Gel Points for Biodiesel Oils

Video Transcript

"GRAYDON BLAIR: My name is Graydon Blair from Utah Biodiesel Supply and on behalf of Expert Village, I'm going to tell you a little bit about the gel points of biodiesel based from different oils. It's really important when you make biodiesel that you know at what temperature it gels at. Biodiesel actually gels at a higher temperature than diesel fuel. I've got a graph here that I want to show you that shows just how drastic this stuff is. Canola actually doesn't gel until you get cleared down to about 30 degrees Fahrenheit versus coconut oil can gel almost at 50 to 70 degrees Fahrenheit. That's not really good if it's sitting in the tank of your car and so, there are some things you need to do. I'm going to show you some of these different oils just so you get an idea. Canola is the absolute best oil to use if you're going to make biodiesel for the cold weather. It's because it has such cold weather gel points. This stuff won't go solid 'till it's about 0.20 degrees Fahrenheit. I've been putting some in my garage just to see how cold it'll get. Corn oil is a little bit higher. Soybean oil is a little bit higher than that. And if you've ever had olive oil in your fridge, you'll notice that it gels pretty, pretty low. In fact, if you look down here on the bottom, I've actually got gelling and it's not that cold where we are right now. I'd say it's about, I don't know, 60 or 70 degrees. But I've got this solid chunk of stuff down there. It's really important that you know what the gel point is if you're going to put this stuff in your tank. Now, the way to get around it is you mix it with diesel fuel in different varieties. But you need to--after you've made your biodiesel from the different oils, it's important that you take a sample and you put it in the fridge and you see at what point it gels at so you know when to start adding diesel fuel to it so you know where your gel point is. And that's--it's very important."