Burning drain oil

[JohnEd]

Now this is what I am talking about.   Really smart and experienced people telling me straight up "don't go there, John" and maybe saving me a bundle.  Who knows how many others were considering this in some small way.  Thank you all.

In another lifetime i worked part time in a gas station to give the kids something extra.  One dark night shortly before closing a semi pulled in.  He was a young guy and maybe he was a little too slick but he had gotten off the highway and was looking in a town so small it had not a single traffic light and was shorter than a football field.  He needed fuel and we didn't sell diesel and we were the only station for 25 miles.  He begged me to sell him 50 gallons of kerosene and it was midnight Sunday.  He said he would have to drive 50 miles west to get fuel in order to drive 100 miles east.  Well, I bit.  Never considered the fuel tax angle, and i sold him the kerosene.  He also bought 5 quarts of 30 weight and added that to the tank as he filled.  Said he was making diesel #2...or was it #1?  I learned the next day that he was correct in his chemistry and ratios.  From this experience when I was 22 and from many other tid bits of data since, I have concluded that diesel and motor oil are, in fact, related.  That wasn't a defense of drain oil, only a defense of why something so dumb sounding made enough sense for me to pose the question.

Following the logic of my past experience I wondered if that drain oil might not be made clean enough to use it in the engine.  I understand that the answer is "not only no, but HEXL NO!".  So there you have it....how smart I have gotten. And others, maybe, as well.

Now about that heating oil.  There is a Yahoo group devoted to burning that stuff in boilers to heat their homes and other stuff.  They have a dickens of a time getting stuff just right as those furnace burner heads are not all that simple and are really finicky on WMO.  That it is a proved concept is without question as there is a whole industry devoted to manufacturing WMO fired furnaces.  witness testimonials of Knuts even in this single thread testifying to their thousands of dollars of savings per month and how toasty warm they have been.  There isn't a model of ProHeat that is burning WMO and the factory at ProHeat central has told me they have nothing on the drawing board for that fuel.  Pity!  I have learned that the ProHeat will work OK with motor oil mixed in the diesel fuel in some ratio.  Never got the full story but the gist was that it wasn't as finicky as the WMO furnace and you could save a buck on your heating bill.  Seemed food for thought and I admit to having WMO on my mind...figuratively speaking.  Color me cheap or whatever.  Burning the stuff seems to be legal in some places and ultra GREEN Orygun is one of them and I think there is even some sort of tax incentive...like Bio.  I don't feel like the mad scientist that is disregarding the welfare of all of mankind in investigating this.  I hope others have more to say as i am learning something on this subject.  Hope my questions haven't cost me any "good will" from my fellow Knuts.

Thanks all,

John

[JohnEd]

TomC,

I just reread the thread and saw that I missed your comment that it is common knowledge thing among some.  I thought I had heard about it several times.  I guess it like burning Waste Vegi Oil.  It works in the older mechanical engines but isn't a good bet in the new electronic stuff.

We have a car sales lot here that sells nothing but WVO equipped cars and they have 20 cars or so for sale.  Mostly Mercedes Benz of 1988 and older.  There are a slew of them around here and I have yet to hear of anybody ruining an engine.  The exception to this is the VW TDI engine.  I saw one that is brand new and owned by a restaurant owner that is converted to burning WVO from his fryers.  He had three vehicles, two trucks and his VW Jetta that were running on WVO.  He was ecstatic with the results.  I pondered the cost of a new TDI engine but he was sure convinced it was the way to go.  There is always the engineer that says the success in burning WVO isn't proved and that all the positive data is purely "anecdotal".   Well yeah!  But it is thousands of "anecdotals" and they won't shut up for an instant.  Well respected Knuts on this board are installing WVO fuel systems and others are having no problem with their system for DD 2 strokes.  Who cares if it gets 6 MPG if your fuel is free?  Right?

Any way, Tom..Thank you very much for your input,

John

[lostagain]

John, please be assured that nothing was taken personally. I am beyond that. Your comments and mine are all part of the discussion. Yes I maybe a little sensitive as a gasoline retailer because of the current run up  on prices. Customers take their frustrations on us and mostly our staff. I just wanted to make a point of telling people that most of us retailers don't do such things as diluting diesel with used oil.
Read your post again: "Truck service stations routinely dump hundreds of gallons of drained oil into their Dino tanks.  The agrument is that 200 gal of waste into 10,000 gal tank is not going to register.  Of course, they are getting $4.50 for that waste and they aren't paying to have hazardious waste hauled at many $ per gallon.  This is a tangled web."
You might have started your sentence with: " I have heard that..." but this came across as quite factual and I thought it needed correcting because most gas stations don't do this sort of thing. Am I naive? Maybe they do... I doudt it though, because even if you are operating in a large market, the bulk of your customers are locals and word of fraudulent practice would soon spread.
I agree, there are unscrupulous people in the oil business, as in any business for that matter.
Anyway, I do enjoy this discussion forum because of all the different caracters contributing their varied ideas to it. It certainly makes for an enriching exchange of ideas that I've surely enjoyed since I've joined 2 or 3 years ago.
I always look forward to reading your posts John because you are usually at least one foot outside the box and I like that.
I know that printed words sometimes don't convey the intended idea quite right. I look forward to meeting you in person some day.

Onward...

JC