biodiesel for honda 2000 generators?

[silver suz]

Since I'd much rather have the generator smell like french fries- could I toss this idea out to the general group? I concede that solar will NOT meet my energy needs. Thank you to all the people who told me many times- I am a bit hard headed! I am now thinking of using 2 honda 2000 generators linked in tandem (I heard they are much easier to handle that way, weight wise than a 4000???) and using biodiesel to run them. The very major advantage being that I could handle the filling of the fuel- except for smelling french fries all the time would be bad for a dieter. In a pinch I could go to Sam's club for gallon containers of the cheapest vege oil they have. (we are not considering money here but rather my being able to handle the fuel, and the smell.). My son is thinking of converting his truck. The Real Goods Co. in CA (www.realgoods.com) has a complete setup and instructions to make 40 gallons at a time in about an hour. He would make it.
Do any of you have comments about this viability?? silver suz

[MikeL]

I would be interested in knowing how you intend to convert 4 stroke Honda generators to run on Diesel of any kind. While externally diesel and gasoline engine look alike they are light years apart in operation, From fuel delivery to compression and cooling requirements it would be interesting to know how you're going to pull this off. --Pieman

[74Argosy24MH]

They have gasoline engines, not diesel. Not viable at all.

John

[jordandvm]

Originally Posted by silver suz

Since I'd much rather have the generator smell like french fries- could I toss this idea out to the general group? I concede that solar will NOT meet my energy needs. Thank you to all the people who told me many times- I am a bit hard headed! I am now thinking of using 2 honda 2000 generators linked in tandem (I heard they are much easier to handle that way, weight wise than a 4000???) and using biodiesel to run them. The very major advantage being that I could handle the filling of the fuel- except for smelling french fries all the time would be bad for a dieter. In a pinch I could go to Sam's club for gallon containers of the cheapest vege oil they have. (we are not considering money here but rather my being able to handle the fuel, and the smell.). My son is thinking of converting his truck. The Real Goods Co. in CA (www.realgoods.com) has a complete setup and instructions to make 40 gallons at a time in about an hour. He would make it.
Do any of you have comments about this viability?? silver suz

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I understand that vegie oil will only work in diesel engines, and there has to be some grain alcohol in the mix also to start the engines. I'm not aware that Honda makes a 2000 diesel generator. I heard a talk by some High School students locally who are making biodiesel in conjunction with some university students. Their goal is to fuel all the maintenance vehicles in the School District, and if there's some left over, to sell some to the public. I guess it works well, but the cost would be more than traditional diesel fuel, so no savings to the pocketbook!
Jim

[markdoane]

Originally Posted by silver suz

(we are not considering money here but rather my being able to handle the fuel, and the smell.). My son is thinking of converting his truck. The Real Goods Co. in CA (www.realgoods.com) has a complete setup and instructions to make 40 gallons at a time in about an hour. He would make it.
Do any of you have comments about this viability?? silver suz

Before you commit to using this system, stand close to a generator burning biodiesel and see if you can tolerate the smell.

There are diesel generators available, but they are not light weight hondas. Yanmar makes a fine 4kw unit, but you cannot lift it.

Biodiesel, after it is burned, contains a lot of particulate soot, more than what is in straight diesel fuel. Biodiesel does burn with lower amounts of NOx.

[MikeL]

