What an evening...

[Tony]

Sunday went to put fuel in the car for a trip but it foamed up from pumping and the bubbles took a long time to pop - a sure sign of soap - this was confirmed by nigel's soap test.  This was fuel settled a week, drywashed and 1u filtered.

Clearly the drywash tower needed changing.  But it was that or pump fuel... so in it went (take a chance!).  I stuck 25l in a drum in the boot so I could see what was happening in the tank.

Trip went OK.  But, today I checked my 25l drum and it had a layer of black slime at the bottom... not good - must be the same in the tank.

So today I've drained the car's tank (seemingly no black goo - where did it go?), repacked the drywash tower, primed it by circulating 10l until it went clear, re-drywashed my last batch, drywashed a settled batch, made a new batch - I'm knackered!  Car is currently completely empty - zero litres in the tank, will have to 1u filter some tomorrow morning and put in the car.

This game is a right palava sometimes...

[nigelb]

You really need to move over to the wet side Tony. You'll never have to drain your tank again.

Glad the kit came in handy though.

Nige

[Tony]

The kit is often handy.

Sometimes a 50:50 test gives cloudy results but it's just bio sticking to the sides, so ti looks cloudy even when it isn't.  Your test doesn't lie though

My fear of water washing is making emulsions and having to cart water to and from the outbuilding at the end of the garden...

[Julian]

A year or so ago I never thought I'd say this, but I have to agree with Nige ... water washing seems to be the way to go.  That said, I'd like to get a full and severe winter under my belt before I'm totally convinced.

[Tony]

I have no doubt that water washing produces a better quality fuel, consistently.  But it's the extra effort and knowing how to deal with the inevitable emulsions...

[nigelb]

One way that newcomers to water washing fail is having the bubbler on too powerful a setting. I control my bubbles with an aquarium air control valve. The bubbles are slow and gentle for the first 2-3 washes. It does not need to be any higher . There are no benefits. As I've stated in the past 5-6 washes is all I need to remove the soap and methanol. Generally washes 4 and 5 have increased agitation and wash 6 is normally a hot, pump wash.

I have had my fair share of emulsions, some recently when experimenting with in tank pump washing, but they are all recoverable. I even had a partial emulsion in my wash tank about 5 batches ago. Not wanting to pump everthing back to the reactor I went to tesco and got some malt vinegar. Following a succesful recovery in a 1 lt jug I upscaled to the wash tank volume and this also had a satisfactory conclusion.

50-60lts of water to wash 150lts of raw bio is pretty good I reckon.

Nige

[Tony]

So for my new process batch size of 375l I'd need about 125l of water?  I'd have to plumb in drainage and a cold water supply for that.

I take it most water washers do so in garages with easy access to drains and cold water?

[Julian]

Until recently the water supply for my shed was a hose which I plugged in on a hoselock connector each time I wanted to use it.

Your main problem would be drainage.  You could try looking for a second-hand Saniflow or similar and run that on a large bore hose.  Once you have running water and a sink in the shed you'll wonder what you ever did without it.

[Tony]

Well this batch still hasn't settled (it's the one I was talking about on VOD).  I've been making and using others in the meantime!  But, I have me an agitation pump to experiment with now

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/221097029477

If that works I wonder if a loudspeaker on an AC transformer (nice loud 50Hz hum) stuck in a plastic bag and dangled into the bio would work too.