Greasel or Greasecar? NEITHER!

[GREASE FIRE]

In light of the very selfish and greedy things that both greasecar and greasel have been doing, i thought to post some info i have learned about how much cheaper it would be for someone to just buy/construct all the components from a greasel kit themself.
Don't get me wrong here, i know this is a frybrid forum and i am not saying no one should ever buy a kit - i am sure that goodwin's kits are of the highest quality and anyone who can should buy one. But i am very turned off by both greasecar and greasel and would like to see anyone considering either of them to just take the matter into their own hands. Giving your money to them is not much different than giving you money to OPEC, as they are both driven by more or less the same motivations.
Again, i feel goodwin is in an entirely different league and i am glad greasecar drove him from their forum becasue now there is a better one!
But here is some info i would like to share:


Although i don't consider myself an unhappy greasel customer (but i know there are lots of them out there) i just thought i would share wisdom of hindsight here:
the poly tanks they sell are made by Tempo and can be purchased directly through their website for much cheaper (and what's more, most of the fill caps that greasel installs in them leak around the top, making for quite a mess that can quickly ruin the inside of a carpeted vehicle). They come with their own sending unit as well. For heat, all they do is put in a transmission oil cooler with coolant running through, anyone can do that. If you do a looped return system, then the three way brass valve is also sold by Tempo (or at a pipe supplier).

The full line of racor filters and replacement elements are available through marinefilters.com for nearly 50% cheaper. I recently treated myself to the huge racore 1000fH for $190, as opposed to the $400 greasel gets for them. While greasel's come with the 5 amp band heater, you can just coil some coolant hose around the whole thing and get all the heat you need for about $10 more for the hose and fittings.

The pre-filter bags they sell for about $12 are available from filterbags.com for $5 each, and filter down to 1 micron.

And the HOH they sell, made by racor-parker and sold for $8/foot, is just two lenghts of coolant hose ($.50/foot at napa) and a length of high quality fuel line hose. Get you some of the best fuel line hose you can find and the whole thing should be less than $2/foot. Use your imagination to figure out how to tie them all together (cable ties) and insulate the whole thing (use that silver "bubble wrap" stuff with duct tape or whatever.

the fuel selecter solenoid valve is just an off the shelf item, with the money you save you can find a more heavy duty one.

For about $20 - $30 you can build a simple heat exchanger and dramatically increase the svo temps by using a section of 1" copper pipe with coolant running through it, and 3/8" with the svo running through the inside, put T's and compression fittings on the sides to hold it all together.

Now with all the money you saved so far you can buy the plans for Dana Linscotts prefiltering unit, the total cost will be less than $100 and you will have a better filtering system than what greasel recommends.

If you are interested in the "Nomad" system, well that's even cheaper to make with a 55 gallon drum and some hard copper pipes with coolant running down into it - gets the wvo you collect on the way very warm. Although if you try to collect/filter and run in fuel tank all in one trip you may have more water in you svo tank than you think; so the nomad idea is really not the best.

Again, i am not complaining, i really like my system although i have modified it a bit to get more heat in the svo system. But i am not happy about the leak in my tank and since greasel does not seem to answer their phones any more these days to help me, i just thought i would post this info to save the next guy this problem.

-Paul

[madcat8000]

u do have some good points but not everyone is a do it ur selfer. while im a pretty good mechanic (u have to, to be self employed) im just not comfortable with doing the install my self. mabee on my other riggs but not the first one. i also think that while this is a cottage industry these people may have to charge inflated prices to support their familes. but if u can do it urself more power too u. just dont assume that they are ripping people off. i know the prices are high and am willingly paying it to have it done right the first time. dosnt bother me a bit.

[pedro]

Madcat, I could not agree more. Just because you can make a computer for 50 bucks does not mean that dell is ripping you off. In fact I think their stock is doing quite well.

