Handyman Club Life Member Gene Jordon just smiles when he passes the corner gas station and witnesses the rising price of fuel in his Hartford, CT, suburb. In March, he converted his 2005 VW Jetta wagon into a grease car that runs on used French fry oil from a local hamburger joint (photo 1). He only used a tank and a half of actual diesel fuel to drive the first 3,000 miles. Most of the time, he cruised for free.

“When you can practically eliminate a big expense like vehicle fuel in this economy, it provides great peace of mind,” the retired career U.S. Army veteran says. “I’m so happy. I just put on almost 600 miles and the diesel gauge is still touching the full line.”

While life is great in his own little world, Gene’s not so sanguine about the rest of the planet. “It also makes me feel rotten. He who controls oil controls the world, so it’s a sad world we’re living in,” he says.

Interest in energy independence is nothing new to Gene and his wife, Monique. In 1984, they bought Northeast Utilities’ model energy home. With its lower-level woodstove, super-insulated 2x8 framing, high-efficiency windows and rooftop solar panels, the house only required about $50 worth of oil (and a cord and a half of  free firewood) to heat last winter.

10 years of research
Gene researched grease cars for about 10 years before locating just the right vehicle and bringing it to Evergreen Motors in Greenfield, MA, to be converted to run on SVO (Straight Vegetable Oil). He wanted a roomy, low-mileage diesel wagon that was built in Germany (so it would be engineered for sustained speeds of 100 MPH on the Autobahn). He also specified that the spare tire well be located below seat level to accept the vegetable oil tank (photo 2).

“The Greasecar Fuel Systems oil tank is high quality stainless steel, and the welding is the best you can get. But in a rear-end collision, you don’t want to have 13-gallons of 170-degree oil end up with you in the front seat,” he explains. Volkswagen eliminated the spare tire well in 2006. Gene hunted for a 2005 model on the Internet for months and eventually bought one, sight unseen, in Colorado last year.

The complete conversion kit from www.greasecar.com cost him about $1,350, and professional installation was about $1,200. He also spent about $20 creating a manual fuel-filtering-and-storing system. A commercial kit with an electric pump and barrel heater would have cost about $800. At his initial 2,000-miles-per-month driving level, Gene should recoup his roughly $2,600 investment in about 11 months. If fuel prices continue to escalate as expected, the conversion will pay for itself even sooner (not counting the cost of the vehicle).


How it works
To understand how grease cars work, imagine a grease fire on a stove or grill. If cooking oil gets hot enough, the vapors will ignite. The grease-car system uses the hot coolant from in the engine’s radiator to preheat the fry oil. When it is injected into the hot engine, it fires and drives the pistons. The radiator also heats the lines, filter and storage tank, which enables the oil to flow smoothly in cold climates (even Alaska or Canada).

Because the veg-oil and the engine need to be hot for the fuel to ignite, the engine still starts on regular diesel fuel. When the required temperature is achieved, an electronic “Co-Pilot” controller mounted on the center console automatically switches the fuel source to the veg-oil line (photo 3). It also purges the lines and flushes them with diesel fuel for about 17 seconds before the car is turned off so it is ready to be cold-started on diesel fuel next time.

Gene says his grease car has not required any personal compromises on the road. “If I didn’t tell you the car was running on vegetable oil, you probably wouldn’t be able to tell the difference,” he says. The wagon  gets about 37 mpg, has experienced no power loss and, if anything, runs a little smoother when accelerating because the peanut oil lubricates better than diesel.

Gene and Monique seldom drive more than the 481-mile range of the veg-oil tank, and they could switch to the diesel tank on a longer trip. It’s unlikely they would ever need to. Nearly 5,000 grease car enthusiasts are registered on the  www.fillup4free.com Web site, which lets members know where they can get fuel from each other while traveling long distances.


Good Cholesterol?
Gene has been very particular about his diet since having heart surgery about 10 years ago, and he is no less fussy about what he puts into his wagon. “The fry oil wouldn’t be healthy for me, but my car runs beautifully on it,” he jokes.

Experts agree that the type and quality of the vegetable oil that goes into the tank is the most critical consideration for trouble-free grease-car performance and durability. It starts with getting pure vegetable oil (not hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oil) from a source that is free of water or bacteria contamination. Avoid oil that has white sediment on the bottom, that smells rancid or that was used to fry batter-coated food, Gene cautions. Solids suggest hydrogenated oil. A foul smell means bacteria are present. And batter flour will clog filters.

Like Gene, most grease-car owners collect their own oil at fast food restaurants. When Gene approached the manager of restaurant, he got permission to drain the oil directly from the fryers rather than from the dumpster out back. This ensured it would be warm enough to filter and contaminant free. The oil is 125 degrees when Gene drains it into 5-gallon containers for the 1-1/2-mile trip home (photo 4). He filters it through a 100 micron filter right at the source to remove large food particles. Back home and while the oil is still warm, he uses a hand pump and gravity  to pass it through a double 5-micron filter he made from the legs of old blue jeans and then through two more commercial bag filters (one 5 micron and another 1 micron) (photos 5 and 6).

To be certain his system would produce premium quality fuel, he sent a sample to a laboratory for testing.  It reported zero moisture and no measurable impurities.  Once inside the vehicle’s tank, the veg-oil passes through a high quality diesel filter before it reaches the engine. If the fuel contains no moisture or impurities, the filter could last up to 3,000 miles.

Gene collects 22 gallons of fry oil from the restaurant every Thursday morning. It takes him about 10 minutes to empty the oil into his containers and an hour to filter it back home. Each run produces the equivalent of about $100 of diesel fuel (enough to drive about 800 miles). He already has accumulated about 350 gallons, (13,000 miles at 37 mpg).

Gene has one important rule as a veg-oil processor. “I refuse to pour. Any time you pour hot oil, you are taking chances. The container might tip over or you might miss. You could get burned or make a mess,” he says. Instead, he uses a hand pump and gravity to move the oil from one container to the next.

Grease-car enthusiasts are quick to point out that their rides are in green terms “carbon neutral” because the plants used to produce the oil absorb more CO2 than burning the oil releases. And unlike biodiesel, the veg-oil fuel contains no caustic chemicals like lye. The only catch is that, unlike diesel fuel or biodiesel, it must be heated before it is injected into the engine.

For more information on grease cars, conversion kits (photo 7) and fuel processing, visit www.greasecar.com and www.fillup4free.com.