and it worked good as long as it remains sunny during the whole run. Pics are shown here:
http://www.burnveg.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=4

How about a 12volt water heater element, I installed one in my Rabbit seemed to heat the oil up before starting, might not be enough for what you want to use it for but it could be powered by solar or wind easier than 120 element.

soon the heating system will be upon us- how do you heat? maybe you can incorporate that, too...

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Yes I have used a parabolic solar panel to heat the VO before the CF...

Right on I did see that in your drawings - so this gets to the heart of the issue. I also heard you say that a PS pump tops out at 140. So the question is how hot does the oil have to be to get flash evaporation entering the CF? Again the consensus seems to be 190-200. And since the water heater elements are more expensive I'm guessing that's the reason you switched Sun, to reach that temp post pump. So then is it possible to stretch the boundaries with the preheat? My idea involves the sun, similar to Sun's parabolic curve but on a smaller scale post pump - lets see what imagination has dreamed up so far.

That's a good idea Charlie, is it about 200W? I've seen the kind you're talking about and I do have a deep cycle battery on an isolator.

I also wonder if anybody has measured the induction surge on a gear motor, my friend is off the grid and he thinks 6.4A AC is going to end up about 19A on startup.

OK here's 2 ideas I plan on putting into motion with my CF.

1. A 5/8 thick insulated black rubber garden hose - we've all seen how hot water can get sitting in the hot sun so why not oil. It not only gets hot but stays hot without problems so I can imagine feeding the CF this way out of the barrel after a 1 micron bag prefilter. Imagine the hose connected to the 3/4 bung on a close top barrel that would leave the 2" for an opening. Putting the barrel on axis rotation would allow for my existing method of stuffing a bag filter inside that larger bung. You could also lengthen the gravity feed to your PS pump this way especially where I live on a mountain slope literally.

2. From my wicked youth the life lesson of not playing with fire - a magnifying glass. I think on a black iron pipe with some fireproof insulation and a fixed arm magnifying glass moved by hand periodically you could heat the pipe like a gas flame underneath only without the danger.

I built this alternative Element for a mate to heat up his oil for making bio with. Runs on liquid solar energy in the form of WVO.

200w sounds about right, hard to tell though, I stopped using the thing after I forgot to turn it off, parked car came out to find the battery dead and the top of element fried to a crisp or at least the plastic part, the metal part seems fine so it might still be usable but can't tell what size it is. Have it installed in a pipe cross joint, element pointing down barb fittings to sides and cap on bottom.

200w will not be enough heat. 12v is not more efficient than 110v for heating, if you run through an inverter there is about a 10% loss in conversion. If you run on 12v there is about a 10% loss in the wiring. The watts is what matters.

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Originally posted by muzak:
I also heard you say that a PS pump tops out at 140.

I don't understand, the pump has nothing to do with temps.

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So the question is how hot does the oil have to be to get flash evaporation entering the CF? Again the consensus seems to be 190-200.

FE starts for me at 120F and 160F is the max I run, so where do you get your consensus?

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So then is it possible to stretch the boundaries with the preheat?

With my concentrating solar I can reach 160F easily.

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I also wonder if anybody has measured the induction surge on a gear motor, my friend is off the grid and he thinks 6.4A AC is going to end up about 19A on startup.

It varies widely depending on your motor and could be up to 19A for a split second.

Thanks for the responses. Sun I can't remember the exact post in 143 pages but you said something like oil hotter than 140 would be too hot to work with a PS pump. If that's just my misunderstanding, great. Personally I also don't like putting oil through rubber above 160 either. So in sum: if the oil can start at 160 that will be enough to get it up to the 210 needed for flash evaporation?

BTW: Where did you get that collector, it looks like a bathtub with a lid?

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Originally posted by muzak:
you said something like oil hotter than 140 would be too hot to work with a PS pump.

I don't think I said that. I ran my PS pump to 160F every time.

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Personally I also don't like putting oil through rubber above 160 either. So in sum: if the oil can start at 160 that will be enough to get it up to the 210 needed for flash evaporation?

As I said 2 posts above FE starts at 120F and I don't need 210, 160 is plenty. With my concentrating solar I can reach 160F easily.

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Where did you get that collector, it looks like a bathtub with a lid?

A local classified ad.