> 1) if the temp goes up close to 150-155 will this in itself adversely effect the reaction?
Yup. And if you're lucky, all you'll have is a mess to clean up. Methanol boils at 145*F. Your reactor contents would froth immediately upon the addition of the methoxide. Explosive fumes would inundate the area. Everything in close proximity could quickly become toast if an ignition source is present, such as an open motor. Suggestion for your problems would be to conduct a "proper" titration, then do the "poor man's titration," with your proper titration sample in the middle. Measure the amount of glyc cocktail that drops out of each. When you identify which two sequential samples have an equivalent amount of glyc cocktail, go with the one that had the slightlye higher amount of caustic. Also, do a wash on each sample and observe the results. Presumption is made that you're using warm water for the wash? You can get a good wash with colder water, just that it's more hassle. After observing your wash samples, you might add 0.2 ml of 85% phosphoric acid to each and agitate again and observe the results. > (I think my earlier tries were agitated too much) That's impossible. Todd Swearingen . greg Kelly wrote: > From JtF:" with a creamy white layer sandwiched between water and > biodiesel, it's not quality fuel and your process needs improvement. > Either you've used too much catalyst and made soap (better titration), > or a poor conversion has left you with half-processed mono- and > diglycerides, fuel contaminants that act as emulsifiers (better > titration, try more methanol, better agitation, longer processing > time, better temperature control), or both too much catalyst and poor > conversion. See Emulsions > <http://journeytoforever.org/biodiesel_bubblewash.html#emulsion>. > My third batch turned just about the same as the earlier tries: > quality test ends up with a thick creamy white third layer. This batch > seperated much better, being mostly done in about 15 minutes. I have > used virgin oil (soy), what is labeled as 90% KOH (which Keith hadn't > heard of until lately) and methanol from a racing fuel station. It is > labeled as 100%. I calculated and measured quite carefully, redesigned > my reactor vessel, watched the reaction much closer (I think my > earlier tries were agitated too much), kept the temperature much > closer to a steady 135 f, and ended up with very close results to my > first try. > > My questions of the list are: > 1) if the temp goes up close to 150-155 will this in itself adversely > effect the reaction? I am using the technique exactly as on JtF, > leaving the methoxide bottle hooked up to collect condensate, so > little methanol has the chance to escape. But by using a water bath > heat source, the temp does stay up there for a few minutes if it gets > away from me. > 2) Is there a quick and dirty qualitative test for the methanol, to > tell me if I am working with something other than 99+ pure stuff? If > there isn't an easy test, any guess on what percentage I should add in > extra methanol? > 3) If I assume the KOH is NOT 90% and instead consider it 85% would > the extra 5% endanger the conversion? (if it turns out to really be 90%) > 4) Should I reprocess this batch or continue with washing and see what > the results are? > Thanks in advance, oh wise ones. > Greg Kelly > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >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/ > > > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >Internal Virus Database is out-of-date. >Checked by AVG Free Edition. >Version: 7.1.385 / Virus Database: 268.4.4/319 - Release Date: 4/19/2006 > > _______________________________________________ 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/
