Place I worked for had a propane conversion on a 80s Chevy truck with a 350. That thing was a slug on propane.
I’m not moving to the city so I’m going to need at least 60 miles. I’ve also thought about getting an old Mercedes with the million mile engine. Supposed to be good for running biodiesel.
IF this phase out of fossil fuels actually does happen, it will be decades from now and I would think diesel would be the last to go. Electric heavy equipment, 18 wheelers and large farm tractors ain’t gonna cut it. One could just get a vehicle with a small diesel. Volkswagen makes them. Chevy Colorado would be my pick. Gotta have a truck though I’d prefer full size. All depends on future fuel prices.
I have a little subcompact tractor. 1980 Mitsubishi that has mechanical injection and it would probably run on biodiesel with some modifications. Biodiesel has to be heated in cool weather. It already has a block heater so the engine can be made nice and warm. Guess I’ll need solar panels/batteries to run the heaters though. LOL
We actually lived off grid for 5 years. Two while searching for land and three after we got the land. Ran off of a small solar panel set up. Charge controller went out 3 days before electric service was installed. Inverter not too long after that and the golf cart batteries are shot but they made it 7-8 years which is higher than average. It was kind of cool hearing the neighbors complain about the electric being out the previous day. We were clueless to that and were likely on the internet the day before. We had phone/DSL 3 years before we had electric service. Ran it off the inverter as it takes very little power.
I do want to get the solar panels set up again. Need 4 golf cart batteries($500) and a charge controller($200). Already replaced the inverter. The router and cordless phone would go back on solar and we still have LED lighting that currently runs off an RV converter, until the electric goes out. The converter is also a charger so even just having batteries would give us a day or two just running LEDs and internet.
“I have a little subcompact tractor. 1980 Mitsubishi that has mechanical injection and it would probably run on biodiesel with some modifications.”
They are all ready to go with any kind of veggie oil and as you know even deep frier oil, Most diesel sold today is “blend” Biodiesel. For others reading, as you also know Pollard the first diesel was designed to run on peanut oil. Just have to melt them back to a liquid first. The more recent applications of this concept are dual fuel. They run the exhaust through an additional tank with the alternative fuel.
Start it on diesel, and when the heat from the exhaust melted the fuel in the other tank they switched it over from diesel. I have a friend who builds diesel motorcycles and he runs straight up almond, corn, or other vegetable cooking oils with no problems at all.