[Note from Mike Briggs - since there are so many posts asking about Diesel Secret, since newbies to the forum apparently don't know how to use the search feature, I'm making this thread sticky so it stays at the top. Thanks Graydon for compiling the list included.

any NEW threads on DSE will be deleted. We do not need a dozen different threads just of people asking "anyone know about this DSE stuff?". Since it appears the DSE company is themselves participating in such postings on biodiesel forums, and using a mass google advertising campaign, I will not allow them to do more advertising here, by posing as potential users of the stuff. If you want to discuss it, use this thread. Otherwise your new thread will be deleted. - Mike] Diesel Secret is a vendor hawking an additive based program that's supposedly "better than biodiesel and petrodiesel" and cheaper. Since this question has come up numerous times and also because I've been getting a ton of personal email on this vendor, I've compiled a list of all the threads I could find here & over at the infopop forum and posted them in a single thread. Here's the link to it: http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/groupee/forums/a/tpc/f/419605551/m/1311010701 Caveat Emptor if you're planning on trying it... It ain't goin' in MY diesel!!! -Graydon [edit by Mike Briggs again. I am posting in here a posting the very knowledeable Girl Mark made over at infopop on DSE] From infopop (http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/groupee/forums/a/tpc/f/419605551/m/9741005301 )

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Posted by Girl Mark at infopop Due to much discussion about the new Google advertisers, "Diesel Secret", I'm posting somewhat of a summary of what we've been able to learn about this exciting new form of snake oil. Enjoy!

The Diesel Secret MSDS is here:
http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/groupee.../4511077101/p/1 includes this, supposedly: "DSE additive Material Safety Data Sheet
General
Synonyms: dimethylbenzene, xylol
Molecular formula: C6H4(CH3)2 This is a mixture of the three xylenes, m-xylene (CAS 108-38-3), o-xylene (CAS 95-47-6) and p-xylene (CAS106-42-3), and often also contains ethyl bezene (CAS 100-41-4)." also posted at that thread is an explanation of what they tell you to buy, more or less: a (questionable) SVO filtration system (they claim a Goldenrod will remove water apparently which I think is not accepted as true generally by experienced SVO'ers) and some household water filters for filtration (Dana Linscott has in the past posted some good reasons not to rely on pumping oil through those).
The MSDS for the 'additive' is available through their site. Apparently it's $13 plus $10 shipping, per each 12 oz bottle, which isn't a cheap habit when you add it to $3/gallon gasoline and diesel or kerosene and an additional cetane booster additive.
You're supposed to mix the dimethylbenzene additive with filtered WVO and a lot of gasoline and kerosene and some cetane boost additive for good measure. In a 'Wal-Mart garbage can'. Just remember, safety first!

There have been people using blends of vegoil and diesel or gasoline ("thinning"), but there are cautions and problems with this approach.
There have been very mixed results in the US with blends because both used vegoil and diesel seem to vary a lot and solid material sometimes seems to come out of solution (not known whether this is WVO-related or diesel-related).
Perhaps in Europe they're buying new SVO and blending it with petroleum thinners, which I can see being an easier blend to maintain than some of the WVO we collect here. The Bio-power people (also not very well regarded in the SVO / biodiesel world) mix up their magic potion and let the stuff sit for several weeks to allow waxy stuff to fall out, which seems like a different practice than the Diesel Secret shortcut promotes.
Cold weather is a big issue with blends as well.
One (semi-critical) Infopop discussion forum thread on blends is here: http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/groupee...51/m/1571038201 , both pros and cons are somewhat discussed.
I think Tilly did some viscosity tests at one point at the infopop forum, that showed that it's really difficult to get the viscosity of cold WVO blended with petroleum products to be anywhere near the viscosity of diesel, which means that some peopel's injectors can end up spraying poor spray pattern, which can eventually lead to coking of injectors, which leads to more poor spray pattern, which can lead to engine damage (one form of which is polymerised engine oil- your lube oil becomes a rock and your engine components seize) as has been noted in dozens or hundreds of scientific studies in the past few decades. I've actually seen this happen to three different users- two SVO, one biodiesel with poor engine maintenance and possible fuel quality problems. Some engines and fuel systems are more sensitive to this than others , apparently. For more information on how this happens please see the University of Idaho summary of some of the old 'cold SVO' studies, some of which involved blends of SVO and diesel:
http://www.uidaho.edu/bae/biodiesel/rawoils.html (follow the link for the summarise of individual studies and what kind of damage resulted)

Of course the emissions of a mixture like this aren't known either but are probably quite a bit worse than if you were to do SVO right ('heated') or to use biodiesel, though emissions isnt' the marketing angle they're using.
The worst part of this Diesel Secret snake oil phenomenon is that they're marketing (via Google AdWords) very heavily and are attracting people who are completely new to biofuels and are not going to be able to get the hand-holding and support that blenders who participate in the SVO forums will get.
The response in the SVO/biodiesel world has been extremely sceptical, and at TDI Club forums biodiesel section, there is even some concern that some of the recent discussion has been started by the DSE company's own 'shills' posing as legitimate posters. This seems to be a reasonable fear.
So... be afraid... be very afraid.

