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In late February 2006, my Greasecar was ready. Daryl Beck, of Evergreen Motors spent a good day putting a second tank into my Volkswagen Beetle TDI. Flipping the switch to grease was undramatic, except for the cool but subtle "diner smell" that you could notice at stop lights with the windows down.

So, I'd like to think with two years under my belt, I'd have some reasonable suggestions for potential greasers -- maybe some pitfalls to avoid, and some tips of things that worked well for me:

First off get a good oil supply. That's "good" in several senses of the word: 1) Enough oil, but not too much; 2) Relatively clean; 3) Soy or canola, NOT hydrogenated of any sort. For a while I used oil from a nice little falefel shack down the way from my workplace. LOTS of crumbs and flour and crud in the oil made it very difficult to filter. Secondly, you really need a reasonable space for a couple of 55 gallon barrels and multiple cubies. A garage is ideal. You WILL spill, the question is really how much! I have to filter inside in the corner of our basement and I have spilled a bit. Use those floor diapers or oil absorbing pads around a bit. Third, use a filtering approach that works. I use denim filtering above a poly barrel ($10 from car wash businesses). I make these homebrew filters from pairs of jeans, but don't use worn jeans. Get next-to-new from Salvation Army or some such. If you are able to heat before you pour the oil into the filters it will filter much faster. Otherwise the denim filters will clog sooner rather than later. Settle as much as possible: two weeks is ideal.  Google these items, or check into the Veg Oil forum of Biodiesel Infopop.

Anyway, back to my story. I found the TDI Beetle was just great on fuel. I always had enough oil because the fuel economy on this vehicle was easily 45 MPG. We traveled from Boston to DC on a mere 13 gallons of grease! Sadly, the Beetle met an untimely end. A year later in 2007 on a local street I drove over a raised portion of asphalt on a dark local street. The Beetle is a VERY low car, only about 4 inches above the street. Impact with this "traffic divider" dislodged the engine from the mount, and according to the mechanic, cracked the engine block.

Enter 25 year-old Mercedes. This car is such a beast. Very heavy, a bit sluggish around town and sounds like a truck with its clatter-clatter. But you can feed it grease and have little fear about any sensitive components getting out-of-sorts. It CRUISES at 80 on the highway (not that I drive that fast!).  By contrast the TDI has a notoriously expensive injection pump that "may" fail when using veg over time. On a hot day, you can pour veg oil straight into the main tank of "Frances"! 

While I replaced a lot of plastic parts on the VW that will likely wear out sooner rather than later, over the past year, the following has been repaired or replaced on the Benz: 1) Vacuum pump; 2) Transmission; 3) Shocks; 4) Tires; 5) Steering wheel; 6) Rear axle. I know it sounds like a lot. However the car cost a mere $3200 (originally $31k in 1982) and presumably these parts will last another 100k miles or so on a car with over 200k.   The nice thing about the Benz is that it seems to "warn" when something is wearing out.  So far no ugly surprises, it hasn't left me stuck by the roadside (the TDI did more than once).  On the downside, there is already some underside RUST on this vehicle that I've been treating, but with salty roads in New England winters, this is probably the what will require the most long term attention.

So I was lying in a hospital room this summer with a case of babesiosis that I acquired during some vacation or another while Katrina was the big news.   It was a 3-day stint, during which I had one of these small in-your-face TV's complete with CNN cable connection.  In a sense, it was a nice diversion while I wondered whether it was some new chronic condition (leukemia?) that may have been causing my platelet count to be in the basement (26 when the norm low is 100).  While I watched news of hurricane refugees and fears of rising fuel prices, I also learned new words like "petechiae."

I imagined how the expected four-dollar-per-gallon fuel prices would impact my commute (70 miles roundtrip).   I began to recall how my friend Chris had a Volkswagen TDI and recently boasted of 45+ miles per gallon.  With nothing to do in my hospital bed but wait for the lab to figure out why my blood wouldn't clot, I did the math.   If I could evenly trade my nice Mazda Protege5, I would immediately save at least $100 a month.

(Click here to download the QuickTime plugin if you do not hear the audio on this page. )

One thing led to another and not long after my hospital stay ended, I learned about burning vegetable oil in diesel engines.  In fact, as you can Google around and find out, Rudolph Diesel actually intended that his engine would burn vegetable oil.  Just to clear up a common misconception:  Biodiesel is NOT THE SAME as burning veggie oil.  There are lots of pros and cons, but after researching and debating the merits of each approach, I figured that the risk to my engine from glycerin was less of a concern to me than the risk to my household from storing large amounts of methanol.   Making biodiesel requires a mix of lye and methanol in a "stew" that you cook in an old water heater.  Veggie oil simply requires filtering (sometimes filtering and filtering and then settling) and an apparatus installed in the diesel vehicle of your choice. 

As luck would have it, one of the most popular vendors for veg oil systems, Greasecar, is right down the road.  Daryl Beck is a cracker-jack indepedent installer who works right around the corner from Greasecar's Easthampton, Mass offices. 

