Blackstone Report Running 2 tank and blending

[walexa07]

Bad news guys... ... ..... I got my first Blackstone report done after running a 2-tank heated system and 1 tank of blended fuel 80/20 wvo to rug. I believe the wear metals are high because I have 370 injectors and their spray pattern isn't in the piston bowl like they are supposed to be. I am going to put my 215 injectors back in, change my oil at 3000 this time, and after another 5,000 miles have another report done. I will post my results here. I also have a frantz filter on my truck and I wonder how much it improved my results. Here's the report:

 

[Gary - K7GLD]

That's about as poor a report as I have seen - dunno if the high wear is directly related to the bio - the fuel dilution certainly isn't all that bad, nor was Silicon. Personally, I'd be watching these reports VERY closely, and making a decision as to whether the current fuel source and method was really worth the potential long range downsides...

 

[walexa07]

Thanks for the response Gary. Just for clarification, WVO is not biodiesel... ..... it is waste vegetable oil. I have a second fuel tank conversion that has 4 heat exchangers in the system to make the wvo thin for proper spray pattern.



I believe the main problem is the 370 injectors. Every since I have been reading on diesel truck forums I have read that the 370 injectors have a poor spray pattern... ... i. e. , some of the spray hits the cylinder walls. This isn't such a big deal with diesel fuel since any that makes it past the rings into the crankcase oil should evaporate out, but I don't believe the wvo evaporates out. I plan to run on diesel until I can put my 215 injectors back in... ... . and I also plan to adjust the starwheel so I'm not blowing black so easily. If this doesn't bring my wear metals way down I will go back to diesel completely and see what that brings. I have been running wvo since April... ... . so that's about 6 months and 2 or 3 oil changes worth of damage. I also plan to shorten my oil drain interval to every 3,000 miles until I get a grip on what is causing the bad report.



The only other thing I can think of that might account for some lead or copper is the lubricant that came with my ARP studs... ..... I know it is high in moly, and I know some antiseize lubricants have copper and lead in them..... but it still doesn't account for the aluminum, chromium, and iron. Plus, I put the studs in before I converted to wvo... ... . so I would think that most of that would have already come out with regular oil changes. Any other advice is greatly appreciated.



Waylan

 

[Gary - K7GLD]

Thanks for the response Gary. Just for clarification, WVO is not biodiesel... ..... it is waste vegetable oil.

HEH - I tend to consider pretty much all "homebrew" fuels from typical restaurants as "Bio" - ignorance on my part I guess... :-laf



ANYWAY, since WVO most likely goes thru some mechanical contact and agitation in its normal cooking operations, I wonder how much stray wear metals (grill surfaces, spatulas, etc. ) it picks up before it is finally dumped for recycling?



Has anyone ever had their BIO or WVO analyzed BEFORE running it thru an engine to establish for wear metals and contaminants?

 

[Boondocker]

biodiesel testing

I don't know if WVO can or would be tested the same as BioDiesel, but here is one place that does Bio Diesel Testing The standard is known as ASTM D6751. This company lists various testing packages, detailing what tests are in each package. Basically it's for contaminents (organic, metal, water, etc), but there are a few other criteria, like cloud point and flash point available.



I haven't heard of homebrewers using such a service, probably because most homebrewers are trying to get by on the cheap. I think it's geared for commercial producers who want to be able to claim an authoritative quality standard, which is a good thing.



I'm a new student of BioDiesel, but not a practitioner. My wife has a thing against lye and methanol. Come on honey, they're only deadly chemicals

 

[Gary - K7GLD]

WELL, if the raw, pretreatment fuel is already heavily contaminated by what normally registers as "wear metals" by commercial analyzers, I doubt that any refining/treatment done by "homebrewers" is very likely to remove many of those contaminants.



And since it's pretty likely that a fair percentage of any such contaminants WILL find their way into the crankcase and lube oil, if those levels are NOT tested and factored into later lube analysis, that lube analysis MIGHT be pretty meaningless.



