We are looking for information from anyone who has had any expriences using waste oil (in combination with diesel fuel) or biodiesel produced from waste cooking oil to operate oil-fired steam locomotives.

In addition to operational issues, any information on dealing with EPA or the various state environmental bodies is welcome.

There was a presentation about this at the ARM/TRAIN Fall 2011 conference. Grand Canyon Railway is using waste vegetable oil in their locomotives.

You can mix diesel and vegie oil(filtered etc) regardless. The more vegtable (bio) you have to clean the burner more often. Waste oil needs a slightly bigger oil gap. Pre heating Bio and Waste helps.

Bio Vegtable oil has almost no legal problems. Waste oils are very dirty and you may not be allowed to for both enviromental and health and saftey reasons.

The Austin (TX) Steam Train Association has always used straight waste crank case oil in their SP 786 loco, it worked great, but you have to keep it hot, and it smokes a lot. Robert Crossman was the main guy over there, he's now over at the TX St RR. The loco has been down for cylinder replacement for about 12 years now, so who knows it they still burn the stuff. There was also an article in L&RP magazine that mentioned the use of used oil by one of the North East tourist RR's long ago. Those guys might have some good info if you can find the article and one of the men that worked there.

If a burner would burn bucker "C" oil, (that looks like tar when at room temp) and most would if it was preheated, then they will burn a waste oil/diesel combo easily, and cooking oils probably burn much better than crank case oils that are designed not to burn in IC engines. The differences are really one; there is much less low temp combustibles in the waste oil tahtn the old bunker oils, so you really have to get waste oils hot to get them to burn! The diesel will be what you use to help increase that volatility and keep it burning if you don't have a lot of preheat available on start up. You will need a good fuel preheater system, thats certain.

I have two barrels of used motor oil for burner experimentation. One is 30 gallons of used petroleum based motor oil, the second barrel is 55 gallons of 50% 5w30 Castrol Edge (the best synthetic oil in the world), 30% Shell 5w30 agricultural synthetic oil (the second best synthetic oil), and th last 20% is regular 10w30 used petroleum based motor oil. I'm planning to build a burner test rig to test burners and my oil pre-heating temperatures with. That is where I will later test the burning qualities of my oil supplies. I am going to see what the burning differences are between the two barrels. I suspect that the mostly synthetic oil (the 55 gallon) will not burn without a high percentage of diesel in the mix, no matter how hot I preheat it to. I'll also get some cooking oil from a freinds restraunt to test at the same time.

Maybe you could build a small burner test rig to perform a scaled down burning test of your oil supplies periodically to test their burning qualities with?

Be sure you don't use any RED dyed diesel without a legit agricultural reason, the tax man will get you if you do!

The red dye is put into fuel for off-road use, which a diesel locomotive or oil burning steam locomotive should qualify as... I believe.

With regard to tourist lines in the Northeast, I fired former FEC 148 at Black River and on the Morristown and Erie, using waste oil. We also ran a pair of trips with that engine, with a mix of crankcase (from Morristown), later topped off with number two heating oil and then some diesel. Not fussy at all- and the engine's original gravity fed burner, designed for number 6 or Bunker C, was retained.

The other line that used waste oil was the Morris County Central. 385 and 4039 were fitted with burners designed by the railroad's owner, the late Earl Gil. This burner system was pressurized, with an two motored electric pump running on 115 VAC for fireup, replaced with a 32 VDC motor running off the headlight generator once steam was up.

I was told by one of the firemen that SSW819 didn't like diesel much, better on waste oil but still not a great fuel. Be carefull where you get your old oil!!! They got a load of aviation hydraulic fluid mixed in once, (skydrol), found out fast that it's a glycol based fluid treated with a heavy fire retardant package (hydraulic fluid has to resist fire even when hot and sprayed through a 'nozzle' (leak!) at high pressure. And also a transformer oil scare. Never, ever let them load if they just came from the electric company! Never say the words "transformer oil"

All your new oils should burn nicely, the synthetic should burn the cleanest. The new trend in motor oil is to get rid of as many additives as possible, as they foul the exhaust emmision systems of newer cars. While the big class ones may seem to burn clear diesel, it is only clear because their isolated supply routes of fuel, in fact it may not even be the same as pump diesel. While anyone small enough (shortlines etc) will be burning red dyed diesel, tho some may be clear because the dealer adds the dye, not the refinary, and that bulk of fuel might avoid dye since they know the DOT man won't be looking.

