Burnin' down the house...

BioDiesel

Veteran Member
Joined
Oct 29, 2001
Location
CT
TDI
'98 Jetta
"In Northborough, Mass., a biodiesel fire in 2007 destroyed a home and caused about $350,000 in damage, Fire Chief David Durgin said. The homeowner had served in Iraq and wanted to stop relying on foreign oil."

hey, three cheers for this vet!!!


Cooking, cigarettes, and dryer lint cause about 10,000 times more fires per year than biodiesel homebrewing. Is it time to start worrying about bans on cooking and smoking and drying?

A toaster burned up the inside of my cousins house. I support a ban on toast.
 
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cvalentine

Veteran Member
Joined
Aug 7, 2003
Location
Anchorage, AK
TDI
2003 Golf, 2014 328d
More restrictions aren't the answer, and getting everyone to follow existing fire code would solve the problem. Most backyard biodiesel setup I've seen don't even attempt to follow any fire code. Converted water heaters are a huge offender.

The Pacific Biodiesel Pump in Maui was supplied by a converted milk tank last I saw - no emergency vent or secondary containment, just an accident waiting to happen. A UL listed tank isn't that expensive.
 

Medic92

Veteran Member
Joined
Sep 11, 2004
Location
Bel Air, MD
TDI
Audi A3
Sorry to see that you had a problem with your setup. I do not have a seperate struture in which to make my bio-d.T his is the reason why I toyed with the idea, but I never went through with making my own brew.
 

Dieselfitter

Veteran Member
Joined
Mar 1, 2009
Location
Edmonton Alberta
TDI
2009 JSW TDI with DSG
Hot water to heat oil

I am lucky in that I use hot water to heat my house and shop,from an outside coal stoker furnace.

I run an Isuzu Elf 2 ton cabover on WVO. Also have a 14 hp Listeroid 1 cyl diesel that I want to run on WVO,as well as seeing if I can put an auxiliary oil burner on my coal stoker.

I use 160F water from my heating system to heat my WVO before filtering it. I am paranoid about open flames for heating oil. i can see where a contactor could malfunction and stay ON. One might want to consider a Safety High Limit that is set 20F higher than the Normal Limit Switch.
 

meetis

Veteran Member
Joined
Feb 15, 2005
Location
MA (massachussetts)
TDI
2001 VW Jetta silver
cvalentine said:
More restrictions aren't the answer, and getting everyone to follow existing fire code would solve the problem. Most backyard biodiesel setup I've seen don't even attempt to follow any fire code. Converted water heaters are a huge offender.

The Pacific Biodiesel Pump in Maui was supplied by a converted milk tank last I saw - no emergency vent or secondary containment, just an accident waiting to happen. A UL listed tank isn't that expensive.
At least those are metal. I think the plastic reaction vesels are nothing more than a ticking time bomb. Sure they TECHNICALLY meet specs to be safe but should there be an issue they will do nothing to contain a fire in fact they would become fuel for the fire. Not a trait i would want in such a place that is going to be exposed to reacting chemicals that are producing heat. Sure the fire might happen because i measure chemicals wrong and add too much lye or alcohol which initially creates the problem and reacts too violently but the problem would be further magnified by the vessel itself not being able to contain the heat / reaction. Sure plastic is a lot cheaper... but at what cost?
 
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