Waste oil fired boiler or furnace

JohnEd · November 30, 2007, 08:54:17 PM

I had intended posting to this topic for a couple days. Richard made a short jog into it today with a comment about waste oil heating being legal only if you use your own generated waste oil in WEST VIRGINIA. Thats poorly worded but you understand.

I have friends that have installed waste oil heaters for large business operations. The tech seems sound and both had very good results. The one that owned a garage and installed a tank that measured 4X5X15 collected all his waste for the year and burned it all including a few 55 gal drums every winter. His savings were huge and he recovered his investment in a few years. I called Webasto and Proheat and both said they did not make a heater/boiler that runs on waste oil and have no plans to do so. Does anybody have any info on this technology that could be adapted to our PH type system? We are in a facility daily that is a collection point for waste oil (truck stop) when we travel and a 55 gal tank could be squeezed in somewhere. Aren't the diesel and waste oil boilers closely related?

Thanks,

John

rv_safetyman · December 01, 2007, 04:58:30 AM

Hi John

Waste oil and diesel are quite different. Waste oil is usually thicker and has a lot of contaminants in it.

A while back someone posted a thread on waste oil heaters and it led to the following site:

http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel_library/ethanol_motherearth/me11.html

As you read through the page, you will see that a major problem with waste oil heaters is the coke and other deposits that are left as the oil burns. Many waste oil heaters have to be cleaned each day and the crud is considerable.

Wabasto type heaters all rely on spraying clean diesel into the burning chamber. Waste oil would never work for that.

Jim

DrivingMissLazy · December 01, 2007, 07:41:39 AM

As I recall, waste oil heaters can operate on 50 weight motor oil or hydraulic oil. I believe hydraulic oil is better and has more BTU per gallon.

I purchased a waste oil heater off eBay for $3500 and immediately started saving $1000 per month on my heating bill. I think it was rated about 150,000 btu. I had a small equipment rental shop and I really did not generate enough used oil in my shop so I took a chance and cheated. The school bus garage was just down the road and I got a few drums from them every few months. I also found a service shop where I could take my gasoline engine pump in and get a few drums occasionally. I averaged using over one drum a week in the winter and I did not try and keep the shop above 50 at night.

I never had any coke deposits or anything else at the burner. I did have to clean the input filter every week to remove water and other impurities that the filter would catch. It was only a small automotive type filter and if I was doing it again I would get a larger filter and one with a drain on it to remove the moisture.

All in all it paid for itself several times over in the two years I used it and then I sold it for what I paid for it when I closed my shop.

This is one quote I copied from an ad I found

QuoteDispose of all your waste oil, used engine oil, hydraulic and transmission fluid, gear oil, vegetable oil, biodiesel, and more — while heating your shop at the same time!

here:
http://www.heco.net/wasteoil.htm

The oil is heated and is sprayed in the same manner that a Webasto unit sprays the oil with a high pressure pump. Improper combustion leads to the formation of the coke I believe and I had a special adapter on the exhaust that I adjusted to get proper combustion without any smoke or coke formation.

Richard

JohnEd · December 01, 2007, 10:38:29 AM

Richard,

Thanks for that first hand report. My friends that bought those heaters had the same experience as you.....good. They had the same complaint about the filter, as well. I think the magic is in the combustion chamber. The only one I have seen "into" on a bench was a chamber the size of a gallon paint can that was made of ceramic wool that was pressed and formed. The oil was sprayed into it and ignited initially by a glow plug. A high speed little blower pushed a lot of air into the chamber and achieved a white hot combustion. I think if you put diesel into an open vessel and lit it, like the "green" waste oil furnace, it would be as smoky and need as much service as the waste oil furnace. I helped set up one of those commercial WOF (waste oil furnace) and the final adjustment was me going outside and looking at the roof and signaling them to turn down the pressure feed till I saw ZERO smoke at the chimney. High tech! This was a large unit and the heat output was a 4X4 foot duct only 10 feet long that dumped into a 80X80 shop with 60 foot ceilings and it only broke the chill so it ran constantly. Needed no service for cleaning after 500 gal of fuel but did need a few orifices and filters.

