Black Diesel On The Road!

[Platypuss]

Hi All

Fist time poster here. We purchased a 1995 Scania K113TRB coach bus about a month ago, and began fitting it out as a motorhome. Its a BIG rig, with a 22.5T GVM, 10T towing, three axles, and 14.5M of living space. With the fuel prices of late, I decided that its 600L main tank needs to become a black diesel tank (WMO) and the 180L overflow will be kept as a 'warm up' tank for 'extortion level' diesel. Just a few problems with this idea...

1 - We are permanent travelers. By permanent travelers I mean, we refused a compulsory government medical procedure and were forced into homeless vagrancy as punishment. So a 'settling tank' is an impossibility.
2 - I cannot find anything about my engine running on WMO. Its a Scania DSC11 as the 380Hp variant, which is an 11L straight 6 turbo. Shes has a mechanical type distribution injection pump to direct injection system (from what I can see?), but not entirely sure. They are most commonly used as marine grade engines, so should be very forgiving on what you feed them. One thing I am finding with this recent move is that information about truck engines and parts is a lot harder to come by than standard cars.
3 - I'm a newbie! But I am autistic when it comes to learning a new skill. Although I've never touched an engine with black diesel before, I know how it all works in theory. But I'm on here to share my experience with anyone who wishes to follow my journey in feeding black gold to a DSC11. But most of all... to learn off all of you!

The system:
Im going to have two 110L 'dirty' tanks, where I suck all my WMO from local mechanics as we pass through town. I hope that by sucking the top of their tanks, it helps with the lack of ability to settle my dirty oil. I'll have a 220V heated "raw power" 6000 RMP centrifuge from WVO Designs, which I will set to run on a circulation loop between the two tanks while driving with a 2L/min oil feed pump. This will give the oil anywhere from 3 to 6 hours a trip to cycle through the centrifuge. Once its spent a good time in circulation, it will gravity feed through the centrifuge one last time into a separate 300L 'clean' tank. After which, I will add my 15% ULP, and let the gear pump cycle that tank and blend the ULP with the clean WMO. Once I'm happy with the blend, I will then set the same gear pump to fill the main 600L vehicle tank... and viola! I hope... haha!

Anyway, hi again, thanks for your time to read my post, and feel free to feed me as much of your knowledge relevant to my situation as possible!

Bernie

 

[DaveBen]

Welcome to O.B. Platypuss! That is a nice project. I have nothing to offer besides the Welcome.

 

[Jesus Freak]

It seems that I'm usually the second welcome behind DaveBen. But welcome to the club. It really sounds like you're on the right track with your WMO plan. I don't know that particular engine, but as long as it's mechanically injected you should be good. I run WMO in a turbo 7.3IDI ford and don't have any real problems, anymore. I do advise that "in my opinion" WMO is a learning process with a curve. Getting your engine set up to crank up on diesel and shut down on diesel will be important. And if you can tap transmission shops for tranny fluid from time to time your IP and injectors will appreciate it. Good luck on the adventure. Please start a thread outlining your WMO experience, good and bad, a lot of us will be curious. There's several threads discribing our WMO programs. Mine is called "Jesus Freaks WMO thread".

 

[Jesus Freak]

Your first modification, should be to make sure all the fuel return lines go to the WMO tank to keep the "extortion tank" clean.

 

[Platypuss]

Thanks for the welcome DaveBen! And thanks for the help Jesus Freak!

I want to touch base on something I'm not 100% sure on. For blending the ULP and clean WMO, I've read all you need to do is circulate the blended tank through a gear pump for a few hours. If the fuel sits on top of the oil, and the circulation sucks from the bottom and returns in the top of the tank for a few hours, is this enough to blend?

 

[Jesus Freak]

I'm sure that's more than enough.

 

[Fixswheels]

what is ULP? everyone on this site uses all these abbreviations...maybe its texting stuff? thanks -fix

 

[SultanofNACL]

My guess would be unleaded petrol, just like using the shorthand RUG.

Platypuss, I put a Microsoft 'paint' diagram together depicting your setup, as I understood it. The top right corner has a resemblance to what I might have as an on-the-road WMO collector, the manifold shows a bypass section on the first leg followed by filtered legs, where the filters could just be more 'coarse' filters for filtering out large debris (say, 200-400μm) as the oil is collected.

 

[Jesus Freak]

My guess would be unleaded petrol, just like using the shorthand RUG.

Platypuss, I put a Microsoft 'paint' diagram together depicting your setup, as I understood it. The top right corner has a resemblance to what I might have as an on-the-road WMO collector, the manifold shows a bypass section on the first leg followed by filtered legs, where the filters could just be more 'coarse' filters for filtering out large debris (say, 200-400μm) as the oil is collected.

Hey, that's pretty cool Sultan. I'm fnot sure of the platypus's complete plan, but if I was to edit anything, I'd say don't let any of the return go to the "dino diesel" tank. That tank should only be for cranking and shutting down, if any return goes there it will become an oil tank over time.

