Can vegetable oil be used as motor oil?projectfarm

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I just saw this on youtube and thought everybody here might find it interesting. He has a bunch of cool videos, mostly about engines (running them on different fuels, etc). Pretty neat!
 
It would be great if he did any of the Moly or Ceratec Videos but use the "run engine without oil" ones where he runs the engines until it seizes. I would love to see if Moly or Ceratec would benefit the engine run time vs just a regular oil w/o them added.
 
Blind old eyes caught some shiny bits in the used oil. Even so, who'd a thunk it? Mebbe oil is just oil
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Due to a comedy of errors I put about a quart of used vegetable oil into an old dodge mini van. I ran it for a few months believing it was motor oil. I swear it ran smoother than usual. Scrapped the van before it caused any problems.
 
Can we get him to submit the used vegetable oil for a UOA along with new oil for a VOA? It sure looked awfully metallic in the cup for the second round of lubricity testing...
 
Originally Posted By: TmanP
I just saw this on youtube and thought everybody here might find it interesting. He has a bunch of stupid videos, mostly about engines (running them on different fuels, etc). Pretty neat!



Fixed that for ya.

Or maybe they are the same thing?

Veg oil should work OK as a lubricant until it oxidises, which it'll do fairly quickly depending on how reactive the oil is, from linsseed as among the fastest to castor as among the slowest. This is not news, hence the name Castrol.

Cannola (genetically modified Rapeseed, IIRC), is fairly stable too and the original was much used in marine steam engines in WWI, which was also very stupid, but wasn't on Youtube.
 
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Back in the late 60's a cousin was putting peanut oil (someone gave him a 20 gal barrel of the stuff) in a 49 Chevy he used as a fishing car, smelled great in that car. He said just to see what would happen. Later that engine was put in his dads hay truck when it's motor went bad. I don't know how long it ran after that.
 
Will vegetable oil work as an engine oil? No, lets move on to another subject...

nuff asid,
 
It is my understanding that RLI is basically biosynthetic which is an ester base. So it makes sense that veggy oil would work.
 
Originally Posted By: Rat407
It is my understanding that RLI is basically biosynthetic which is an ester base. So it makes sense that veggy oil would work.


Virgin vegetable oils cannot be used in an engine, period.

RLI uses biobased(synthesized)-esters, PAO, and modified vegetable oils.

Those modified vegetable oils have no resemblance to virgin vegetable oils.

Those biobased(synthesized)-esters are made by extracting the acids from plant oils and reacting them with selected acohols.

In addition, RLI had to work with an additive company to produce an additive package to keep this mix from oxidizing. They call their additive system, "HOBS."
 
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There was a lot of glitter in that oil, but Project Farm always uses old abused engines. It seemed like the veg oil flushed a lot of old stuff out of the crankcase.

I have a few 2 stroke Nitro RC car engines that used to use Castor Bean oil (vegetable oil) and top RPM on those is around 33,000 rpm. They did just fine on castor oil, but I'm sure the new synthetic oil Nitro fuels are much better.
 
Originally Posted By: Scdevon
I have a few 2 stroke Nitro RC car engines that used to use Castor Bean oil (vegetable oil) and top RPM on those is around 33,000 rpm. They did just fine on castor oil,


Castor oil has its PLACE.... but it isn't the same as soybean oil.

To say, "Well, castor oil works in engines...." is not anything at all like saying "Corn oil/soybean oil works in an engine"

Don't use Crisco where an extreme pressure lithium complex grease is called for, either.
Sure, your wheel bearings will last.... maybe 20 miles?
 
Originally Posted By: Linctex
Scdevon said:
Don't use Crisco where an extreme pressure lithium complex grease is called for, either.
Sure, your wheel bearings will last.... maybe 20 miles?


Think Crisco is "hydro-treated" for longer shelf life and enhanced circulatory system damage, so it might last a bit longer.
 
I actually have some real life experience with a moron former acquaintance who used Crisco back in the late 1980's to pack one of his front wheel bearings before letting his girlfriend-soon-to-be-wife-soon-to-be-ex-wife head out driving from Vegas to Cincinnati. He got one side done, and ran out of grease, so he grabbed the Crisco canister from the pantry and finished the other side.

She made it a about an hour outside Vegas and had to call a tow. So what, maybe 50 miles. Said one of the wheels was smoking and there were horrible noises. That marriage didn't last long......Still friends with her, decades later. Him, no.
 
From a paper: "Specialty fats consisting of the [virgin] esters of castor oil with its own fatty acid have been reported. These type of esters undergo thermal dissociation, leading to formation of de-hydrated castor oil with an additional double bond adja-cent to the hydroxyl group originally present and conjuga-tion of unsaturations up to 30%..."

Translated: Castor Oils' in which the Ricinoleic acid (12-hydroxy octadecenoic acid) have not been separated out of Castor oil, has the potential to produce gummy deposits or we say scientifically, it produces a "snot-like" deposit.
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Originally Posted By: Linctex


To say, "Well, castor oil works in engines...." is not anything at all like saying "Corn oil/soybean oil works in an engine"

Don't use Crisco where an extreme pressure lithium complex grease is called for, either.
Sure, your wheel bearings will last.... maybe 20 miles?


Oh, I know. Plant oils are not all created equal. Sometimes it's just fun to screw around with stuff like Project Farm does. He actually does all the stuff that the rest of us sit around and daydream about.
That Briggs and Stratton engine is no great loss. It probably cost Briggs $20 to produce it. (if you can buy a complete brand new low end lawnmower for $99).
 
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