How to Make Alternative Fuels
Alternative fuels are becoming an increasingly popular means of dodging high gas prices and cutting costs. They also pave the way to energy independence. The two fuels that can be made at home are ethanol and biodiesel. However, they both require different procedures and markedly different equipment to make. It is highly likely that anyone interested in alternative fuels will need to commit to making one or the other.
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Things You'll Need
- Vegetable oil
- Methanol
- Lye
- Rubber gloves
- Safety goggles
- 5 gallon stainless steel buckets
- Metal rod suitable for stirring
- Siphon hose
- Butane camp stove
- 6 liter heat-safe narrow-mouthed beaker and stand
- Rubber stopper sized for this beaker, with an opening for a tube and a thermometer
- Thermometer
- Copper, plastic or glass coiling
- Cooling sleeve
- 3 liter ordinary narrow-mouthed beaker with stand
- Rubber stopper for the second beaker
- Alcohol testing kit
Instructions
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Making Biodiesel
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1
Assemble the following components: 1/5 ounce of lye, 7 ounces of methanol, and 34 liters of vegetable oil. These proportions can be scaled up as needed to make larger batches. For example, a gallon of vegetable oil would need 4/5 ounces of lye and 28 ounces of methanol.
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2
Stir the lye into the methanol inside a stainless steel bucket. This will create a compound called sodium methoxide.
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3
Pour the sodium methoxide into the vegetable oil and start stirring. Properly mixing this stuff will require a lot of work, so stir vigorously for at least 15 minutes.
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4
Let this sit for at least eight hours. A layer of glycerin will form on the bottom of the bucket.
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5
Use the siphon hose to drain your biodiesel fuel away from the layer of thick glycerin that has formed on the bottom of the bucket.
Making Ethanol
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6
Set your first stand and six-liter heat-safe, cooking beaker over the butane camp stove gas burner. Do this in an outdoors location for safety.
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7
Pour fermented grain or sugarcane mash into the cooking beaker and cork it with the rubber stopper.
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8
Insert the thermometer and one end of the coiling into the rubber stopper.
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9
Slide the cooling sleeve, filled with ice water, onto the coiling. This will be absolutely necessary for even a small-scale fuel ethanol production process.
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10
Set up the second beaker and stand. Cork this condensation beaker with its rubber stopper.
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11
Insert the coil into the condensation beaker and stopper.
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12
Activate the camp stove's burner. Adjust the burner's setting until a stable temperature between 173 and 200 degrees Fahrenheit is reached. At this temperature, the alcohol will vaporize, but not the water. The vaporized alcohol will then condense back into a liquid in the condensing coil, and drip down into the second beaker as more concentrated alcohol. However, this first distillation is not nearly pure enough for use as fuel alcohol. It will need at least one more distillation and perhaps more. Keep distilling and testing the alcohol until it reaches 95 percent purity.
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Tips & Warnings
Always wear rubber gloves and safety gloves when working with lye, which is extremely caustic. The main danger when distilling fuel ethanol is the fire hazard posed by having very pure alcohol in close proximity to an open flame. Never try to make fuel ethanol in an enclosed space. Do this outside. Good ventilation is key, as is not burning down your house or garage in the event of an accident.
