I have a good friend who designs/builds centrifuges for bioD plants and I can ask him if he has any "expert" opinion on this. First things first though..... what is WMO? lol
i doubt a centrifuge would separate them out. at least with my experience they only filter out heavier particles and i would think the additives being lighter then the base product would mostly stick around. I have actually never heard of anyone bringing them up before so it would be interesting to find that info out.
and for bshupe, it means waste motor oil
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Will a centrifuge alone separate these additives from WMO?
Has anyone sent some WMO that was known to have detergent in it to an oil analysis lab after centrifuging it? If so, what were the results?
Do these oil testers even check for detergents?
I've got alot of WMO (about 500 gallons), but I don't know if I really want to burn it if this issue isn't practical to solve.
I'm a blender, not a 'fuger so my answer is swayed by that. It is my belief that the gasoline that I blend into the WMO allows the detergent to release its grip on what it is keeping in suspension. The detergent is probably still there.
You've asked a good question but it appears to go a bit deeper than most WMO's go.
If you can't get an answer, I'll be glad to take the oil off your hands and give it a good home. (albeit a smokey one).
Carbon is harder than metal. Considering particle size, weight, and the fact anything the detergent has should be filtered out by the time it is burned, I would consider it a non-issue.
Think about the guys running pure ATF. The only issue with high detergent content seems to be breaking every bit of crud loose and plugging filters until it gets the system clean.
I'm curious about specifics. Subscribed.
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As I understand it the detergents are supposed to hold particles in suspension so they will drain out with oil changes and not settle in the engine or crankase. Seems to me a mechanical filter would catch them, but then I ain't no rocket scientist. What do I know?
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Last edited by wdbtchr; 01-18-2012 at 18:44.
Reason: can't spell for you know what
I spoke with my friend who knows a lot about these things (engineers centrifuge systems for bio-d plants) and he said that anything that will settle out of the oil by gravity will come out with a centrifuge. If it doesnt settle out then a centrifuge cannot remove it. A centrifuge only shortens the time it would otherwise take for nature to do its thing.
He also said something similar to what has already been mentioned here. The detergents are DESIGNED to hold on to the oil so any effort you make to try and get them out will likely be thwarted by the evil plans of some high-paid chemical engineer at an evil oil company. lol
It sounds to me like if you want to burn that stuff then burn it and plan to replace your filters a lot for a while until everything is nice and clean and then you shouldnt have any problems.
I am not a chemist, so I don't know for sure, but I suspect that filtering the detergents from WMO is as feasible as filtering the brown out of coffee. I just don't think it can be done by filtering. Can it even be done by some chemical process? I don't know. But my suspicion, again, is that these compounds have an affinity for the oil and are there for keeps.
The questions then are: will burning these compounds along with the WMO cause any problems? And if so, can they be removed (or, at what titer does it just not matter)?
Metallic detergents and WMO