RV Safety Man,

Thanks. I had looked at that site and rejected that method of combustion out of hand for even my shop. I think a home furnace with the proper combustion chamber could be modified....they sell them that way. I think with the correct white hot combustion chamber there will be complete combustion and ash residue will be blown out the exhaust as the Wabasto does. Given oil has less energy, I guess a starting assumption would be that it requires less air and being thicker it needs a bigger orifice. If I had a shop at the moment I think it would be worth it to buy a Pro Heat from Charlie Daniels and start finding the right mix. Who wouldn't pay some additional cash to be able to heat with free fuel?

Another topic: I want to purchase one of your extinguishers at the first of the year. Can it be shipped to me dry and then charged? I will do it anyway but I was wondering.

DrivingMissLazy · December 01, 2007, 10:57:09 AM

Quote from: JohnEd on December 01, 2007, 10:38:29 AM
Richard,

Thanks for that first hand report. My friends that bought those heaters had the same experience as you.....good. They had the same complaint about the filter, as well. I think the magic is in the combustion chamber. The only one I have seen "into" on a bench was a chamber the size of a gallon paint can that was made of ceramic wool that was pressed and formed. The oil was sprayed into it and ignited initially by a glow plug. A high speed little blower pushed a lot of air into the chamber and achieved a white hot combustion. I think if you put diesel into an open vessel and lit it, like the "green" waste oil furnace, it would be as smoky and need as much service as the waste oil furnace. I helped set up one of those commercial WOF (waste oil furnace) and the final adjustment was me going outside and looking at the roof and signaling them to turn down the pressure feed till I saw ZERO smoke at the chimney. High tech! This was a large unit and the heat output was a 4X4 foot duct only 10 feet long that dumped into a 80X80 shop with 60 foot ceilings and it only broke the chill so it ran constantly. Needed no service for cleaning after 500 gal of fuel but did need a few orifices and filters.

RV Safety Man,

Thanks. I had looked at that site and rejected that method of combustion out of hand for even my shop. I think a home furnace with the proper combustion chamber could be modified....they sell them that way. I think with the correct white hot combustion chamber there will be complete combustion and ash residue will be blown out the exhaust as the Wabasto does. Given oil has less energy, I guess a starting assumption would be that it requires less air and being thicker it needs a bigger orifice. If I had a shop at the moment I think it would be worth it to buy a Pro Heat from Charlie Daniels and start finding the right mix. Who wouldn't pay some additional cash to be able to heat with free fuel?

Another topic: I want to purchase one of your extinguishers at the first of the year. Can it be shipped to me dry and then charged? I will do it anyway but I was wondering.

Based on how clean it burned, I really do not see why the same technology could not be used for engine fuel. Charley is talking about a centrifuge to remove impurities and some type of magnetic seperator to remove any metallic particles should make it clean enough to use in a diesel engine. As hot as the fire is, I feel that any impurities would be burned and exit as exhaust carbon.

BTW, I had a device on my furnace (damper?) that was mounted in the exhaust tube that had an adjustment on it to permit a specific amount of fresh air into the exhaust stack. By adjusting this weighted flapper properly, it eliminated all smoke and I could adjust the oil pressure to the orfice to determine how much heat I needed. There was a small window to see into the fire box so I could adjust the size of the flame and then adjust the exhaust flapper accordingly.

Richard

rv_safetyman · December 01, 2007, 04:50:31 PM

That is what I love about this board. You learn a lot.

I had a good friend who heated his house with waste oil and had a terrible problem with crud build-up. I guess the difference is drip system vs spray system.

I visited the fellow who wrote the article I posted. We live in the foothills west of Denver. He is starting to see signs of having issues with getting oil. Apparently in Denver (perhaps other places) the EPA is clamping down on oil change businesses. They must account for the oil they remove and it must be handed off to an EPA approved oil collection company.

In the next county over, the school bus barn has a sign out front stating that they need used oil.

I guess that is all good for us folks who have had a hard time getting rid of 11 gallons of oil each time we change oil. I used to feel so guilty taking more than 5 gallons to Checkers.

John, I will drop you a note off-line re the extinguisher.

Jim

David Anderson · December 02, 2007, 07:47:34 PM

There are some threads on the Bio/wvo websites I've been cruising that had lengthy discussions about waste crankcase oil as fuel. None of them were very positive, not because it won't work, but because of the heavy metals, etc that send pollutants out the pipe. Veggie oil is said to be carbon neutral, if anybody cares about these things.

As far as using this oil in your UL approved furnance in your home, it is a great idea, but like Jim said, the lube places are under tight scrutiny by the environmental agencies of their states to account for every drop drained and every oil filter removed. From what I've read in the professional carcare journals (they cover lube shops) the EPA is allowing them to burn the waste oil on site in these furnaces.

