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Burn olive oil in a regular Kerosene lamp

Published on Aug 29, 2013

"I followed Brian Bellacosovitch's instructions in his video on how to convert a kerosene lamp to burn vegetable oil and it works. Vegetable oils are much safer than kerosene or lamp oil because the flash point is so high the fuel can't ignite if the lamp is dropped or knocked off a table and the glass font (fount) shatters spreading the fuel. If you do that with a lamp filled with kerosene or lamp oil you can kiss your house goodbye.

"The flash point of a volatile material is the lowest temperature at which it can vaporize to form an ignitable mixture in air"

MSDS Flash Points:

Kerosene: Flash Point: 101.00 F (38.3 C)
LAMPLIGHT ULTRA-PURE LAMP OIL: Flash Point: 207°F (97° C)
Olive Oil: Flash Point: 437.00 F (225 C)
Soybean Oil (Crisco, Nice, Wesson): Flash Point: 491°F (255°C)
Canola oil (Wesson): Flash Point 621 °F (327 °C)

Kerosene saturates up the wick easily so the burner being many inches above the fuel on a tall font is no problem but olive oil especially and other vegetable oils are thick and can't saturate far up a wick. Vegetable oils often appear to be thinner and lighter than most olive oils.

The goal of this modification was to move the top of the wick as far down to the the fuel as possible (still retaining an adjustable wick mechanism) by: 1 removing the burner dome. 2 cutting the wick tube all the way down to the top of the vent plate. 3 using a short, squat, wide font to hold the fuel rather than a tall one. In this short font from full to empty the oil only lowers one inch rather than many inches in a tall font.

Another issue is Kerosene combustion fume inhalation is a Health Hazard. Lamp oil such as Lamplight Farms Ultra Pure lamp oil is cleaner (less soot) and safer to breath. Vegetable oil is even cleaner and safer to breath than lamp oil. Finally Olive Oil is the cleanest burning (no soot) and safest to breath of all.
Vegetable oil and olive oil being thicker than kerosene will not evaporate as quickly during hot weather or when unused for long periods of time. The fuel level in a Kerosene lamp will go down from evaporation even when not used for a number of years.

Parts used:

#2 Burner.with #2 insert collar or a Lamplight Farms 31507
3/4 inch standard wick.
Ball® Collection Elite® Half Pint (8-oz.) Wide Mouth Jar.
Chimney.

Brian's video:

...

Wick fouling issues:

You must wash the new wick in water and Ivory Dish Soap, rinse and then allow to dry. The wicks are made of cotton and there is something on them when they are new that causes the wick to foul excessively quickly and quit burning. You have to trim the wick after every use as vegetable oils foul the wick quicker than kerosene or lamp oil.

I researched the fouling issue and came across this explanation of why vegetable oils foul the wick so quickly:
http://answers.yahoo.com/question/ind...

Best Answer - Chosen by Voters
in-telex answered 5 years ago:

You can't use vegetable oil in an "oil lamp." Vegetable oil hydrocarbon chains are too long and complex to effectively burn. It can be used in diesel engines where a fine mist is mixed in with oxygen for combustion. This process is most effective when the glycerin is removed from the hydrocarbon. There simply is not enough surface area on a wick to effectively introduce oxygen and burning vegetable oil together. In order for oil lamps to work, shorter and simpler hydrocarbons are used. Kerosene is 12-15 carbons of straight chain hydrocarbon. This lighter weight allows kerosene to partially vaporize, mix with oxygen, and combust near the wick. Vegetable oil comes in the form of triglycerides, or three fatty chains on a glycerin back. This means that the average molecule of oil weighs about 870 g/mol, not 210 g/mol for kerosene. As a result, it is much more difficult to get vegetable oil to vaporize off the wick for effective combustion. You'll need the temperatures of a combustion engine.As a result, vegetable oil is not used in lamps without major smoking and rapid fouling of the wick.

Source(s):
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lipid
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vegetable_o...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kerosene "