Cooking oil in TD5

not sure if this has been asked before, and there was no way i was going through 50 pages of this to find out

Im looking at running the 110 (200tdi) on cooking oil, but seeing as its hard to get used oil, im thinking of getting fresh oil at €1.35 a liter, which is still approx €0.20 cheaper than diesel.

Question is, will fresh oil be ok? and is there a preferred oil? rapseed, sunflower etc?

Also ive heard of adding a bit of methylated spirits to the mix? is that right?!

Hi, there are loads of threads here on cooking oil. But in short yes you can run clean oil in 200 or 300 tdi, I use a 50% mix with derv. we pay around £19.00 for 20 liters here. If you do though change your fuel filter after a few hundred mioles and keep one spare in your truck as they do get clogged up quicker.

Shifty1962 said:

Hard to say. Depends on whats mixed in with the oil. I leave mine three months to settle but I have the space and oil drums to do so. Never had a problem yet with water in the fuel.

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3 MONTHS!!! i'll be broke by then lol, perhaps i need to sort a better storage system than i have, not much available space at the moment (shouldn't have sold the lock up), should have a decent sized shed in about 2 month but we'll be moving middle of next year so i could do with getting as much as poss sorted and ready to use before then

Changing back to engine oil! I don't know any one else doing it, so have no reference! Is it normal that they stink? To the point where people complain! It's not smoking, it just stinks! It seems happy enough running on it, veg oil never caused this in previous vehicles, it smelt different but not vile like its about to blow up on me! I suppose that's a possibility! It's been nothing but grief lately

Stink of what?

Basically like a knackered engine burning oil! Yes I know it is burning oil but I assumed it'd burn it a bit cleaner than it is!?!? It is rather bad!

Can't smell any worse than veg oil surely?? I've used veg oil and people have refused to follow me when off rd

What mix are you on. Hardly any difference on mine on a 50/50, smokes a bit thats all

Not tried 50/50 yet! 30-40% at most. I've used veg oil in the past and it was never this bad!

I only get a very slight warm oil smell, perhaps its contaminated with something?

It's what I generate. Some ATF. But it's water free and any odd stuff! A lot of its out of narrow boat engines. The rest from cars. Mostly drain, filter, tank so no opportunity to get contaminated! Perhaps I'm misleading myself and me engines knackered

Heavy Breather said:

I only get a very slight warm oil smell, perhaps its contaminated with something?

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Same here.

Some heavy gear oils can smell a bit funky but I've stopped using them as apparently they can have some very corrosive stuff added and need a lot of thinning in order to filter.

and the td5 runs on petrol i have discovered, even peanut oil, but in all seriousness

shifty you said you had your td5 tuned by alive tuning ? and your running motor oil in it ? that seems hard to believe when alive tuning costs in excess of £400 ???


i know engine oil can work but not like you lot are putting it, if i was anyone reading this, i wouldnt try it, stick to veg, and thats only if you have 200 300 or earlier

lordluke1995 said:

and the td5 runs on petrol i have discovered, even peanut oil, but in all seriousness

shifty you said you had your td5 tuned by alive tuning ? and your running motor oil in it ? that seems hard to believe when alive tuning costs in excess of £400 ???


i know engine oil can work but not like you lot are putting it, if i was anyone reading this, i wouldnt try it, stick to veg, and thats only if you have 200 300 or earlier

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Well I beg to differ. I never use veg oil because I'd have to pay for it, I dont like the sickly smell, and fuel filters dont last long. It also emulsifies and froths much easier and absorbs water which is a ball ache to remove. It requires complex filtering, including using chemicals (if using reclaimed veg oils) and in-vehicle pre heating to use.

I've noticed next to no difference between regular diesel and oil based homebrew despite my StgII remap in over 30k miles of motoring. My motor gets worked hard - its no weekend toy. The TD5 is particularly suited to all different kinds of oil as fuel because of its high injection pressures (2200-3000 bar or about 33,000-45,000 psi depending on what spec engine) that completely atomises pretty much anything. It was part of the original civvy/military brief when the engine was designed that it should be able to run on what ever was available.

I once ran my old 100k miler EU2 TD5 engine on 100% used engine oil and it ran perfectly. I have to concede it did smoke like 007's Aston on acceleration but it ran for more than 200 miles with no performance issues before I decided it was anti social and just asking for a pull from plod.

fair enough, i knwo the td5 is a very diverse engine

i ran my escort cab fitted with a 1600 diesel on a mix of engine oil and paraffin mix with diesel, ran well for a year but cav pump packed in a month ago, it was a 1998 engine so it could have just worn out. never smoked or smelt but only 25%

TD5s dont have an injection pump. Injector pressure is generated mechanically inside the injector.

so thats why they run so well on it, i guess 200s dont do as well then with their bosch pump ?

on that not why do the td5s not like veg oil if they have no IJPump ? why do they go bang on neat stuf ? i run my mums on 70% bio fine

I never said TD5s dont like veg oil I just said I dont use it because I'd have to pay for it and at the current time used engine oil from my local indy is free.
You could run a TD5 on neat veg oil and many on here do.
Just carry a supply of fuel filters with you as they seem to clog up more readily on veg oil.
I cant comment on the 200/300 Tdi engines as I've never owned or played with them.

there is many people on here that say td5s dont like veg, that is why i say this, one chap said he ran it for 1000 miles then bang ( he didnt say what exactly),

im not to sure on that td5s are not known for veg, 200/300 yes all day long, but i swear td5s dont,
i run bio in my mums fine, but dont even run neat bio let alone neat veg !

shifty heres one for you, i was thinking, if a td5 doesnt have an injector pump, it could run off heating fuel as it wouldnt need the pump lubricating ?