 

[SultanofNACL]

Absolutely correct! The only reason why I put fuel returns to each tank was so that as the engine is running off of a particular tank, its return would be routed to that respective tank. I depicted spring return solenoid valves being inline with the supply and return of each tank. Ideally, the engine would be started off the extortion tank as has been said, and once the engine is warmed up some, then WMO would be supplied via the piping circuits. Before shutdown the fuel supply would be set to pull from the extortion tank and the return set to the WMO tank to purge WMO from the return lines before the return switches back to the extortion tank.
It has been some time since I looked at the different companies that make the kits, but some biodiesel kits can/could be used to simplify and allow some leeway towards a plug-and-play setup. These kits have temperature monitoring built in that automatically will actuate a solenoid block so that the fuel supply moves from dino diesel over to the alt-fuel.
Filters, heaters, collection equipment, testing supplies: Utah Biodiesel Supply
Solenoid blocks, parts, electronics: Greasecar

 

[Platypuss]

Thanks so much for your help guys. The knowledge in here is insanely valuable. And thanks for the system drawing Sultan! This really gives me a good idea of how the system will look. Ill start compiling a list of parts needed, and break it down into stages.
Im guessing the first stage will be to separate my tanks and get that change-over system going. I will have to take a double take to make sure, but I think my main tank (where the engine sucks from) has a lift pump in it. The fuel has to travel over 14 meters to get to the engine, so I guess a lift pump makes sense. But if so, does this mean I will need to install a lift pump in the overflow too?
Another thing I've noticed, even under heavy running, my engine temp doesn't move a smidge over 75C (its a Euro, so will use Celsius for this one). I've been doing some research, and these big engines don't heat up much. In fact, running too cold is the most common issue. They have a running temp range of 70C to 95C, and will never hit minimum running temp while at idle (which is why it has a rev lever on it to hold the revs up when sitting at idle for long periods). Is this going to be an issue for running on WMO?

Thanks again all!

 

[Jesus Freak]

I don't know your exact engine, but that could be a potential issue... kinda. It'll probably start "wet heading" and smoke a good bit at idle. Which won't be a bad thing if you're camping in a swamp with a lot of mosquitoes, but could be an issue if you're trying to make friends at a Good Sam's camping ground. You might have to switch to the extortion tank or maybe have one of the tanks set up with a 50/50 mix or whatever mix you figure out won't smoke at idle. From time to time you do need to run it hard and get the EGTs up so as to "clean out the cylinders. Maybe they make a warmer thermostat for your engine? And do understand, WMO is a learning process. You will have failures, but from those you will have victories!

 

[SultanofNACL]

I've burned a lot of WMO, ATF, SVO, dino diesel. Ran a few thousand miles on alt fuels but stopped to rebuild cylinder heads and diagnose hard starting issues. WMO viscosity range and cleanliness are important for pumps and atomizing through injectors so centrifuging is A+.

first stage will be to separate my tanks and get that change-over system going. I will have to take a double take to make sure, but I think my main tank (where the engine sucks from) has a lift pump in it. The fuel has to travel over 14 meters to get to the engine, so I guess a lift pump makes sense. But if so, does this mean I will need to install a lift pump in the overflow too?

I would separate the tanks in preparation to put the WMO system together, but make notes on which hose is which, or get a label maker or those paint pens. The main tank probably has a lift pump 'cuz the injection pump requires some minimum pressure and flow, but I don't know much about that injection pump in particular. The overflow may need its own lift pump, but what is the current plumbing for that overflow tank? Is it plumbed into the 600 L main tank so both of them act like saddle tanks on a road train tractor or is it for chassis weight balancing?

Another thing I've noticed, even under heavy running, my engine temp doesn't move a smidge over 75C (its a Euro, so will use Celsius for this one). I've been doing some research, and these big engines don't heat up much. In fact, running too cold is the most common issue. They have a running temp range of 70C to 95C, and will never hit minimum running temp while at idle (which is why it has a rev lever on it to hold the revs up when sitting at idle for long periods). Is this going to be an issue for running on WMO?

If the engine has 2 thermostats, maybe the engine just doesn't heat up much or the radiator and fan cools efficiently (but hopefully isn't overcooling). "Wet stacking/heading" where the fuel won't burn as well and can coat the cylinder walls and end up in the crankcase can happen if cylinder heat drops too much. Unfortunately, this un-ideal combustion could also coke the WMO, though I believe this could be conjecture on my part since I was not centrifuging and testing viscosity on my oil.
If you determine WMO viscosity before you use it, I believe this and the rev limiter should be fine. You'd need to idle excessively for it to be problematic.
Could the excessive cooling be antifreeze/coolant percentages being out of range in the cooling system? Does the radiator have a fan clutch that is staying engaged or are there radiator shutters that are not opening and closing correctly?

 

[themechanicalford]

Hey welcome! I want to say most importantly, thank you for being part of the resistance to medical fascism. It’s the issue of our lifetime. We were preparing to lose everything once the mandates rolled out earlier this year. We were prepared to lose our home and live on the road if that’s what it came to. Luckily her job didn’t require it, and so we didn’t have to follow through with it, but we very likely could have been on the road with you guys. I don’t have anything to add to your build but I’m going to follow along!

 

[Jesus Freak]

Hey welcome! I want to say most importantly, thank you for being part of the resistance to medical fascism. It’s the issue of our lifetime. We were preparing to lose everything once the mandates rolled out earlier this year. We were prepared to lose our home and live on the road if that’s what it came to. Luckily her job didn’t require it, and so we didn’t have to follow through with it, but we very likely could have been on the road with you guys. I don’t have anything to add to your build but I’m going to follow along!

Right on! That's why I run WMO, it's an affront to the system! Viva la resistance!