Paul, All of us burning veg or intending to, should show a little respect to anyone who is willing to try to make a living in this business. Let's face it. Untill recently only a college kid who can't afford gas would think that shoving melted pigs in their gas tank was a good idea. And yet a select few decided that the idea was worth trying to make a living at it.

If you never tried to make a living off your own wits, instead of haveing someone else pay your taxes and health insurance, then you may want to moderated you comments about inflated prices a bit. It seems to me that when you DIY folks get in trouble because you red gas tank is leaking, Greasel may know more about it than any one. And if I were him I would no be too keen on helping someone who wanted my knowlege but was too self rightous or cheap to sepend an extra buck and buy something from me.

Remember, .....part of the solution, not part of the problem.
Pete

[cgoodwin]

Remember the title of this forum is "Hack it - Discussion of available systems, thier strong and weak points (BE NICE)"

Let's BE NICE. If you have issue with Greasel for a leaking tank and not responding to you, fair enough, you are not the only one and their customer service - from what I have been hearing - is shamefull. Make the point and make it clearly but there is no real need to pants them in front of the whole class.

I will say that my controller could be cobbled together with a modified turbo timer a fist full or relays, a bag of diodes and (again) a pop tart, and probably do most of what the Gen-3 does. Everything else I make is pretty standard, HIH, Aluminum tank with exchanger, coolant heat exchanger, etc. I do go to every possible length to insure only the best gear has my name on it and I stand behind it 110%, my phone numbers are all over this and the greasecar forum and I answer my phone 5 days a week, I have to, I have a woman and child to support.... and I have pride in what I do.

While I do not know Charlie, it sounds like he has some ammends to make. While I do not agree with the concept of your post, if I sold someone something which had defects and did nothing to make ammends, I would not be shocked to find him trashing my name about town. This kind of reprocussion is an internet age issue businesses NEED to learn to deal with. My first business partner (who tought me a great deal about partnerships by ripping me off) always said, "a happy customer tells one or two people about you. An unhappy one tells everyone he knows"

Chris

PS. We could tone down the GC bashing a bit, while it does make me giggle every time I read it, Pete is right and it makes the industry look foolish. So Lee, if you would just make a heartfelt appology.......;-)

[GREASE FIRE]

It seems that charles may read this forum because right after i made this (unpopular) post i finally got a response from the email i sent him last week, and he said that some of the fill caps they were installing in their tanks had a cork seal instead of a rubber one, and they did not realize it; so the cork seal quickly deteriorates (like mine did) and he said he would replace it with one with the rubber seal.
Fair enough - like i said, i am not complaining about them, just posting some info on how anyone could do it better and cheaper themselves.
However, the fact is that if i had installed this tank in the trunk of a vehicle with carpet, it would probably have a permanent stench to it, and many people would not like this (and many people are probably dealing with this now). thankfully, the area i placed it is all aluminum, at least possible to clean up but the location of it is not exacly easy to do it.
Another concern i had with greasel is that, as of this past summer, they were actively telling everyone (both on the phone and on their website) that anyone use wvo for their cars was actually doing the restaurants a favor by taking their wvo off their hands. Obvisouly an exaggerated selling pitch, because the truth is that there are many parts of the US where wvo simply can not be obtained at all due to contracts with rendering companies. So i believe this is very misleading. Thankfully i did some research before buying their kit and, although i have plenty of sources for wvo, the fact is that none of the restaurants around here pay anything to get rid of it, because there is a huge rendering company around here that makes biodiesel and animal feeds with it - and they buy it from the larger restaurant chains.
I do not believe it is very honest of them to make that claim - and i notice now on their site they have changed the wording a bit, but still they give the impression that wvo is as readily available as trash and it's just waiting for us to save it from a landfill or something.