Robert

Correct.

Red dye means that highway taxes were not paid. The exact non-highway use (agriculture, railroad, stationary generator, etc.) doesn't matter.

At WRM we use red diesel in our diesel locomotive, several diesel forklifts, a standby diesel generator, a diesel fire pump, etc.

Our two diesel trucks have to buy un-dyed fuel at gas stations.

When I was fireman on (ex Reader Railroad) No 108 on the Conway Scenic Railroad in the 1970's, the Reader folks said they used to burn waste oil in her, but I don't think we ever did at CSRR. The Reader man said, as mentioned above, be careful what else is mixed in; he said they had an occasional bubble of gasoline go through, that would usually wake up the crew.

I just wanted to thank everyone so far for sharing their knowledge about operating steam locomotives on the wide variety of liquid petroleum-based and biodiesel fuels.

While we know our operation is not subject to road use taxes, we are still concerned about how to keep ourselves green, since the waste oils will obviously contain hazardous chemicals, including heavy metal compounds. So far, we have had "don't tell them" advice which is always scary, especially if you aren't a riverboat gambler.

Can anyone think of any other way assessing potential environmental risk other than performing complete chemical analysis on each load of waste oil?

Know your source?

Some state highway departments stockpile fuel oil and what doesn't get used gets "recycled" every couple years. You may find a way to buy as surplus a couple tank cars full.

Industrial users that rotate oil on a regular basis in compressors, etc could be a source of pretty dependable quality - especially if you guys go pick it up.

The majority of the waste oil I've used was whatever the recycler got from whatever sources recently, and it was as you may expect variable. Caveat emptor, but don't overthink it.

dave

Back in about 1998 or 1999 when the Austin Steam Train Association was running the #786 on used motor oil, they bought filtered known source used motor oil that had no other (illegal to burn) contaminants in it, from a collector/filtering company and they paid $ .25 cents per gallon for it. That was when the gas prices were about $1.05 -$1.15 a gallon, so it was cheap.

I have often thought about making a deal with service stations in my area and providing them with two 55 gallon barrels, one for oil, the other for their transmission oils, (I would have a taker for that transmission oil prior to collecting it). They might just collect used oil for nothing if you pick up the barrels regularly. Human nature being what it is, (lazy) the people that work at those stations will surely dump trans fluid in your oil barrel, unless you give them a second barrel to use for the other fluids.

The only thing I knew about the red diesel was that the farmers at the local stock sale barn that had red dye in the exhaust pipes of their pickups all got huge fines for it when the tax man came bye and wiped a towel in those exhaust pipes. He started writing citations with their license plate numbers on them for their viewing pleasure when they got finished selling their cattle. So, I was aware that was not part of the legal use, but did not know the specific legal use until now, Thanks for the info.

I hope that synthetic oil does burn well, I can get lots of it for free, from my area farmers tractor oil changes.

Synthetic oils are dificault to burn as they are designed to stay as a lubricant even at high tempratures. You can tell when you get a batch of fuel with high Synthetics.

See update from WCWR for some of my current technology for burning these fuels.

NO! Especially if you have to rise above 'dont ask don't tell' on your oil, you're gonna have have test results BEFORE it gets dropped off. Quarantine tank anyone?

For the record I am a 'waste oil generator' (BTW a source for -very- clean oil would be a generator repair company-will be some diesel mixed in from fuel filter changes. Most oil I change has less then 30 hours runtime on it, even oil from diesels is still usually translucent it's so new, I never get near hydraulic fluid), and -every- batch they pick up from me has a sample pulled 'just in case', most garages will dump everything that will fit in the waste tank from oil to fuel to brake fluid and probably piss once in a while too.

I run a repair shop and I pay to have oil removed. I have people who want to take it free they will come and pump it out of my tank and haul it away but what happens if they have a accidend and there is an oil spill. Someone is going to start looking for some oun to pay for the clean up. The company I use is insured for this reason. I would be careful of trucking it myself.
AL

You should check the law closely-as a generator you are accountable for your oil from cradle to grave-them being insured helps but in the end -you- can be held liable till it's all gone....I dunno how often this has been used, but it's how it is....