# Efficiency of Indian kino oil as a biodiesel

1. Oct 22, 2008

### ash_nar

I am planning to test the efficiency of Indian kino oil as a biodiesel...... How do I do it???? I only have access to my school chemistry lab..........

2. Oct 22, 2008

### mheslep

3. Oct 22, 2008

### mgb_phys

Re: Biodiesel

If you want to measure the efficency simply in terms of how many Joules/kg you get from the oil you can do it by building a simple calorimter.

- In simple terms you want to burn a known amount of oil and use it to heat a known amount of water. You measure the temperature change of the water and we know how much energy it takes to heat 1kg of water 1 deg C (you can look this up).
In practice it's difficult to do accurately because you have to make sure that none of the heat from the diesel flame escapes, but at the same time allow enough air to reach the flame for it to burn.

4. Oct 22, 2008

### mheslep

Re: Biodiesel

IANA Chemist, but as I recall calorimetry is notoriously difficult to perform with useful precision? In addition to the problem of capturing all the heat, in this case the diesel burn efficiency will be highly dependent on the device used to burn the fuel.

5. Oct 22, 2008

### Staff: Mentor

Re: Biodiesel

Combustion heat is measured in pressure calorimeters filled with oxygen, that's not a device that you can make out of nothing.

6. Oct 22, 2008

### mgb_phys

Re: Biodiesel

As a school science fair experiment it's reasonable. You could probably compare the energy you get from vegetable oil and diesel - probably not a good idea to try gasoline!

7. Oct 24, 2008

### chemisttree

Re: Biodiesel

First, you need to define what you mean by 'efficiency'. Do you mean, "Will it burn in a diesel engine?" or do you mean, "How much more or less energy per gallon does Kino oil-derived biodiesel have than _________?" For the former, you need a diesel engine for the latter you merely need a calorimeter. If you are asking about pertinent fuel parameters (cetane, cloud point, acid number, etc...) consult the appropriate ASTM standard. Lots of specialized (\$) equipment...
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