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Sunday, September 17, 2006

Washing and Drying biodiesel

Some people say you don't need to wash biodiesel. But raw biodiesel from the reactor contains left over methanol, glicerin, soap, and who knows what else. I didn't wash my biodiesel when I used it in my 17 year old VW golf, but now that I have a 4 year old VW passat, I simply have to.
I pump most of my biodiesel into a container, making sure no glicerin gets sucked in. Then I add some water (about 20% the amount of biodiesel). Throw in a bubbling stone like the ones in an aquarium, and turn on the aquarium pump. There should be as little agitation as possible.
The bubbling stone is at the bottom of the container - where the water is. The bubbles get covered by water, and they take the water with them toward the top. After bursting, the water is released and sinks back down to the bottom, cleaning biodiesel on the way.
The water gets white and looks rather like milk.
This bubbling should last about 4 to 8 hours. Then I change the water, and repeat this process, but this time I leave the water in the container for 12 hours. After changing this milky water for fresh water, I bubblewash for another 24 hours.
I change the water once again and bubblewash for another 24 hours.
I now let the washed biodiesel settle by lifting the bubbling stone higher than the level of the water, so that the bubbling stone sends bubbles directly into the biodiesel.
Water in the biodiesel settles back down with the rest of the water, and some of the water evaporates because I keep sending in dry air through the aquarium pump.
After 24 hours I turn the aquarium pump off, and suck the water from the bottom of the container. This water is used for the first washing in the next batch of biodiesel.
For the last 24 hours I've really been drying my biodiesel, and I continue to do so, for another 24 hours.
Dry biodiesel is absolutely clear, and beautifull to look at.
View a video of the third wash.
This is the final wash where you'll see that the water and biodiesel are clean. The bubbling is also set stronger as with the first and second washes.

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