I made it home in about 19 hours and about 1 gallon of diesel, tired but happy.

I left with a full tank of diesel and a full tank of veggie oil as well as 50 gallons of veggie oil in one of the barrels i was bringing home. I drove from about 5 pm to midnight to a rest stop in northern California just as the veggie tank went dry. Luckily the temperatures where in the 40s and it was raining instead of snowing as i came over the mountains.

I took a five hour break, slept in the back of the cab, refilled the veggie tank and headed south again. Heading up the Grapevine pass the fuel pressure started to flick back and forth and the green light indicating i was running on veggie started to flicker. As i still had half a tank of veggie oil, this indicated that the pressure in the veggie system was blocked. It is expected that the first filter on the V3 system will last for just over one tank of veggie as all the dust and crap in the tank are cleaned out. I made it home by running on diesel on the uphills and veggie on the flats and down hills.

The truck is unloaded, the filter is changed and i am running smoothly on my last 20 gallons of veggie while i build out my home filtration system and get some local oil. See pictures of the whole trip here.

Jason and James from Dino Fuel Alternatives came by in the morning and pitched right in on the final tasks to get me on the road south. Preping barrels for my filtration system, electrical connections on my sotera pump, no job too small. These guys have a great product and they stand behind it. The actual fix of a minor wiring issues on the unit took under 15 minutes and then we were test driving.

Within 5 miles the system switched over to veggie oil and we did two laps around Portland. There is no noticeable difference between driving on diesel and veggie oil other than the very bright green light on the fuel switch. Time to load the truck and head south.

We are Sooooo close to finished with the install. The tank and filler neck, fuel lines, wiring harness, gauges, dash switches and V3 unit are all installed. There is a small wiring issue with the V3 unit that the Vegistroke guys are going to check out in the morning, then we test drive. See photos on my WVO album.

Don’t let the terms ’system’ and ‘install’ lull you into the view that this is all a ‘paint-by-numbers’ affair. While the majority of the V3 unit components are very straightforward, the fuel tank whether in-bed or under-bed, involves cutting holes in your truck and making things fit. There is custom work involved and it does not always go smoothly. These under-bed tanks are still a fairly new product (since last August) and connections were not in optimal locations, fittings not included . . . nothing critical, but it sure pushes some extra work onto the installers. Dan wrestled with that tank for half a day, ground down fittings, custom cut plumbing and ultimately fit the tank with millimeters of clearance between the exhaust, towing package and rear shocks.

I have to say that all my dealings with Dan and Farhad at the Green Drop Garage have been great. Very good communication, great hospitality, straightforward in explaining options and costs as well as helping out on any questions regarding veggie oil in general. (oh, and Farhad showed me some great restaurants in the area)

Landed in Portland, met the boys at Green Drop Garage and saw the truck. Touched the Truck, Sat in the Truck. IT IS REAL!

All the mods and repairs are complete and tomorrow we start on the Vegistroke installation.

Before i get to Portland there are a few necessary fixes and a few performance modifications that Green Drop Garage will be performing on the truck.

Known issues when purchased include the front brakes and the front main seal also discovered during the in depth diagnostic they performed is the need to put in new glow plugs. Otherwise she is good to go. I chose two performance modifications:

• K&N Air intake manifold
• 4″ exhaust from down pipe to tip with straight-through muffler

Between the two modifications I should see more than 15 extra horsepower and a little bit better mileage per gallon of what ever i am driving on.

I had just watched the last Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien, Neil Young did a great number which inspired me to play a random assortment of his music while i bought my one way flight to Portland. First line of the first song (Out on the Weekend) “I think I’ll pack it in, and buy a pick up, take it down to LA . . . .” Thank you Neil.

I am flying up to Portland on Wednesday, February 3rd for two and a half days of Vegistroke installation and then driving back on the weekend. Although the guys at Green Drop Garage have been busy checking out and buying the truck, ordering parts and such, I finely feel like i am crossing the border from planning to doing!

Like collection equipment, it is possible to go very slick with the machinery of filtration, centrifuging, flash evaporation and such. Most WVO folks will tell you that heat and time are your friend. With both of these you can defeat the twin foes of WVO as Fuel: Particulate matter and water. Centrifuging and fancy piping and filters will save you time. If i had lots of oil coming in and heavy use in my immediate future (a good problem to have) I would consider jumping right into a centrifuge set up.

My plan involves metal barrels with band heaters, hoses and filters. The image above is more of a logical construction than the physical plan. For instance Mist washing and de-watering, as they both require heating the oil, are likely to happen in the same barrel. Also the filters in the diagram suggest house filter casings with plumbing, it may be the case that I use sock filters and my collection pump to move the oil around. The pre-filtration unit may be a 5 gallon bucket with window screen and old sheets or a 55 gallon drum top filter. The idea at this stage is to understand what steps need to be taken to take fryer fresh oil and prepare it for the fuel tank.

I have chosen not to suck.
After some great email and phone conversations with Farhad at the Green Drop Garage, I am going to hold off on the super sucker plans. While it is still the system to aspire to, I think i am going to work up to it. Regardless of what systems for collection and modifications to make to your vehicle, it is always good to have someone to bounce your ideas off of. Farhad built his own wvo vehicle mods back in his Berkley days before getting behind the Vegistroke products and in his day collected 5000 gallons per month of WVO.

Above is the picture of the Sotera diaphragm pump, a little pricier than i was planning on, but it is the Cadillac of pumps. It is a 12v pump so we can modify the cord to plug into the trucks trailer adapter. House it in a nice Rubbermaid tote and it won’t be too much work to load and unload. Additionally having the collection be more portable allows a greater collection range form the truck . . . 15 ft cord + 15 ft collection hose doubles the range.

Planning, planning . . . can’t wait for doing, doing . . .

As in the best method to collect the yellow gold . . .
One could scoop, pump or suck WVO from barrels, using a vacuum appears to have the most benefits. It is the fastest (especially on a newly vacuated vessel), it won’t choke on chunks, and is quietest.

A 30 gallon tank with a 27″Hg vacuum in it will draw in 10 gallons very quickly if a large enough hose is used (I like 1.5″ “spa” or suction hose) the next 10 gallons will take about twice as long as the first since the vacuum is reduced to around 22″Hg and the lower the vacuum the slower the flow. Given enough time and low enough viscosity VO a 30 gallon tank will eventually fill to about 95%.

Another bonus is that a “super sucker” collection unit has no valuable parts so leaving it in the back of your truck presents no temptations. It is typically constructed of a pressurized tank (water pressure tank, hot water heater tank, propane tank, compressor tank . . ) fitted with a small ball or needle valve from which the air is drawn out to create vacuum or pumped in to push out the collected oil. The additional modification to the collection tank is the opening for oil to be drawn in or be pushed out. This portal is a 1.5″ pipe welded so its interior opening is at the lowest point in the tank. Attached to it is a ball valve (make sure the inside diameter of the valve is not smaller than 1″) and then connected to enough hose to reach from your truck to the barrels. Get fancy with detachable tips (clear, filtered with a shower drain cover, electrically heated for winter collection), male and female hydraulic quick couplers, clear tubing to see what you are gathering, pin striping . . .

An internet search of “WVO Super Sucker” will provide hours of educational reading, plans and completed units for sale.

Here is the extra tank for the Powerstroke that will hold the WVO. It was ordered today. Essentially you get two choices, a tool box style tank that goes in the bed or the one above which fits under the truck instead of a spare tire. This tank includes DFA Designed heat exchanger built inside, feed port, return port, rollover check valve, and venting port.