WMO filtration system on the vehicle?

[sonic reducer]

How viable is an onboard wmo filtration setup? Up front I will say that I have no experience with waste oils in general although I have been reading around here and elsewhere a bit. I would like to get into waste oil(WMO specifically) but just cannot justify having the equipment stationary at my house. I live in an urban environment, my garage is in the basement and space is at a premium. I don't want a big barrel of oil inside the house. my neighbors are lame-***** so I don't want to do it outside. I like to fly under the radar whenever possible. All that said, wmo processing on the property seems questionable.
I figure if you were doing smaller batches you could run smaller tanks and use the truck's systems for heating the oil whether that was coolant lines or 12v. the filtration systems are compact enough per component that they could be mounted wherever they fit under the bed and then plumbed to suit. on a truck with dual tanks you could have a collection tank up in the bed somewhere, say inside a truck box, which would pump or gravity feed into the second tank. run a dual tank type system to the truck's fuel system. front tank diesel, or known good fuel, rear tank waste fuel, with secondary filtration between the two. so the flow would be collection tank-coarse filtration-secondary tank-fine filtration-primary tank-fuel system. Possibly even simpler than that? Why doesn't anyone do setups like this for WMO?
What other considerations can you guys think of for a setup such as what I am suggesting? Functionality, safety, legality, cost effectiveness, and convenience all are factors. If there are factors that I am not considering, please set me straight. I'm sure there are plenty.


some WMO collection questions:
Are shops/wmo suppliers likely to be willing to deal with a guy who wants to pump wmo straight to a tank attached to the truck, similar in appearance to a transfer tank? of course this will not be cut and dried but maybe there is a tendency one way or another?
Are shops usually willing to dispose of wmo to a random unknown person at all, and if not, why?
what are the usual methods in which shops dispose of their waste oil, and are they paying for it?

 

[Brad S.]

I would say you could do this type of setup, BUT it's gonna get a little complex.
The first thing to think about do you need any space in the bed of your truck?? With this type of system your bed
space is gonna shrink.
Your gonna need a pump that has some muscle. IF a 12v pump your electrical system will get loaded more.
The filtering system should have two tanks in the bed. That way you can make several "passes" through the system, then pump
the wmo to one of your stock fuel tanks,(which ever tank you make the "wmo tank")

With regards to your stock tanks, in order to keep the wmo fuel away from the "clean" diesel a person should really put in some 3 port valves on the supply & return lines. On a stock two tank system when you switch between tanks some of your wmo fuel will mix into your clean diesel. Pretty soon both tanks will be "wmo" fuel.

As far as getting wmo from a shop, first thing to ask if they use for heating the shop, they probably won't sell or give it away.
If you get a shop to supply you keep working with them, if they can't depend on you taking the wmo they'll go with someone who can.

 

[wmoguy]

I am not a fan of the onboard filtration idea'r. I thought about doing that, and in the end decided I like having a pickup bed for it's intended use. Further, be prepared to get questioned by the authorities at some point. Your insurance company would likely drop you like a bad habit if they knew what you had going on in the vehicle. If you had an accident, you'd have a lot of 'splainin to do

See if you can partner up with a business that has excess garage space. Maybe in lieu of some cheap rent (for a little space) you could offer them some fuel in trade?



Oil Collection answers to your questions:

1. I don't think they care what you do with the oil if you take it with permission
2. Yes!! shops either get paid for it around my area, or they have to pay to have it removed. Obviously the ones that pay are happy to give it away. You'd be surprised what a properly worded ad on Craigslist will do for you to get "leads" for oil collection sites.
3. See answer to #2

 

[NTOLERANCE]

http://s30.beta.photobucket.com/user/ntolerance/media/VID-20120908-00000.mp4.html

 

[leswhitt]

I was filtering on board when I was driving my box truck around the country, the first tote was for oil collection and settling and the second was for the final product. You could scale it down and accomplish the same, you'd probably have to mount the tanks onto slides so that you could slide them out and drain off the water/crud from the bottom of the tank.

 

[Kalashnikov]

Most people don't go onboard because it takes up a lot of space plus unless you know your WMO is 100% free of water, you'll need to let it settle. It will be constantly shaken in a truck wich will never let the water and trash settle out. You'll be cooking through filters if the stuff you're getting is really nasty.

There shouldn't be any legal issues if you have the required tax documentation if required in your state. Tractors have fuel tanks much large than anything you plan on doing.

 

[leswhitt]

Most people don't go onboard because it takes up a lot of space plus unless you know your WMO is 100% free of water, you'll need to let it settle. It will be constantly shaken in a truck wich will never let the water and trash settle out. You'll be cooking through filters if the stuff you're getting is really nasty.

There shouldn't be any legal issues if you have the required tax documentation if required in your state. Tractors have fuel tanks much large than anything you plan on doing.

I thought the same thing about the truck shaking and mixing things up but when I tried it, I found that as long as you were on normal roads and not jumping in Baja, stuff would still settle out. The other thing I found was that if you parked overnight, let the water settle, and had a clear separation line, driving the truck wouldn't mix it back up. Once it was separated, it stayed separated. (**This was with 275 gallon totes though, maybe a smaller tank will allow everything to mix back up**)

My process was to pump it into one tote and mix with RUG, let it settle for 2-3 days (whether driving or sitting still) and drain the bottom, pump it over to another tote and wait another couple days, test the bottom to make sure nothing else settled, then drain from the bottom and into my tank. If I did it over again I'd do some things differently (this was back when I first started on WMO) but even with this method, I was still getting 4K plus miles out of fuel filters and the truck was running great. Since I was only pulling 8mpg, this was at least 500 gallons through it before it started plugging up.

My future plans include taking an extended road trip around the US and I plan to carry/collect about 900 gallons with me. In this setup, I'm planning on mixing/settling in the first tote, centrifuging in the second, and the third tank being used as a holding tank until I'm ready to pump it into my fuel tank. With all 3 totes I'll pump from the top and will use the bottom valve to ensure that I'm water/crud free. This is the same that I'm doing with my stationary tanks now so it'll be an easy transition into an enclosed trailer.