Now, how that is any less polluting out its exhaust over the tailpipe of a diesel engine I have no idea, but it is so much less complicated for a lube shop owner to dispose of his waste in a legal manner than paying a rendering company to haul it as hazardous waste. If you have a good oil source I hope you can hang onto it. You are fortunate.

DrivingMissLazy · December 03, 2007, 12:42:56 PM

David, the law here is that you can burn any waste oil that you generate in the course of operating your business. So any repair shop that is changing oil could obtain a waste oil furnace and burn any they generate from changing oil. I understand that some shops run their furnace 24/7 and even into the summertime to dispose of waste oil so that they do not have to pay to have it hauled away.

Richard

pvcces · December 03, 2007, 09:15:52 PM

JohnEd, it might surprise you to find out that thicker oil (higher viscosity) would require a smaller nozzle or MORE air because the increased viscosity at a given pressure would INCREASE the flow through the nozzle. To some degree, this can be offset by lowering the fuel pressure.

I don't know what the BTU content of the oil you were thinking of might be, but normally, higher viscosity would mean a heavier fuel and more BTU than fuel oil. However, the relationship isn't linear, so it would be hard to predict.

For bus use, this means that it is important to be able to keep the fuel temperature warm enough when you get into cold weather or your burner will begin smoking. It's also why we use only single line fuel systems in Alaska every chance that we can.

For what it's worth.

Tom Caffrey

JohnEd · December 05, 2007, 08:28:56 PM

Tom,

ALWAYS good to hear from you. And always informative. Got a nut for you to chew on this time, though. Fuel oil/ diesel has MORE energy than drain oil. I think the thicker the oil the LESS energy. If you dilute you fuel with 10% motor oil you get a 10% reduction in power. Motor oil will float on gasoline and gasoline will float on diesel. If I am wrong here I sure as heck hope I get corrected.

Always an appreciative admirer,

John

JohnEd · December 05, 2007, 09:41:23 PM

Guys,

It seems without a confirmed supply, it makes no sense to get into this. If the EPA is in it they are on a short leash now but the next administration will probably get serious and the supply will get really hard to access. I had no idea that things had changed so much in the last ten years. Oregon seems to have a lot of latitude in these areas, for whatever reasons, so maybe we are living a sheltered life up here.

Whoever said waste oil had impurities in was understating the facts....it is considered a carsanogen and a bio/chem hazard in Ca. and elsewhere. Might be a little strong but it signals an opening to tightly regulate the stuff. Personally, I think it should be AGAINST the law to throw the stuff away. All that hype about oil independance is just hype if they want the stuff disposed of instead of cleaning it and returning it to service. Effectively, wearing out oil is a myth. Even at that, 30 wt becomes 20 wt and that has uses, right?

Thank you all again for a really stimulating discussion.

John

Hartley · December 06, 2007, 09:03:47 AM

Everything is a bio hazard or carcinogen in California. ( I guess living there is hazardous too from all the bad news reports recently )

Issues aside, The problem still comes down to supply and demand. If you don't have a secure supply of oil / wvo / svo / motor oil or any other kinds of flammable material to burn it doesn't matter where the discussion of how to do it goes.

I have been thinking for years now about how neat it would be to have either a carbon dioxide or nitrogen fusion reactor to power my toys. I haven't had my epiphany yet. Maybe even a Mr.Fusion and a Flux capacitor would be neat.

Safe to say, The answer IS out there somewhere and it's probably simpler than anyone would imagine.

So far I have only invented more ways to waste time and drive myself a bit more nutty, But I never want to grow up. Old is another matter...Time is running out...

Dave....

pvcces · December 06, 2007, 09:07:16 PM

John, I don't dispute what you said about the energy of fuel, but I will chew on that nut 'til I get it figured out.

Thanks.

Tom Caffrey

Quote from: JohnEd on December 05, 2007, 08:28:56 PM
Tom,

ALWAYS good to hear from you. And always informative. Got a nut for you to chew on this time, though. Fuel oil/ diesel has MORE energy than drain oil. I think the thicker the oil the LESS energy. If you dilute you fuel with 10% motor oil you get a 10% reduction in power. Motor oil will float on gasoline and gasoline will float on diesel. If I am wrong here I sure as heck hope I get corrected.

Always an appreciative admirer,

John