Weekly Progress Report: Week 9

This week, Louis finished up testing on all samples. He reports that all passed the 3-27/newspaper tests. In addition, data was analyzed and graphed.

Figure 1: Graph of soap mass removed over time of water washing.

Figure 2: Results of soap titration test. Red: Combined washed. Orange: Electric field washed. Blue: Water washed. Grey: Control.

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The group continues to work on the Final Report/Presentation due in Week 10.

Weekly Progress Report: Week 8

This week's objective was to dry all of the samples. The purpose of this procedure was to remove water from the washed biodiesel. Water in biodiesel degrades the fuel back into methanol and oil, which is bad for engine life.

Theoretically, the samples undergoing electrolysis wouldn't need to be dried, but they were anyway, to eliminate extraneous variables. Each sample was placed on a hot plate and heated to between 50-60 degrees C for around 45 minutes. This causes the water present to evaporate.

Figure 1: Biodiesel in the process of drying.

Figure 2: Biodiesel after drying

 After drying, the biodiesel appeared to clear up dramatically. This property will be formally tested in a "newspaper test" next week.

Figure 3: Hot plate and stirrer.

Weekly Progress Report: Week 7

In lab, Louis, Jiaqi, and Johnny worked on the washing process. A procedure can be found under "Tutorial 3 - Water Washing Purification Procedure".  A total of 4 50 mL washed samples were produced. Two will be evaluated against the electric field washed samples. The other two will be washed using electric field and then compared with all samples.

Figure 1: Biodiesel sample after washing.

Figure 2: Wash water poured off of biodiesel. The milky white coloration is due to soap that has dissolved into the water.

Louis reports that the soap titration kit, ordered from Utah Biodiesel Supply, has arrived. It will be used next week to test for soap content.


Next week will consist of running final electrolysis on the water washed samples, drying of all samples, testing of the final product, data analysis, and final report preparation.

Weekly Progress Report: Week 6

This week, Blake and Esmail have started the electolysis process in Esmail's dorm room. Using the rig they constructed, lab glassware, a Sinometer MS8268 digital multimeter, and an Extech 382280 power supply from the Physics department, several trials have been conducted as a "proof of concept" for electrolysis.

Figure 1: Initial electrolysis purification rig. From left to right: Multimeter, crude biodiesel, electrodes and beaker, graduated cylinder, and power supply.

Figure 2: Schematic of electrolysis purification rig.

Trial #1 was conducted on May 7th, 2013. 25 mL of crude biodiesel was drawn from the first batch made by Dong, Louis, and Jiaqi. The test ran for six hours, with electric current measurements being made every half hour. Current started at 14 microamps and dropped to 2 microamps.

Trial #2 was conducted on May 8th, 2013, using crude biodiesel from the second batch. The same procedure was followed. This time, current measurements were much lower and more inconsistent. Current was measured to be at 2 microamps and gradually rose to 7 microamps.

It was decided that the spacing of the electrodes during trials may have been inconsistent. Blake and Esmail decided to make new electrodes and a new jig. This new jig was made out of a piece of wood cut from the first jig. To preserve spacing, it was 15 mm wide, as with the first version. In lab, Blake and Esmail made new electrodes from .7 pencil lead. These new electrodes had greater surface area. In addition, the procedure was modified to let the beaker sit overnight after electrolysis and before pouring the sample into a storage vessel. This was found to increase the yield of precipitate at the bottom of the beaker.

Figure 3: Precipitate at the bottom of a beaker. Used in Trial 1.

Figure 4: Redesigned electrodes.

On the weekend of May 11th, Esmail conducted Trials #3 and 4. They both used biodiesel from the fourth batch. Trial 3 was run for 12 hours, with current readings taken every half hour for the first six hours. Trial 4 was run as the others, for only 6 hours.

Figure 5: Electrolysis purification rig prior to the start of Trial 3. Bic lighters were used to balance the electrodes.

Trial 3 started at 42 microamps and dropped to 6 at the end of the trial. Trial 4 started at 6 microamps and dropped to 1. All trials except Trial 1 produced biodiesel that had a clearer, lighter-colored appearance.

Figure 6: Several of the purified samples.

Also, in a partnership with Drexel University, Air Products of Allentown, PA has given financial support to this project. At the end of the project, the deliverables will be used by Drexel College of Engineering as examples to incoming freshman students.

