There is lots of talk about biodiesel, check the forum. I often refer to 'biofuels.'

 

Did I mention that there are 78 million acres of soybeans this year? The yield is 4 gallons per bushel, or so, and a typical average yield is 40 bu/acre.

I belive more in Biodiesel than ethanol..

Oh yeah, Henry Ford built his car to run on alcohol.

 

50 BPA is not uncommon in a good year is these parts. So that's 200 gallons per acre. Then don't forgot the amount of bio diesel that comes from waste products from the dairy industry.

 

im all for biodiesel in the summer but without a good heater it wont work when its cold, also same goes for e-85... cold starting sucks... and with ethanol i think everyone can agree it cuts mileage... and right now the difference is about 10% between e-85 and gas here- not quite worth it- a vehicle will lose about 15% mileage... so im going propane :-) also produced domestically

 

Diesels in general won't start in the winter with out a heater. I do wonder how much more efficient it would burn in my furnace.

 

BioDiesel has been around for years.Mother Earth News was running trucks and farm tractors on corn,sunflower and soybean oil about 30 years ago,and getting good results.
Leo

 

there is a forum on Yahoo for alternative fuels in fuel oil furnaces.. /group/altfuelfurnace/
You'll have to go to the yahoo groops and get to them, because apparently yahoo groups links are a taboo to post... I tried, and it never made it on, so I figured I should be able to supply enough for you to find it.

 

Hehehe, sounds to me like the perfect ammo for an ad in support of the Ethanol bill:

"The oil companies, which have reported record profits in the BILLIONS of dollars, have spent 70 MILLION to PREVENT our dependance on THEIR product. What are THEY afraid of - giving the consumers a choice?"

 

One small problem with propane - it is also getting more expensive than gasoline, and it also suffers from a notable drop in mileage.

 

propane only loses mileage if you dont build the engine to take advantage of the increased octane by increasing compression... my 545 will be running almost 12 to 1 compression... 9.6 to 1 dynamic- really mild rv cam... now if pump gas could support that then pump gas would get better mileage... but it cant- thats why im going propane... not to mention that it burns cleaner and doesnt contaminate the oil with carbon and fuel residue... or that your spark plugs last longer and reduces strain on your ignition system because you reduce your spark plug gap

 

Hi darrin1999.Most people don`t purpose build an engine for propane or natural gas.With propane an engine has to be derated 10%,with natural gas it is 20%.These figures were given to me many years ago by people that were propane distributers.Yes,the two fuels mentioned ARE very clean burning,and as you said propane costs are going up.The costs will be higher because of the losses mentioned.

Leo

 

Thats exactly the same issue with E85, if you are running a flex fuel vehicle it is going to have to be able to run on 89 octane, but if you were to build a engine with E85 specifically in mind I am betting the drop in power and fuel economy wouldn't be nearly as great as people are reporting. Ethonal is well over 100 octane which means you can run in the 11+:1 compression range and with alum heads over 12:1 now figure in some good computor programing to take advantage of the higher octane too, and add some timing and I am willing to bet it would increase power and possibly increase mileage.

 

I'm doing exactly that with a 4.0L V6! See my thread about it here:
https://www.ford-trucks.com/forums/5...e-a-motor.html

 

yep thats what i was thinking... if i had to run a dual fuel setup id choose propane and e-85- theyre pretty close on octane and therefore ideal compression ratio. but with e-85 you still have to put what would be an oversize carb on and jet it way richer than if you were running gas because its got so many fewer btu's than gas or even propane, so youll still get mileage loss

 

You don't need an oversize carb. It just needs to be jetted larger.

Reading material:
http://www.swri.edu/4org/d03/engres/...n/pbeffimp.htm
http://aaae.okstate.edu/proceedings/...ticles/556.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E85
http://www.answers.com/topic/e85