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West Newsmagazine
is West St. Louis County's exclusive direct-mailed community newspaper. |
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| West Newsmagazine News |
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Local mechanic creates own biodiesel for his vehicleBy Steve Glover
 When Rudolph Diesel designed his first internal combustion engine in 1897, it originally was meant to run on peanut oil. But when diesel fuel prices hit the $5 mark in some parts of the country, drivers like Pat Rawie went back to the basics and began producing their own biofuels.
Rawie, the owner of MasterTech Auto Service in Ellisville, said that he was motivated by the high prices of diesel fuel and a curiosity of whether it could be done. “I guess I’m part geek, part mechanic,” Rawie said. “Years ago, diesel was cheaper than unleaded regular, but now it’s higher than any premium gas out there. So I thought that maybe I should look into this stuff. I did some research on the Internet and heard of some guys in Iowa who were selling the equipment to process it. I thought about the fact that these guys in Iowa are up there and using this stuff in farm equipment, so I’m thinking that Iowa might be the best place to go because they’re actually doing it and have been doing it for quite some time.” Rawie took a class through Azure Biodiesel Co., based in Sully, Iowa, where he learned the basics of biodiesel as well as the collection of cooking oil and the production of biodiesel via the FuelMeister II. Although the FuelMeister II is designed for use in one’s garage, Rawie had his concerns with residents not only handling methanol and lye, but also the potential fire hazards. “It started out as a way for someone to do this in their home garage,” Rawie said. “I don’t recommend doing it at home because there are a couple of chemicals that you use that are pretty potent. One of them is lye and the other is methanol, which is a very flammable form of alcohol. But I figured that with having the shop here and having the proper equipment and fire suppression it wouldn’t be that big of a deal.” So where in the world does Rawie get most of his cooking oil to process into biodiesel? It actually comes from Fortel’s Pizza Den on Clayton Road. “They save their oil for me and I pick it up about once a week,” Rawie said. “I get about 8 gallons a week from them and save it up and process it as I go.” Rawie actually has two FuelMeisters at his shop, which process approximately 40 gallons each. So over the course of a weekend, he usually can produce approximately 80 gallons of biodiesel. Those 80 gallons of biodiesel usually last a month. Rawie said the one thing that the general public does not realize is the fact that a diesel engine can run on more than just diesel fuel. A diesel engine also can run on a variety of fuels, such as natural gas, alcohol, gasoline and plant oils. “A lot of people don’t realize that diesels will run on quite a few things,” Rawie said. “I like biodiesel because it’s real similar to the diesel fuel that you put into your engine now. The only problem with biodiesel now is that you can only run it in most vehicles from 1996 to present. In cars built before 1996, you might have problems with the fuel lines because the fuel lines were made out of just regular rubber, and biodiesel will attack the rubber and make it into a big giant sponge.” So what kind of gas mileage does Rawie’s 2003 Chevrolet Silverado pickup truck get? Approximately 20 miles to the gallon, which is about the same mileage that his truck would get running regular diesel fuel. “They say that you lose about 3 to 5 percent, but you really can’t tell what’s in there,” Rawie said. “The first time that I ran it, the exhaust smelled like hamburgers. Some guys say that it smells like French fries, but it depends on the oil that you’re getting. But this oil that I’m getting from Fortel’s, they’re probably deep frying a lot of other stuff.”
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