Brew Your Own Auto Fuel For 41 Cents A Gallon

Iphtashu Fitz writes "Damon Toal-Rossi of Iowa City, Iowa had enough of the high price of gasoline, so it didn't take too much for his friend to talk him into switching to biodiesel, an alternative fuel based on soy or vegetable oil. But after a few months of driving 10 miles to a biodiesel fuel station he decided it was time to start brewing his own. It didn't take him long to find a recipe for biodiesel, and with used cooking oil that he gets for free from a nearby restaurant, he figures he's now getting 44 miles per gallon out of his diesel powered VW Golf and only paying 41 cents a gallon. According to the National Biodiesel Board the number of biodiesel stations in the US rose by 50% last year (to a whopping 200). The president of the American Soybean Association claims biodiesel has almost the same amount of energy as petroleum-based diesel, but cleans an engine's fuel injectors and cuts down on the number of required oil changes. Perhaps these are some of the reasons why diesel powered cars are making a comeback in the US."

French Fry Smell

[Danathar]

Just think....

McDonalds could outfit all of their trucks with used French Fry Oil...and then evertime you saw one pass you'd smell that wonderful French Fry Aroma!

Seriously......They COULD do this!

Car-B-Q

[charlieo88]

Cars running on recycled vegtable oil? Reminds of an old episode of wings, where everybody was driving around with a CarBQ cooking food on the engine.

Re:How's it smell?

[smackjer]

Yeah, but now our freedom fries are going to smell like exhaust!

Live?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Not all of us live nearby KFC :)"

What do you mean 'live', buy one of their buckets and pour the gallon grease at the bottom right into your car.

I love the Colonial.

Ass-diesel

[EaterOfDog]

I don't know about bio-diesel, but if I can get a car that runs on methane, I could drive for three days on $10 worth of Mexican food. The adapter between my digestive system and the car might be uncomfortable though...

This just in...

[raistphrk]

White Castle and Taco Bell to invest in joint biopower enterprise.

This guy's a dead man

[jocknerd]

He better hire someone to start his car everyday. The oil companies won't put up with this.

Re:How's it smell?

[ProgressiveCynic]

You can also get your source oil from Krispy Kreme... Mmmm, donuts!

fat chicks

[millahtime]

Yeah, I have a problem. You may have fat chicks chasing down your car.



I know it's not PC to say that but oh well.

Re:How's it smell?

[Russ Steffen]

Great, so then every cop in a 10-mile radius is magically drawn to your car. Even if you're not doing anything wrong it would still be unnerving as hell leading a parade of squad cars all trying to get a contact sugar high from your exhaust.

Re:French Fry Smell

[eggoeater]

"Welcome to McDonalds, can I take your order?"
"Yes, I'd like a Big Mac, large fry, small diet coke, and filler-up with McDiesel."
"Would you like to Biggie-size that to include an oil change?"

Re:Great...

[17028]

They recycle vegetable oil?? Right, tell me what restaurants are using recycled oil please. I'm not eating there!

Ha

[Gothmolly]

The IRS can kiss my greasy ass if they think I'll declare this.

Re:Clean?!

[maxbang]

...and diluted by water

Would this have anything to do with people like my friends and me throwing massive chunks of ice into the fryers while working at Wendy's in high school? There's nothing quite like watching (and hearing) a deep fryer exploding with gigantic scalding bubbles of grease. However, I'm thinking your water-diluted grease gets the water after it's cooled.

Re:Like they say about Linux...

[IthnkImParanoid]

Not only that, the price of my time skyrockets when it comes to handling vast quantities of used cooking grease. I can't imagine what this guy, and his home, smelled like after such an undertaking.

For my time/money, I'll wade through man pages and dependency checks long before I'll touch a drum of boiled fat.

Re:How's it smell?

[Oliver Wendell Jones]

I wasn't trying to kill myself, your honor. I started the car and noticed the smell of donuts and figured that the kids had left some in the back seat, so I went looking for them and well, the next thing I remember is the paramedics leaning over me, telling me I should have opened the garage door first...

That's my retirement fund!!!

[Anonymous Coward]

That's WILLY'S [snpp.com] grease!!

Free as in beer or free as in oil

[Greyfox]

Yep! It's like fish heads. Right now you can find fish heads for free if you ask around to various local groceries. As soon as all those outsourced IT workers realize that for the same price as ramen, they could be eating ramen with fish heads, that market will dry up faster than a dead coyote in death valley.

Re:Clean?!

[stratjakt]

I went into a KFC about a decade ago - at the height of the California Raisin's meteoric rise to fame, and KFC was giving away Raisin dolls. Guess that must have been more than 10 years.

Anyways, just as I got to the counter, some lady stormed in. She opened her bucket of chicken, and pointed to disgusting black globs of rubbery crap. It was really vile looking. The guy behind the counter said that some of the kids had been melting the Raisins in the deep fryer, apologized and gave her a refund.

He then asked me what my order was, like the oblivious idiot he was. I asked them when they change their oil, he said "never, we just add to it when it gets low".

Yucky. Though it probably would have been cool to watch those Raisins melt.

Re:Biodiesel - myth?

[transient]

we used gallons of vegetable oil to wind up with a couple litres of fuel

How are things going at NASA?

Awesome news

[Mean_Nishka]

Now I can buy a hummer!!

Re:Great...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's "shoo-in". Not "shoe-in".

Have you seen the commercial where someone does something very outstanding and everyone wants to know how they do it and they say "No, but I stayed at a -hotelname- last night" ?

I think you need to sleep there a few nights.

This defies the law of supply and demand!

[Dark Coder]

Only 0.41?

I'd gladly pay $1.50/gallon for this stuff!

What a markup for these biodiesel guys!

Re:Availability

[discstickers]

I'd hope so, otherwise Mr. Thermodynamics might have to have a few strong words with Mr. and Mrs. Biodiesel.

Re:Great...

[Snowmit]

If you aren't living near a fast food restaurant, you probably aren't living in North America.

Re:Great...

[Bakerman]

Europe has much higher fuel prices. We evolved our society in one direction ([sub]urban sprawl/commuting) and they in another (it helps that they are so small and dense though).

Hey!
Some of us Europeans are actually tall and smart!

Re:How's it smell?

[bradwww]

If the oil you use for fuel was used to cook fries, that is what it smells like. If it was a mexican place, it smells like burritos. If it was a doughnut shop, it smells like sweets. If it was a theatre, it smells like popcorn. This is how we get people excited about Biodeisel sales - designer fragrances for your tail-pipe! The stylish locals in California would love this!

Re:Great...

[nule.org]

Yes, I work in automotive fuel systems.

You must be very tiny.

Re:Where do you think the flavor comes from?

[Anonymous Coward]

Idiots. You drain the oil because it becomes contaminated with some very nasty chemicals. If you change the complete oil you can wait twice as long before you have to do it again and in the first half the quality is better than it will be ever compaired with draining half. But you shouldn't take cooking advise from people who can't cook, like the British