Air Products employs 20,000 people. Its mission as a company is to make energy systems more efficient and practical. Environmental impact is also one of its top concerns. In the field of Biodiesel, Air Products has researched technology that recovers energy from glycerol, a byproduct of the biodiesel synthesis process.

Coming soon: Testing of the samples and comparison with water washing.

Weekly Progress Report: Week 5

In Week 5's lab, Louis, Jiaqi, and Dong reacted three more samples of crude biodiesel. In addition, Samples I and II were separated out into crude biodiesel and glycerine and poured into a glass jar. Both samples yielded approximately 75% biodiesel and 25% glycerin. To expedite the process, Sample II was separated using a centrifuge at 4000rpm for 8 minutes. Sample III was put into a separatory flask and left to settle. Sample IV was left to react in the water bath shaker.

Figure 1: Sample I being separated into biodiesel and glycerin layers.

Figure 2: Sample II in centrifuge tubes. At right: Before centrifuge was applied. At left: Separated layers after centrifuge.

Figure 3: Sample I in separate jars. Glycerin is on the left while crude biodiesel is on the right.

Esmail and Blake have finished building the components of the electrolysis rig, with the exception of the power supply. On Monday of week 6, the power supply will be procured from the Physics Department, and electrolysis will be run from noon to 6 PM.

 Figure 4: Basic prototype of electrolysis rig. Since taking this picture, the electrode distance has been shortened and the 150 mL beaker has been replaced with a 50 mL beaker. Not pictured: Multimeter, connecting wires, power supply.

It has been calculated that to run the full course of experimental trials, around 9 samples of crude biodiesel need to be produced. This will be achieved by Dong, Louis, and Jiaqi sometime between this week and next week.

 Also, the cold soak filtration test has been determined to be unsuitable for this project. The ASTM specification for the cold soak filtration test requires a .7 micron glass fiber filter, and it's expensive. Instead, we will use a soap titration test.

In Week 6, we will run the electrolysis procedure and modify it if necessary. The washing procedure will be attempted and perfected. In addition, more crude biodiesel samples will be made.

Weekly Progress Report: Week 4

This week, Louis, Jiaqi, and Dong made an initial batch of crude biodiesel. A procedure for this process can be found under "Experimental Processes: Step 2- Transesterification Reaction."

Blake and Esmail talked to the Physics Department about borrowing a power supply for the electrolysis rig. The power supply they will supply has a maximum voltage of 40 volts and a maximum current draw of 0.5 A. This is 10 volts lower than the 50 volt power supply used in the patent. Lower voltage means that the purification may take longer than specified in the patent. In addition, the power supply can only be borrowed for a few days at most, which is going to impact project scheduling.

Esmail has ordered a multimeter that can measure microamps. 

Blake and Esmail also drafted procedures for the electrolysis and washing experiments. These drafts can be found under "Experimental Process, Step 3 - Purification."


Next week, Blake and Esmail will attempt to do one test run of the electrolysis procedure, while Jiaqi, Louis, and Dong will make more crude biodiesel.

Weekly Progress Report: Week 3

This week, the group gathered supplies and set up their experiment.

Louis got some waste oil from a nearby Chik-Fil-A.

                                                    Figure 1- Waste oil in funnel

Blake and Esmail bought epoxy, alligator clips, pencil lead, aluminum foil, and copper wire. Esmail went to the machine shop and made a piece of wood to hold the electrodes in place. In lab, Esmail and Blake glued the pencil lead together into bunches to be used as electrodes. Meanwhile, Louis, Jiaqi, and Dong processed the crude feedstock oil. They filtered the particulate matter from the oil. At first, they tried to use a centrifuge to separate out the solids. However, the oil was too viscous for the centrifuge to have any effect.

  Then, they used a Buchner funnel to remove the solids. At this point, the feedstock oil was a rich brown color (Figure 2).

Figure 2 - Processed oil feedstock

Louis, Jiaqi and Dong titrated a sample of the feedstock to determine the free fatty acid content (Video 1). More details on this procedure can be found in the page "Experimental Process - Step 1."

Video 1 - Titration of processed feedstock

This week, the group plans to obtain a DC power supply for the experiment. Blake will go to the machine shop to modify the mount for the electrodes.  In addition, a procedure for the electrolysis experiment will be written. In lab, the group will make its first batch of crude biodiesel.