Hi Keith,
I will take all of this into consideration when I start putting things together.
Thanks for the input.
Sincerely,
Gregg
Keith Addison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Keith Addison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
Hi Gregg
>Hi everyone,
>
>I'm in the planning stage of trying to put together my biodiesel
>reactor. I've heard that the taller slimmer water heaters are
>usually best, however, I'm a bit cramped for space & would probably
>need to go with a shorter one. If anyone has any thoughts, comments,
>advice, etc, I would really appreciate the input. I'm also toying
>with the idea of modifying a 55 gallon drum to use if possible.
Generally I'm not a fan of water heater reactors, excepting Dale's
one (the original). Otherwise, not very impressed. But to each his
own, as long as it works well.
Tall and thin (like me! LOL!) is generally better than short and fat.
See what Michael Allen has to say about it:
The Design of 'Deepthort'
http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_processor8.html#design
(The whole page is worth a read, lots of good info.)
Have a read of this too:
http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_processor10.html
Journey to Forever 90-litre processor
More good reasons for tall and thin. On the other hand this reactor
is about the same proportions as a 55-gallon drum. There is a more
ectomorphic tank pictured there too, but the existing one's just fine.
These tanks are 90-litre kerosene tanks commonly used for heating
water here. Anything similar would do, and they're a lot smaller than
a 55-gallon drum. How much fuel do you use? How often will you need
to make it?
Another consideration is whether you'll use a pump or a stirrer for
mixing - either way you'll get better agitation in a tall thin vessel
with less danger of unreacted stuff ending up in the final product.
With stirrers you can use higher speeds, more efficient paddle design
or baffle plates to improve agitation. With pumps the "rose" inlet we
use probably solves the problem. (Don't use a 1" clear water pump for
a 55 gallon drum, it needs something stronger - max. for the 1" pump
is about half that size, 100 litres.)
You'll also need a washing tank of the same capacity or more -
batch-size plus one-third as much water or more plus headroom.
Depending how you want to pre-heat the oil you might also need a
pre-heating tank, though not if you'll be relying on electric heating
elements in the reactor. We pre-heat the oil in a separate tank (NO
methanol around at this stage!) over a biodiesel or by-product burner
and transfer the heated oil to the reactor, then use the heating
element to maintain the temperature, much cheaper. You could also put
a burner under the reactor but not if you're going to put a cone
bottom on it or if there are a bunch of outlets and valves there,
unless you can avoid frying them somehow.
We find a separate settling tank and an extra wash tank are very
useful, but you can do without them. Still, this whole set-up fits in
a corner, compact and effective, very flexible.
HTH.
Best wishes
Keith
>Respectfully,
>Gregg Davidson
_______________________________________________
Biofuel mailing list
Biofuel@sustainablelists.org
http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel_sustainablelists.org
Biofuel at Journey to Forever:
http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html
Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (50,000 messages):
http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
__________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around
http://mail.yahoo.com
_______________________________________________ Biofuel mailing list Biofuel@sustainablelists.org http://sustainablelists.org/mailman/listinfo/biofuel_sustainablelists.org
Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Search the combined Biofuel and Biofuels-biz list archives (50,000 messages): http://www.mail-archive.com/biofuel@sustainablelists.org/