Mark

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Bump, the inundation returns.

Do you suppose making this sticky would help stem the incessant addition of new threads? I only have slight confidence that it would, since people don't seem to look before posting, but it might be worth a try...

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Originally posted by CTB
Do you suppose making this sticky would help stem the incessant addition of new threads? I only have slight confidence that it would, since people don't seem to look before posting, but it might be worth a try...

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+1 All the Diesel Secret posts make me STRONGLY suspect we are victims of a Web marketing blitz by Diesel Secret. Constantly seeing it might lead newbies and lurkers to think it's something special (as advertised) when it is just thinned SVO.

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Originally posted by Dante

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Originally posted by CTB
Do you suppose making this sticky would help stem the incessant addition of new threads? I only have slight confidence that it would, since people don't seem to look before posting, but it might be worth a try...

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+1 All the Diesel Secret posts make me STRONGLY suspect we are victims of a Web marketing blitz by Diesel Secret. Constantly seeing it might lead newbies and lurkers to think it's something special (as advertised) when it is just thinned SVO.

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Agree with Dante I do.

I've been thinking the same thing about all the posts potentially being web marketing. Notice that it's primarily from people with only one or two posts. Even the few people claiming to be using it are people with only a handful of posts (one of the people who said he's using it and it's working great only made that one post, and has not come back). Very suspicious. Hm, maybe we should check their IP addresses...

I particularly suspect the guy who posted about using it for a year- it hasn't been around for a year. Unless he's part of the marketing company for it. Mark

Is their any follow up on "DSE" claim to have an acceptable alternative to traditional biodiesel. Does it work or is it crap? Does the stuff hurt your diesel engine? I have a 05 Duramax and am looking into alternative fuels. Any sugestions?...

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Originally posted by graydonblair
[Note from Mike Briggs - since there are so many posts asking about Diesel Secret, since newbies to the forum apparently don't know how to use the search feature, I'm making this thread sticky so it stays at the top. Thanks Graydon for compiling the list] Diesel Secret is a vendor hawking an additive based program that's supposedly "better than biodiesel and petrodiesel" and cheaper. Since this question has come up numerous times and also because I've been getting a ton of personal email on this vendor, I've compiled a list of all the threads I could find here & over at the infopop forum and posted them in a single thread. Here's the link to it: http://biodiesel.infopop.cc/groupee/forums/a/tpc/f/419605551/m/1311010701 Caveat Emptor if you're planning on trying it... It ain't goin' in MY diesel!!! -Graydon

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Here is my thoughts on this. If it does thin the svo then it's effective up to that point at getting svo through injectors. However, since there are no "oldtimers" using it successfully, it does make me wonder. I am new here, but I am a web veteran from www.candlepowerforums.com . It does indeed look like a marketing blitz by a shady organization of some kind. A good product need not be secretive like that imho. I hate to say this, but the time may be near to appoint a few moderators experienced with biodiesel to help keep things clean and safe here on these boards. Below is a shining example of one of the things that can go wrong on a forum as it gets bigger, and sloppy marketing by one or more of it's members gets out of control. It's the revelations thread. http://candlepowerforums.com/vb/showthread.php?t=87208&page=1[url][/url]

Oh gosh- here's one for the debunker (from the shiny new dieselsecret.com site): [img]http://img365.imageshack.us/img365/2050/dserevelator4ho.png[/img] Where to begin on this crapload? I don't have time right now, but suffice it to say, there's a lot of B.S. in that chart. Also, this claim from their F.A.Q. -

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Glycerin & Carbonizing issue for vegetable oil based fuel? Glycerin is no more an issue to vegetable based fuel than paraffin is to petroleum based diesel. Both are easily burned up in the high compression explosion of a diesel engine, assuming the fuel is thinned well enough to properly spray out of the injectors. As long as it sprays properly as our fuel does, no residual will be left unburned and, therefore, no potential for carbon buildup.

