Making the Biodiesel day ONE!

Today in class we started the process of making the biodiesel! Our class worked really efficently and we got what we needed to be done in perfect time. The process of making the biodiesel was fairly easy. First, we measured 1 lieter of clean oil into our soda bottles. We were about 4 bottles in and we realized that we have been usuing the DIRTY oil!!! We had to pour the oil back into the dirty oil bucket and restart. Once we were on the right track it went by pretty fast. Our class split up and half of us shook the 12 grams sodium hydroxide and 250mL methanol together in a jar untill completly dissolved, while the other half poured the 1 lieter of oil in to all of our periods soda bottles. Once all of that was complete, we added the mixed hydroxide and methanol in our bottles with the oil 8 times. We did not shake the mixture we just flipped it upside down and then right side up 8 times. Finally we set our biodiesel upside down in a small beaker so it would be stable back on the counter. We did this because we want the glycerin to float to the lid so we can easily dispose of it.

Although we got the job done we had some problems,we were about 4 bottles into pouring the oil into the bottles and we realized that we have been pouring in the DIRTY oil!!! We had to pour the oil back into the dirty oil bucket and restart. To make sure that all of the dirty oil was out we held the bottle upside down towards the bucket, getting ALL of the oil out. The only other minor issue we had today was that some people had some diffucalty to get the hydroxide to dissolve in the methanol, but we quickly got past that and moved onto the next step. I am excited to see the results tomorrow! We are hoping that the glycerin fills to the top and we will not have any problem getting it out of our bottles. Tommorw we are going to clean the oil with water, im not sure how its going to work! Best of luck to all of the classes!