Save Money and Help the Planet By Converting Your Mercedes Diesel to Run Vegetable Oil!
Have you ever flipped a car?
Bio Diesel Conversions
A Mercedes diesel conversion consists of a simple modification to the fuel system!
The Mercedes diesel conversion consists of a modification to the fuel system.
Basically the oil has to be heated, and needs and additional fuel pump added to push it.
The reason is because vegetable oil is thicker than regular petroleum diesel.
A larger filter needs to be added to the fuel system. Vegetable oil will clog up the stock fuel filters too quickly so they need to be bypassed.
There are two types of conversions. Dual tank, and single tank.A dual tank system consists of two separate fuel tanks. The car starts on regular petroleum diesel. The second fuel tank has the vegetable oil in it.
As you're running your vehicle on the petroleum diesel, your other tank is heating the vegetable oil.
The heat comes from the engine coolant. The engine coolant travels to the tank containing the vegetable oil , and acts as a heat exchanger to heat the oil. When the vegetable oil is hot enough, you can switch the petroleum diesel tank off, and switch over to the tank containing the vegetable oil. When you're coming close to your destination you switch back to your petroleum diesel tank to purge all the vegetable oil out of the fuel system.
A single tank system is using only the stock fuel tank of the vehicle. There is no additional tank added. The vehicle starts up, and shuts off on the vegetable oil. You can still put regular petroleum diesel, or biodiesel in the tank after the conversion. I recommend to blend petroleum diesel with the vegetable oil to thin it out when its cold outside.
Easily learn how to electricy heat your vegetable oil
Climate plays a key factor. I would strongly recommend a two tank system in a cold climate. In California in the summer time, you can blend more vegetable oil with petroleum diesel in your stock fuel tank with no conversion. Be careful how much vegetable oil you add. The thickness of the vegetable oil will clog your stock fuel filters, and your car will experience a loss of power. In order to run 100% vegetable oil, you have to bypass the stock fuel filters, unless you want to be changing them constantly.
The vegetable oil can be heated by either electrical heat, or engine coolant. If you use electrical heat. you'll have to upgrade your alternator. Coolant heat is more widely used, but isn't immediate heat like electrical. You have to wait for the coolant to get hot from the engine to heat exchange the oil.
If your filtering, and using waste vegetable oil as fuel, this 12V fuel transfer pump makes transferring WVO very convenient
Tuthill Diesel Fuel Transfer Pump with Suction Pipe-12 Volt, 10 GPM, Model# FR1616

Because WVO is thick, you need to change the fuse that comes with the pump to a fuse that can withstand a higher number of amps. Simply change the fuse, and pump away!