As for greasecar, i am not bashing them or greasel, but it has become clear that their forum is for greasecar customers, just as a mcdonalds restaurant is for mcdonalds customers. Sure, nothing wrong with that, but it makes me wonder just how much they really do care about the environment,etc - there is nothing miraculous about what they are doing, they just have a good idea and, apparantly, a good product with all the aluminum, etc in their kits.
Stories about them going to environmental fairs and totally blowing off anyone who is not seen as a potential customer; telling people not to share info on their forum if they percieve it as competetion to their product; and then one of their own empoloyees does the exact same thing but even more so on this forum, basically just advertising their own product and putting others down like vegdude did; these are the conerns i have, nothing really against them. It is just the reason why i said, to anyone with the skills, time, or just the interest, to build your own kit better and cheaper. With greasecar, they fabricate a lot of their stuff so it would not be as easy; but with greasel, all those parts can be bought off the shelf or ordered on-line and there is nothing wrong with me telling anyone who reads this to do so. There are plenty of people out there who see them as heros (i have met a few) and i don't think any advice i give on how to save money would hurt them at all.
Nicely,
Paul

[6.2L Airforce Van]

I feel I should add that in the end Charlie from Greasel came through in the end for me too. I was sold a racor 690 that wasn't exactly cutting it and I felt I should have had the 1000fh from the beginning, there were some other details that have already been expressed on this forum that had me a bit dissappointed as well. When Charlie found out that I was unhappy, he made every effort to fix it. I feel satisfied that he has done his part in this transaction now. I am installing a 100Ofh today. Sadly it was probably the fact that I stated my dissappointements on this forum that made it happen. Thats not to say I should have gone that route though. I have come to realize that Charlie, just like Chris is a hard working man too. They have different approaches to customer service and their products occupy two different ends of the spectrum but they are both honest with and concerned about their customers The internet is a very powerful tool and on that note I will just say that if I had to do it all over again, I would have gone with the complete Frybrid system. IF i lived on the other side of the country though in Charlie's home state, I might be saying the same thing about him, who knows?

[cgoodwin]

"As for greasecar, [edit] there is nothing miraculous about what they are doing, they just have a good idea and, apparantly, a good product with all the aluminum, etc in their kits."

Well since Lees little prank I will say this. I once referred to their tanks as "A work of art" this was in a comparison with a plastic outboard motor tank. The kit I have leaks like a sieve, the welds would not get you out of a trade school welding class and the access plate on top is held in with sheet metal screws and a cork gasket, when it leaks and you remove it to attempt repair with another gasket and RTV, the threads strip out and you have another leak. The vented cap is designed for regular fuel and plugs with VO causing the tank top to suck in forming a bowl where the leaking VO sits, when you open the cap to relieve the vacuum, the top "Spoings" up and VO runs down the sides. The fittings through which you push the PEX are not de-burred and cut the PEX up and the 3/8 copper coil around the filter makes changing it a drag and time consuming. They have ignored many posts regarding the tank issues and just keep selling them.



Since one of the company "administrators" spends so much time on this and their board, I fail to see why they do not respond to the posts regarding these issues and why they do not change the tank design to limit them.



Free advice: Spot-weld a collar of 1/4" alum inside the tank so the screws have something to bite or attach threaded collars to pre-drilled points for the screws. Vent the tanks, many commercial vents are available which allow air in but no liquid out and most have provisions for a vent tube to be attached so that gases may be vented outside the vehicle.



Chris

[GREASE FIRE]

Airforce, you should tee off the coolant lines going into your tank and wrap heater hose all around the 1000fh filter - this is a perfect filter to do so with since to replace the elements all you have to do is unscrew the top and would never have to remove the heater hose. I have one of those band heaters underneath that even if it may be overkill, but i installed a switch just before it so if it gets too hot i can turn it off and just rely on the heater hose for heat.
Paul

was greasesheikh before but i just got a new email address and so changed user name.

[6.2L Airforce Van]

I will definately look into that. I have to do some re routing of my fuel lines up front as well. I am going to install a return line to the tank, where's the time though, and I am partly afraid that I won't get it going again, I need it for work.

[4.3 Diesel]

Flashlight makers though they had 'it' .... then the Mag-Lite came out.

Greasel:
GreaseCar:
Frybrid:

Good Work Chris.

Dave