Silver Suz----I happened to be looking back through some old posts and found that in june you posted a similar question about running diesel or similar fuels in gasoline engines. This is not ment to make light of your ideas but frankly they won't work. Perhaps you don't understand the difference in the two. Asumeing that here is a brief discription of the two. In a 4 stroke gasoline engine fuel and air are compressed in a cylinder and at the proper time ignited with a spark in the combustion chamber. The fuel -air mixture burns, expands and forces the piston down changing liquid energy into mechanical. If you put diesel fuel in this engine it WILL NOT RUN as the fuel will not vaporize and will not ignite.----A diesel engine while similar uses a heavier fuel that needs more heat than a spark plug produces to ignite it. Diesel engines are ignited by heat of compression. The higher you compress air the hotter it gets .Diesel engines have compression ratios in excess of 16-1 where as gasoline engines range from 8 or 10 to 1. When a diesel engine in on compression only air is compressed in the cylinder instead of air and fuel as the gasoline engine. When the piston reaches near top dead center the air that's compressed is heated by compression to the point that if fuel were present it would burn. At this point fuel is injected into the super heated compressed air and the burning process and mechanical forces are the same as the gasoline engine. This a very simplified explaination of course as there are other systems in diesel engines to get them started etc. So---Simply changing fuels in a gasoline engine will not work for a number of reasons. 1--the fuel simply won't ignite in a gasoline engine-- 2 a diesel requires a high presure injection system for forcing fuel into a chamber that in under several thousand lbs of pressure. 3--You could not crank an engine with a rope starter if it had the compression of a diesel. ---4 If you did get it started some way by mixing gasoline or some other fuel with the diesel it would burn the engine up as diesel fuel has a higher BTU content than gasoline and a gas engine doesn't have a cooling system that can handle the extra heat produced . I personally saw this happen in a car the mistakenly pumped a half tank of diesel fuel into a half tank of gas . It melted the pistons and turned the cylinder walls black and melted the solder out of the radiator. Perhaps this will help in your search for alterative fuels. Pieman

[maxandgeorgia]

Your discussion of gasoline / diesel systems made sense to this non-mechanical reader. I, for one, understand better after reading this 101 on basics of fuel systems. However, I could swear that somewhere someplace I read about Honda having a diesel generator. Is that so and is it just too cumbersome for our RV use, or did I dream that?

[juel]

I had a 4000 Honda mounted on the tongue of my AS Caravel that was converted to run off the propane tanks. I had two tanks on the front and had a rack constructed to fit on the rear that held two more large tanks. This was a 1967 AS so there was no problem with a weak rear frame. The generator would run about 12 3/4 hours on one of the tanks. The generator never had to be cleaned and ran well on that fuel. The only problem I ever had was the noise and vibration. Actually it wasn't as bad as you might expect; however, I would leave the generator in my pickup bed if I were doing this again. I showed dogs professionally and was often stuck at show grounds with no hook-ups. This was a perfect set up.

[MikeL]

Max--- You may be right about Honda having a diesel as I know Yamaha does. The Yamaha is like you may suspect a large gen. IT's a 6500 watt twin cylinder,liquid cooled diesel powered unit. It weighs a meager 526 lbs. Not something you would be throwing in the bed oaf your pickup. It should be noted that this IS a diesel engine not a gasoline engine running on or converted to diesel. Am not sure what the application is for these but would guess they are for industrial or emergency .
By the way we are Airstream owners too. ----Pieman

" It doesn't cost anymore to go first class, you just can't stay as long".

[swebster]

There are plenty of diesel and LP fueled RV generators out there from companies like Onan, Kohler and Generac. These tend to be pretty large generators as they are found on board class A diesel pushers. One of these units could be permanently mounted in the tow vehicle but would require significant space and load carrying capacity.

With the new popularity in diesel powered class C's and B's I think you will start to see some smaller (lighter) diesel gensets coming down the line.

I have to say that I am completely fascinated at the entire concept of biodiesel. I love the concept and have looked into it myself for my in town commuting (I drive about four miles a day to and from the office). But unless you can haul a lot of fuel around with you it certainly does not seem to be something that is well suited for long distance Class A RV travel or cold weather climates.

[silver suz]

You ARE right. I know nothing about engines. And I asked the wrong questions of my husband who would know. No I don't intend to convert a GAS engine ,but to use diesel engines from the start. I guess I read a few too many articles on people using boidesiel exclusively for cars trucks, motorcycles...so I made the next logical (???) jump to diesel generators. That's why I have you all to keep me on the straight and narrow. Obviously, I need to do more research. I wish I could go to the Real Goods store near the wine country in CA. They have all sorts of workshops and run their cars and trucks on biodiesel. Does anyone live near them? Has anyone visited them or took their workshops? I'm hoping to get to their next annual event in august, or the next year? or the one after that?? . suz

[Tinsel Loaf]

Bio-diesel sounds great except you will get very tried of filtering and farting around with the used oils really fast. It is messy. Convert your Honda gen sets to propane. You wont have the gasoline fumes and it is a lot less hassle.

