91 Mercedes 350SDL - How to operate at utmost efficiency?

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slick_t's picture
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Joined: 07/03/2009

I have 2 WVO vehicles; both 7.3L's, one is Greasecar kit.  I'm no mechanic.  Time now to bring the son on board to greasing.  Son will be main driver of the MB.  I don't have the MB yet but will soon.  We live in Houston....so it's pretty freaking hot half of the year. 
The MB already has homemade grease kit with hotfox.  Is there a way to get the 17gal WVO tank or fuel intake hot so quickly that it will switch over within a mile or two?  My son will have a 20 minute trip to school....stop and go traffic. 
This car will make many shorter trips and wonder just what level of efficiency I can achieve as far as minimizing use of diesel while safely operating on WVO.   Also, may put an onboard computer to auto switch and purge.
Am I asking for the impossible?
Thanks!   
 
 
 
 
  

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veggpwr's picture
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Joined: 09/27/2010

Inline fuel heater will help switchover to veggie earlier.

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'05 Cummins CTD 24V HPCR RAM 2500 QC SLT SB Black 4X4 48RE  325 hp  610 ft.lbs
GC Kit  + 3rd Tank WVO(80%)/RUG(20%)  +  Co-Pilot 
3-Tank Operation managed by Co-Pilot: Blending(warm up) / Veggie(hot run) / Diesel(purge for next start)
Smarty Jr  40/70/100 hp (Timing Map Modification)
 

danalinscott's picture
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Joined: 12/13/2004

You actually don't want the tank hotter than it takes to allow the wvo to flow easily. In Houston that almost happens year round at ambient air temp. 
What you want to concentrate on is getting the engine warmed up as fast as possible and getting the wvo as hot as practical prior to the injectors.
This is pretty easy.
Use a FPHE to warm the wvo to near engine coolant temp prior to the IP and high efficiency injector line heaters to get it as hot as possible prior to the injectors. 
The main difficulty in short trips is completely purging the wvo fuel from the IP and injector lines prior to engine shutdown and resisting the temptation to switch to vo before the engine has reached full operating temp. You can put an inline thermo switch in the "VO on" circuit to avoid the second and add a delay circuit in the "ignition off" circuit.  This won't guarrantee that VO is used optimally (for engine life) but it helps.