I have found that gravity will take most of the free water out in time.
Warming the oil to about 140degF speeds up the process. The use of a
centrifuge speeds it up even further (but can be costly unless you stumble
into a good deal on one).
I know some folks are using some vacuum setups to lower the boiling point,
and using flash evaporators and or thin film evaporators, but I wonder if
it is needed.
(As a side question...how much more efficient is a vacuum assisted
evaporator from a total energy usage standpoint, than just heat, after all
one must use energy to create the vacuum?)
There still seems to be some debate over how dry the oil needs to be.
For WVO/SVO fuel systems, I am not positive that small quantities of water
are all that problematic...after all there are water injection systems out
there, and a few companies that sell diesel /water emulsifiers in order to
suspend water into diesel fuel as a method of altering combustion
temperature to reduce NOX emissions. So from a combustion standpoint..seems
that small amounts of water will simply turn to steam.
Free water over time can collect in the fuel system and cause freeze
issues, and corrode internal components of injection systems...but if you
are running a dual tank WVO system, switching back to diesel prior to
shutdown, there should not be water sitting in the injection system.
Does a small amount of water affect the lubricity value of the
WVO?..perhaps..but with the initial lubricity of WVO being so high, I
suspect there is a bit of room to play.
So far I have been running 10 micron filtered gravity settled oil (about a
week at around 70degF) with a heated waterblock type filter in vehicle.
Very little, if any water collects in the clear bowl. I have yet to run
into any problems that indicate water problems...but only topping out at
around 10k miles..so nothing definitive.
I understand the need to dry WVO for biodiesel production, but wonder how
needed it is for straight WVO as fuel.
-Rob
At 08:30 PM 3/8/2005, you wrote:
Hello to all:
I'm wondering if anyone is using WVO and drying it before use. I filter
it and it looks brite and clear but I worry that there may be water disolved
in the oil. Is there a simple test for water content? Is there a simple
method of removing moisture? I don't want to heat 50 gallons to 150C.
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