[markdoane]

Originally Posted by Tinsel Loaf

Bio-diesel sounds great except you will get very tried of filtering and farting around with the used oils really fast. It is messy. Convert your Honda gen sets to propane. You wont have the gasoline fumes and it is a lot less hassle.

You also need to think about what it will cost once the local MacDonalds manager figures out that he can sell his used fry fat, rather than just give it away.

[Tinsel Loaf]

That is a very good point. They may even make you buy fries with the oil.

[rluhr]

There's an abundance of information on the Internet about biodiesel, but what they often don't tell you is that the process of making the stuff involves some pretty nasty chemicals that you can't just buy at the grocery store. The people I know who make their own have elaborate setups and wear full throw-away environment suits to protect them from the stuff they have to deal with. You also have to figure out what to do with the byproducts, which are considerable in volume (gallons of glycerine).

Instead of trying to make the stuff, check around for a commercial source. Biodiesel suppliers are popping up everywhere. It's certainly worth buying it rather than trying to make your own. And it really does smell like french fries at the exhaust pipe.

Keep in mind that in the winter (up north) biodiesel is actually typically 50-80% regular diesel fuel, because biodiesel alone will not flow at low temperatures. Only in summer can you use 100% biodiesel fuel, and even then it is usually 20% regular diesel (often called B-80).

[silver suz]

Oh WOW, this is all very interesting and scary? knowledge. I'm going to the biodiesel because I can't use propane. But if it's mixed with regular diesel- then so much for that idea. Diesel fumes for me are the first 3 letters. I have got to go to one of those Real Goods workshops on biodiesel. Yeah, I thought about the McD guys finally realising the goldmine they are giving away! And YUCK, having to EAT french fries? I need that engine on "Back To The Future III" Any other ideas not involving petrochemicals and the like? Think of "boy in plastic bubble" except the plastic wouldn't be so great, unless outgassed. Thanks, suz

[71_safari]

If you have not been to the Solar Living Center (Real Goods) in Hopland, you owe yourself a visit. It is about 2 hours north of San Francisco in Mendocino County. They have about 8 or 10 acres that was once barren field and is now an oasis with green (trees and ground cover) everywhere, all irrigated with well water pumped by solar 12v dc pumps. And beautiful buildings, all heated, cooled, and powered by solar. A solar parking structure, etc, etc. It really shows what can be done with the free energy from the sun.

If you go, do yourself another favor and reserve a room at the Hopland Inn, just down the street, an old, beautifully restored Victorian hotel with reasonable rates, outstanding cuisine and local wine selection. I believe there is a campground nearby but I always drive the car and stay in the Hopland Inn.

john

[Silvertwinkie]

Displacement on demand seems to be a happy medium, but like some other posts.... that has nothing to do with the question on this thread......

On a generator that small, I wouldn't worry about it. I'd be more concerned with fuel mileage on the tow vehicle and other worries before trying to find a way to worry about a small Honda gen that is pretty fuel eff as it is...

[norbert]

Originally Posted by markdoane

You also need to think about what it will cost once the local MacDonalds manager figures out that he can sell his used fry fat, rather than just give it away.

you guys are really out of the loop...it is already collected and recycled...into nefarious products like LIPSTICK...so the next you kiss your honey...you could be kissing a french fry....Mon J'taime....
norby

[Wardinbb]

Folks, IMHO the real deal is the FuelCell. Just do a search on Fuel Cell and see.
These puppy's can run on almost anything depending on how they are configured/designed/manufactured. Natural gas, hydrogen, propane, water, gasoline, air whatever. The fact of the matter is that they will convert any of the above fuels, and others, into electricity. It's a product solution that has been on the shelf since about 1890. Technology today just can't do the work necessary to bring this solution to market. But the desire, and need, to realize it has been going on since the 70's. The fossil fuel people can't give up their stake in the game (billions) to forego the spirkle that they've gleaned from their rise to power and dominance in the market. But also note that these major players are also invested and providing capital to be first in this new arena. The RV market is one of the perfect places to introduce this technology. Embrace this as RV utilization of this energy resorce will help revolutionize the planet's quest for distributed power.

Promote the idea.
Ed