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Right.

3rd shift, John Mueller, et al: There is no reason to believe that DSE overcomes the problem inherent with running kerosene blended with vegetable oil, which is what DSE promotes. The problem: veg. oil and kerosene don't really mix perfectly, and the vegetable oil in the mix will eventually coke the injectors. From Girl Mark's excellent quote in the first post, above:

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it's really difficult to get the viscosity of cold WVO blended with petroleum products to be anywhere near the viscosity of diesel, which means that some peopel's injectors can end up spraying poor spray pattern, which can eventually lead to coking of injectors, which leads to more poor spray pattern, which can lead to engine damage (one form of which is polymerised engine oil- your lube oil becomes a rock and your engine components seize) as has been noted in dozens or hundreds of scientific studies in the past few decades. I've actually seen this happen to three different users- two SVO, one biodiesel with poor engine maintenance and possible fuel quality problems. Some engines and fuel systems are more sensitive to this than others , apparently.

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If the people at DSE disagree with that (as they appear to in their statement from their F.A.Q., in my post above), they're lying. Or all the science that's resulted in a biodiesel industry as opposed to a vegoil/kerosene blend industry is worthless. Frankly, having met some of the scientists, and being somewhat of an unofficial one myself, I trust them.

All you have to do is try and burn the waste that comes from making bd in order to realize there is a reason that it should not be put through an engine. I realize that the waste is ~50% soap but there are pleanty of other things in WVO that will not burn; water, salt, sugar, other crap from cooking food. I dont want it in my engine. Honestly the concern over the chemicals is stupid too. What are you mixing in with this stuff; gasoline, kerosene and their secret cancer causing potion. In my opinion this stuff is just as bad or worse than lye and methanol. And the settling, filtering, dewatering, mixing setup is just as complicated as a biodiesel setup. Whats the point?

Agreed, cumminsbiopwr. Kudos to Mike for cleaning the forums up!

What is the difference between this method and using straight vegetable oil with a conversion system to heat the oil in your car? It seems like the only difference is the chemicals and the gasoline and the kerosene? And are conversion kits safe? Thanks

the DSE people are saying you don't need a conversion kit, which is why we are treating them as sheistery schemers- because many, if not all, diesel engines simply cannot run straight vegetable oil (even if it's "mixed" with other stuff- I put 'mixed' in quotes because it doesn't really form a perfect homogenous solution) without a conversion kit in the longterm. Are conversion kits safe? Depends on the kit, and many other factors. That one is in your hands. Is ASTM spec biodiesel safe? Yes.

I had read on some of the other threads for dieselsecrets that some of the other people that posted were saying that in europe people had been running diesel vehicles with svo by diluting it with other fuels. Was that a tactic that actually worked and how is that different from what these guys claim? thanks again

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Originally posted by arbicomm
I had read on some of the other threads for dieselsecrets that some of the other people that posted were saying that in europe people had been running diesel vehicles with svo by diluting it with other fuels. Was that a tactic that actually worked and how is that different from what these guys claim? thanks again

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It works for some vehicles in varying degrees, and it probably varies with temperature. It is not different than the "deezel secrete".

It's like looking for a needle in a haystack. I truly do need educated. WHY IS DSE such a problem... and please treat me like the newbie that I am. I have read for the past 2 hours and Still have not seen where DSE method is BS. I have certainly seen alot of bad press on the stuff but no real concise reasons why it is not good. Sure the DSE potion is common chemicals but so is your typical fuel addative. I just need a doctors note as to what's wrong with Diesel Secret.. Thanks DP

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Originally posted by diesel pilot
It's like looking for a needle in a haystack. I truly do need educated. WHY IS DSE such a problem... and please treat me like the newbie that I am. I have read for the past 2 hours and Still have not seen where DSE method is BS. I have certainly seen alot of bad press on the stuff but no real concise reasons why it is not good. Sure the DSE potion is common chemicals but so is your typical fuel addative. I just need a doctors note as to what's wrong with Diesel Secret.. Thanks DP

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Slowly and carefully read Girl Mark's comments in the post at the top of this thread. She knows what she's talking about, and her concerns are real.

Just keep reading DP. When you have time, also read up on the revelations thread from another board that I am also member of. I am glad management of these boards got right on this mess to keep it from getting out of control. [:)] No revelations thread needed here. [^] DSE is not going in my diesel either. [}:)] Shady used car sales shark tactics should never be needed to market a good product. Only a bad product needs such deceptive marketing ploys.