Hello prpony

What is written on the drum of methanol?

quote:

What is written on the drum of methanol?

You know I looked to see what quality Methanol I had but the tag just says "Methyl Alcohol" and that it is flammable. It is produced locally. I do remember asking for the purest. It cost $240 for a 55 galon drum.

Hello prpony

If your container of KOH says Potassium hydroxide or Caustic potash then my next move would be to go get a litre of new oil and see if the chemicals are OK

I am running out of ideas

quote:

If your container of KOH says Potassium hydroxide or Caustic potash then my next move would be to go get a litre of new oil and see if the chemicals are OK

I am running out of ideas

Saint Tilly

Yes the 50lbs bag says just that and 90%. I called the chemical company I purchased the methanol from and they said it is 99.98 pure.

I will do a couple of liter batches, one with a different KOH source and another with heet instead. I will post the results.

quote:

Originally posted by prpony:
I called the chemical company I purchased the methanol from and they said it is 99.98 pure.

That is very high-grade stuff. Pricey?

Sometimes (very rarely) containers get mislabeled. Would your chemical company be willing to verify that it is actually methanol in your drum?

Problem Solved!!!!!!

It turns out my tritation was off a bit. I used a digital scale that measures in 1 gram increments and I used it to make the lye. I must of been just under 2 grams when I made my lye. It give me a very low tritation because the reaction with the lye was almost twice the concentration therefore reaching the pink color before it actually should. The oil in question was tritating between 2.5 and 3. After correcting my lye with a .01 gram scale and re-tritating the oil it tritated at 5.5. and correcting my base to 7.8 as per Tilly's recomendation, I was able to get seperation!!!

My oil is very dark and very difficult to notice the seperation at a glance, but its there. I took a bit of glycerine and washed my hands with this problem.. YESSSSSSSS!

Thanks a bunch for your support. I hope this thread will be of help to others.

quote:

That is very high-grade stuff. Pricey?

Its $240 for a 55 galon drum. I think it's 4.36 a galon including tax.

Hello prpony
Good to hear you have solved the problem.

Still, If you originally used 10.5g KOH per litre and the formula for Very high conversion suggested you should have actually used 13.3 you still should have achieved seperation.
The old Formula of 5.5g KOH + titration would have given you only 10.5g KOH per litre.

If you were performing a Base/Base 80/20 procedure the first stage would have only had 10.6g KOH and that should have seperated.

Have you checked you first two batches closely to see if they seperated?
If they have not you can add the remaining KOH to another 25- 35ml methanol per litre of oil and it should seperate.
I would stir it all up and do a test litre first.

quote:

Good to hear you have solved the problem.

Still, If you originally used 10.5g KOH per litre and the formula for Very high conversion suggested you should have actually used 13.3 you still should have achieved seperation.
The old Formula of 5.5g KOH + titration would have given you only 10.5g KOH per litre.
If you were performing a Base/Base 80/20 procedure the first stage would have only had 10.6g KOH and that should have seperated.

Have you checked you first two batches closely to see if they seperated?
If they have not you can add the remaining KOH to another 25- 35ml methanol per litre of oil and it should seperate.
I would stir it all up and do a test litre first.

Saint Tilly

The first two batches I dumped in my waste drum. The last two, I did notice seperation but very little. I think since the oil was so dark I could of not noticed the seperation. Right now the glycerine is black and the biodiesel is bark brown. In my practice runs when I first started this venture I used my wifes used cooking oils which are very clean and clear therefore I got used to seeing yellow clear bio and noticeably dark glycerine. The restaurant grease threw me off.