Adding to the problem is the likelihood of WIDELY varying contamination levels from one raw material source to another - or even the same one over periods of time...

 

[walexa07]

I could definitely be wrong, but I don't believe that my or any wvo source is contaminated with metals from cooking utensils.



My understanding of what is happening is that wvo polymerizes (turns to a plastic-like substance) under certain circumstances, and if it makes it past the rings, it can polymerize in the crankcase oil... ... . and plug oil passages and such. I do have a frantz filter on my truck and thought that would have me taken care of in that department, but apparently not as well as I thought. Also, with the improper spray pattern of the 370 injectors, I wonder if the rings and cylinders haven't been constantly exposed to wvo to the point that some ring sticking and cylinder wear has occured... ... further allowing more wvo into the crankcase oil to wear on the bearings? I will post more as I find out.



Waylan

 

[cj hall]

hello walexa07



thats not so good but could it be just a bad engine from cummins ? or bad filters used for the wvo? bad oil ?



I have been running wvo as a fuel for 12 months and the last oil change had the oil at a lab and found nothing out of the norm

the report you have said that the potassium and sodium are high



my potassium is at 9 parts per million

my sodium is at 7 parts per million

yours are lower ?



its a different engine 04 vs 98 different oil also Q state vs Chevron

did you send in a sample of new oil so they had a baseline for the test

could it be the oil that has the bad stuff in it?

also it said the lead was the worst of all its high but what does new engine oil have in it ?



what kind of lab is this do they do other testing or are they only doing engine oil/ hyd oil the lab I used is SOS Services Lab its the CAT Lab.



you can call it biofuel just not biodiesel to me its just oil burn it or cook in it thats all I care about.



Hope this helps you

cj hall

 

[walexa07]

thats not so good but could it be just a bad engine from cummins ? or bad filters used for the wvo? bad oil ?



I have been running wvo as a fuel for 12 months and the last oil change had the oil at a lab and found nothing out of the norm

the report you have said that the potassium and sodium are high



my potassium is at 9 parts per million

my sodium is at 7 parts per million

yours are lower ?



its a different engine 04 vs 98 different oil also Q state vs Chevron

did you send in a sample of new oil so they had a baseline for the test

could it be the oil that has the bad stuff in it?

also it said the lead was the worst of all its high but what does new engine oil have in it ?



what kind of lab is this do they do other testing or are they only doing engine oil/ hyd oil the lab I used is SOS Services Lab its the CAT Lab.

cj,



I don't believe it's just a bad engine from cummins... ... . it has 165,000 miles on it and if the wear metals have been high for it's life I believe it would be in a junkyard somewhere... ... but that is just my opinion. The sodium and potassium were just slightly high... ..... I emailed blackstone about those elements being high and he said even if they were high from an antifreeze leak, they are still so low to not cause any change in wear metals. I did not send in a sample of the new oil, but new oil shouldn't have wear metals in it... ... so far as I know. The baseline for comparison is from about 2500 other engine oil samples with an average of 6700 miles on them... ... . over on the right hand side of the page. Blackstone also said they would analyze my waste vegetable oil, so I am going to send a sample in next week and will report back with their findings.



Waylan

 

[Gary - K7GLD]

I did not send in a sample of the new oil, but new oil shouldn't have wear metals in it

Just for the record, here's some oil analysis numbers from a few NEW, unused Chevron samples, including Delo 400 - be sure to click on the image to resize it for easier reading:



-

 

[walexa07]

Interesting that aluminum was 4 and silicon was 3 in new oil.



Is there anything chromium, lead, or copper in the injection pump? I know that the p7100 is engine oil lubricated... ..... just wondering. I plan to change my injectors out this weekend and will do a compression test if I can come up with a tester. Anybody know what kind of compression tester I need and where I can get one?



Thanks.



Waylan

 

[Gary - K7GLD]

Interesting that aluminum was 4 and silicon was 3 in new oil.