Hey did I mention this is better for the environment, in addition to being a more affordable way to travel?

Anyway!  In mid-February Daryl converted my '99 Beetle TDI.  My girls' February school vacation would be the following week.  Why not make a road trip out of it? 

I found a roof-mounted luggage rack and the local VW dealership for $300 (ouch, am I saving money yet?).   I had established an I'll-pick-up-your-used-grease relationship with a couple of restaurants already.  And on the morning of February 21, we were ready to head south for an educational school vacation week.  Oops, one problem, my veggie tank will only hold 12-13 gallons of fuel.  Even at 45 MPG, that will only get us down to DC and not back.  Not enough storage space in this little buggy to carry 10 extra gallons of oil, that's for sure!

Turns out that there is a real "good Samaritan" spirit among many greasers, and as the result of a couple of forum postings, I was able to arrange for a fuel refill just outside of DC for the return trip.  Wow, people can be nice!   Having said that, we did notice a couple of highway "sneers" from drivers of various oversized vehicles. 

So the long and the short of it is that the family made it down to DC and back on just a quarter-tank of dino diesel and the rest was courtesy of greasy throw-away stuff!

Almost seems like a "too good to be true" grassroots form of auto fuel, doesn't it?  Turns out that some states are already regulating the stuff or trying to tax those who are collecting their own WVO (waste vegetable oil) for personal fuel purposes. 

So I guess the lesson is always, "enjoy it while you can!"

Sometimes scarcity yields more interesting results than when full resources are at hand.  We just got back from a Maine vacation.  We spent a week in a cozy  A-frame cottage on Penobscot Bay.  The location, just steps away from the water's edge just can't be beat!  The hosts were quite gracious and gave us good advice about touring the area, and otherwise left us alone to rediscover a needed sense of peace.

Part of my quest for renewal has come in the form of jumping back into the "Weird Hobby" described in the earlier blog below.  I recently acquired a "new" Icom IC-746 (not Pro!) transceiver, just days before leaving for Maine, so I was just itchin' to try it out.  No way would I leave it behind! 

But what to do for an aerial? Pretty presumptuous to show up to a rental and erect a very visible structure next to the cottage, I thought.  When we arrived, and after looking around, the answer became obvious -- try loading into the big silver stovepipe that came down through the living room ceiling!  As luck would have it, a sail mast was laying on the ground, perpendicular to the "vertical antenna" I had discovered.   Enameled wired threaded through a crack in the wall, tied to the boat mast and bingo, I had my ground plane!

But what would our hosts think, at seeing coaxial cable strewn across the living room floor at the cozy cottage?  Surely they would come by and ask if we needed anything, and "what the heck is all of this!?"

Even luckier -- as we left for a day trip up the coast, on the 2nd morning of our vacation, I looked over admiring the landlord's shiny new Harley, and there was my answer on a small 4x6 license plate, which read "N1PVC."  Awesome, another Weird Hobbyist!  Sure enough, Jeff was excited to see me browsing through the 746 manual, while we were sunning on the deck, and merely curious about the "make-do" vertical.

So how did it perform?  Kinda lousy on 15 and 10 meters, but those bands are dead anyway, as we're at the bottom of the 11-year sunspot cycle.  However on 14 Mhz (20 meters) I worked Macedonia (Z32AU), Slovenia (S55DX)...Switzerland, Belarus, Bulgaria, and W4MS in Virginia that needed a QSL card from me to confirm Maine.  Cool-o!  Only 100 watts.

After reporting this result to an old ham buddy of mine, he remarked: "sometimes all you really need is a vertical antenna next to the ocean." 

Indeed...the Simple Life!

It's true.  I've met two first ladies, and they are both Republicans.  Evidently these formative experiences didn't have a major influence in my current political leanings!

I guess it was November of 1970, I was at a George Bush for US Senate rally in Corpus Christi, Texas.  My mom was active in the Republican party in Texas.  Believe it or not, at the time, the Republicans weren't doing very well in the state.  The Democrats were the dominant party, entrenched since the days of the Civil War.  Bush was a member of the "alternative" party!  In any event, my mom brought me over to meet a dark-haired Barbara Bush.  I honestly don't recall if she was wearing her trademark pearls. "Come meet Mrs. Bush, dear," and my mom lead me over to the matriarch for a friendly handshake.  Bush lost the election to Democrat Lloyd Bentsen who held the seat for decades (imagine a Democratic Senator from Texas!).

More interesting was my encounter with Betty Ford in 1976.  I ran into her at the mall at a campaign rally for her husband.  Now get this -- I was wearing an ERA button.  Remember the ERA?  Equal Rights Amendment .    Betty took one look at my button and said, "I like your button."  Wow, whatever happen to Republicans like that?    I'm not sure that she was very serious about her sobriety at the point, and perhaps we could dimiss it accordingly.  Still, given the current times, when we look back on these in the in the Republican camp they look absolutely progressive.

Aaaah, those were the good times!