Hi there.
I have a 2008 6.4L Power Stroke and was wondering about the feasibility of setting it up to run on waste vegetable oil.

I read a little here and there and it seems the 6.4L wouldn't be a good truck to do it on. Maybe I should leave it at that...but... I am curious for what reasons it wouldn't work.

For one, this truck is set up to run on high sulfer fuel. That is, no EGR or DPF system is present. Does that make a difference?

Or is it because of the high pressure fuel pump and/or injectors that it won't work?

Just looking for some info.

Thanks in advance.

 

I know very little about the 6.4, but:
You could probably make it work, as you don't have the EGR and DPF. With those, you've got all sorts of problems.
However, I'm not sure you want to. Why? You're talking at a very expensive system and engine. Unless you get your WVO as clean as pump diesel(filtered very well), you will have major longer-term issues with the tight tolerance components.
You might even have to make biodiesel out of it to get the viscosity down, and you still might have issues.


If I wanted to run a WVO truck, I would use something sloppy and cheap enough to have no trouble doing so. The best engine(IMHO) for this is the 6.9/7.3 IDI - The entire fuel system(injectors, IP) is under $1K to replace. The tolerances are huge, and it will run on just about anything that will flow through the IP. You still want it clean, but these engines are extremely simple and easy to work on.

Of course, they also lack power. Add a turbo and you've got a decent rig. Add some other upgrades and you'll have a nice powerful rig. And the fuel economy isn't much different than the newer rigs.

You can also look at a 7.3 PSD, but it is also more complex. Plenty of people have done it however.

 

None of the PSDs do well on Veggie Oil. A little thing called "injector coking" gets very expensive. Put away the veggie oil Kool Aid. It's been proven to be useless years ago. Long gone are the days of free fuel behind a restaurant. Unless you can refine it and filter as well as a fuel refinery, count on lots of issues. It cost my neighbor about $3500 in injector and injector cup work after running veggie oil for 6 months in his Excursion.

Look at it like this. Ever fried stuff in a frying pan? Ever noticed that VERY VERY sticky residue on the edges of the pan that a steel wool pad won't remove? There ya go.

 

What about a truck with a mechanical injection pump ?

 

See above

 

If you've got a good supply of veggie oil, you can make it work.
You use a mechanically injected truck. You then do lots of filtering to your veggie oil, and if you can, run it through a centrifuge. This will get out a lot of the crud.
Then, mix in about 10% gasoline, a bit of cheap lubricating oil(either new or centrifuged), and you've got something that'll run decently.
The gasoline will help to keep the injectors clean and reduce the viscosity, it should also make it easier to start.

You'll still have to replace your injectors and IP sooner than otherwise(probably), but your cost is a /lot/ less(7.3 IDI = <$1000 for a pump and injectors), and you can probably make money on the deal.

 

[QUOTE=Macrobb;15546813]If you've got a good supply of veggie oil, you can make it work.
You use a mechanically injected truck. You then do lots of filtering to your veggie oil, and if you can, run it through a centrifuge. This will get out a lot of the crud.
Then, mix in about 10% gasoline, a bit of cheap lubricating oil(either new or centrifuged), and you've got something that'll run decently.
The gasoline will help to keep the injectors clean and reduce the viscosity, it should also make it easier to start.

You'll still have to replace your injectors and IP sooner than otherwise(probably), but your cost is a /lot/ less(7.3 IDI =

 

WVO has been proven to be able to run in most modern diesels, including CR.
Your individual success depends on the vehicle, your conversion, and your processing and the condition of the engine.

I was assured by several 'experts' that my VW TDI would not make 10k miles on WVO. I'm now approaching 250K w/o any WVO related problems.

As you know DPF equipped diesel get clogged up, or have crankcase oil thickening problems caused by late injection of WVO leading to unburned fuel going into the crankcase. I don't know of any 6.4 thats been converted, most still have their DPF's.

You could do it, after you learned all about burning SVO, the 6.4, the DPF problem and then what to avoid and look out for. Expect to spend 100's of hours doing this.

You can start here, its about biodiesel but the issue is the same:
http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/eve/foru...2721003282/p/1

 

Whoa Cowboy!!!

You've got it all wrong here. For starters, I personally have over 350k miles on WVO in my (2) 7.3 PSD's. I have done dozens of conversions on other 7.3's that cumulatively have well over a million miles. NONE have had a 'coking' problem.

Your friend did something very wrong up to and including paying waaaay too much for injectors and somehow believing his injector cups were affected by fuel. I suspect he was either 'blending' WVO in his stock fuel system and/or ran WVO contaminated with water and caustic cleaners often used in fryers.

As for me, I like koolaid and I will continue burning the 'free fuel' they throw out behind the resteraunt.

 

There is a 6.4 with a veggie conversion. The engine handles the fuel just fine (with deletes, etc of course). The issue with the converted 6.4 was it used the stock fuel filter for both fuels and had a loooong (and likely still inadequate) purge. This can be solved.

Properly filtered and adequately heated WVO will run in ANY Diesel engine. The emission equipment on late-model engines is a problem, but the injectors, etc don't know the difference. I'll be designing a 2-tank WVO conversion for 6.7 PSD's very soon. Keep your eyes peeled for that!!!

Oh, and unless things have changed A LOT - infopoop is a terrible place for veggie info...

 

saving money on fuel is not a good reason to run WVO in a 6.X. return on investment is not there. BUT, if your after adding lube to your fuel then in my opinion clean vegitble, soy, etc will get you there with just 2% of vegitble oil per tankful of fuel.

 

The 6.0 does fantastic and AFAIK, the 6.4 has a bunch of miles with no issues on straight WVO with a proper conversion. I will be designing a kit for the 6.7 PSD as soon as I have a moment of spare time. These are finally old enough that the demand for a kit is getting high. Since I have easy access to a couple of 6.7 Cummins trucks, I'll probably develop a kit for it first.

Other than the obvious added lubricity, these engines do not know the difference between D2 and adequately heated and filtered WVO. The heat takes care of the viscosity difference between the fuels.

That said, unlike going to the gas station - the operator is in complete control of fuel quality. The people I've known who had trouble burning WVO all lacked the required diligence for properly dewatering and filtering oil.

I also have a TDi that is NEVER supposed to run on WVO according to the 'experts' - but it has over 150k miles on the high cholesterol fuel!

 

B5 is ok'ed by ford. one of the reasons why B5 and not B20 is that while hydor carbon emissions are less with bio, nitrix emissions are more. so the 6.4L is limited to B5 before the nitrix emmssions levels hit the cieling.

Now, the B20 certified engines get around the nitrix limit by using DEF fluid which interacts with exhuast gases to reduce nitrix emissions.

the negative impact running high blends of bio has on injecotrs and pumps is theoretical. the 6.4l injectors are multi frequency and can vary their pulse cycles per second. the theory is thicker fuel will prevent higher cyclic frequency ingector functionality. its not clear when that occurs or if even consumers want it....or if bio is used will the need for this cyclic action even be needed.

the lube value of just b5 is superior to all after market fuel lube adidtives.

my recmondation is to run the b5, and during the initial use, increase the change frequency of your fuel filters becuase the b5 will definitely clean your system out.

some folks report running b30 or higher with no problems.....which would be correct..unnless you are in NYC and are going thru your annual emmissons test...you would fail due to the nitrix levels.