Rumbling Diesel Army
After work today I went over to Maud’s house where a biodiesel demonstration was in progress. A few folks had come over, some old hats, and others totally new to biofuels, to see Maud’s reactor in action and talk shop.
It was interesting because everyone had their diesels pulled around back, and it looked like some sort of diesel army. There were three Mercedes 300s (even another wagon), a Volkswagen Diesel Quantum, and a VW Golf TDI. When they all started up it sounded like a truck stop. It was great.
I got a chance to compare vehicles with a few other folks and talk maintenance. We also compared the sounds of our engines (which is actually a useful diagnostic technique, since three of the engines there were physically identical to my own).
Once the batch was successfully underway we discussed ideas for improvements and Terry distributed a bit of extra fuel she had. I had helped her run a batch the other day, and we loaded 10 gallons of that batch into a drum in the back of my wagon. Upon closing the hatch I heard a terrible noise. Turns out that the drum was about 1/2” too close to the hatch, and the window of the hatch came down right on the rim of the drum, thoroughly shattering the rear window. After some vigorous cursing and sad commiseration from the fellow diesel owners I got myself back together. The window is still intact due to the laminate, and since the front windshield was recently cracked as well, I already needed to make a comprehensive claim. Fortunately, only two weeks ago I lowered my comprehensive deductible from 500$ to 100$ for a mere 36$ per year. A worthy investment, it would seem.
Anyway, despite the annoying window breakage, I’m very pleased that I now have biodiesel to start blending into my tank. This will give me a little time to get my own reactor set up and running, and will let me legitimately put on the ‘Powered by Biodiesel’ license plate frame I got. I’m also glad that I hadn’t put my new “Powered by Biodiesel” sticker on the rear window yet, since it would have had a short little life on that particular piece of glass.
Sunday 28 Nov 2004 | Sam | Energy
you two and your breaking of windows on wagons…too sad and irritating. glad to hear this project is going well sam!
Dude, I had no idea you screwed up your window. You must have done it right after I left. That sucks. BTW, I have a source of oil for us if we can get the equipment up and running. Call me and I’ll fill you in on this and some other details.
Chris
Yeah, the window breaking sucks.. Whats even worse is that the damn-able glass fixing place took out my rear window before realizing that they’d need to order a new gasket. So they put up some cardboard.
Now its raining, and starting to leak into my car. GRR!!