YUP - Silicon readings are always a sensitive category for guys looking at what they THINK is dirt getting past their air filters, when in fact a form of silicon is included in new oil as an anti-foaming agent...



I have yet to see a new oil (including synthetics) that didn't have SOME degree of contaminents right out of the container - and SOME are REAL nasty!

 

[Cattletrkr]

... I also plan to shorten my oil drain interval to every 3,000 miles until I get a grip on what is causing the bad report.

Won't that mess with the results?

 

[walexa07]

Won't that mess with the results?

I wouldn't think so if you divided the ppm by the mileage, basically pro-rating.



Waylan

 

[GECCO]

Just for the record, here's some oil analysis numbers from a few NEW, unused Chevron samples, including Delo 400 - be sure to click on the image to resize it for easier reading:



-

Hey Gary,



I would be interested in looking at the rest of this chart, but couldn't find it on their site. Do you have a link to it?



THX

 

[Gary - K7GLD]

Hey Gary,



I would be interested in looking at the rest of this chart, but couldn't find it on their site. Do you have a link to it?

You betcha!



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Some folks will claim synthetics are more "pure" than conventional oils, since they are "scienticically engineered" rather than refined from a crude oil base - look at the Amsoil samples - especially their "3000" 5/30!



BY the way - those came from the gas/diesel virgin oil sample section on "Bob is the oil guy" board, under "VOA's - a whole bunch!" They're easier to read if you go direct - I wasn't able to make a direct pointer to that thread from here...

 

[nickleinonen]

walexa07:

i'd be dumping that oil. . the wear metals are too high. . no fuel in the oil so that is good. tbn is a little low being 3. 2. . viscosity seems ok [but i'm use to reading cst@100c]

 

[walexa07]

I dumped the oil when I took the sample. I am going to do another oil change here real quick... ... ... to try and flush the rest of the contaminants. TBN, imo, was low... ... . I agree. Thanks for the responses.



Waylan

 

[Vaughn MacKenzie]

Waylan you have me concerned enough I'm sending in an oil sample to be anayzed. I changed the oil in my '98 today, it had 10,000 miles on the oil and I have run though an estimated 150 gallons of filtered WVO. I think I'm going to stop the practice until I see what the numbers are, but reading this has me thinking WVO can do bad things to your engine http://www.uidaho.edu/bae/biodiesel/raw vegetable oils_literature review.doc



When draining the oil it had a noticeably different smell than normal, not the best smell in the world.



On another note I put 300 injectors in about 4k ago.



Vaughn

 

[walexa07]

Waylan you have me concerned enough I'm sending in an oil sample to be anayzed. I changed the oil in my '98 today, it had 10,000 miles on the oil and I have run though an estimated 150 gallons of filtered WVO. I think I'm going to stop the practice until I see what the numbers are, but reading this has me thinking WVO can do bad things to your engine http://www.uidaho.edu/bae/biodiesel/raw vegetable oils_literature review.doc



When draining the oil it had a noticeably different smell than normal, not the best smell in the world.



On another note I put 300 injectors in about 4k ago.



Vaughn

Vaughn,



I changed out my injectors back to my stock 215's, and turned my starwheel back to where it won't fuel hard until the boost is up. I'm checking with High Tech Turbo to see about exchanging my 64/14 for a 62/12... ... . or at least exchanging my 14cm exh. housing for a 12. My fear is that any smoke/haze (i. e. , unburnt fuel) is allowing excess wvo to come in contact with the cylinders. The 64/14 has become real laggy since I turned down the fuel.



Unless there is something going wrong with my engine, the only other thing I could attribute the high wear metals to is my 4kgsk. Due to timing, my truck won't make it over 3850 rpm, but I've had it there a few times during that last oil change interval. Maybe the redline cummins puts on the trucks stock (3100) is correct, and higher than that wears everything at an accelerated rate???? I just don't know. I am back on wvo now... ..... was off for 3 weeks waiting to change out my injectors. I will continue to post upcoming oil sample reports, as well as any other changes I make. I am definitely interested to see how your report turns out.



Waylan