Another Kawmizer/woodsaki

[pineywoods]

Are we talking retrofit to an existing sawmill or building the entire mill?? Replacing a gas engine with a diesel would be a big can of worms. Big problem is weight. Even aluminum diesels are heavy. The head lift mechanism would have to be beefed up considerably, plus the motor mount. In my case I opted for the gas-burner kawasaki mainly because it weighs within a pound or 2 of the old briggs, and it physically fits nicely. (Getting it at a good price had a lot to do with my choice also)

Lack of a governor is not much of a problem. Just about any older gas-burner tractor wil have an external, belt-driven governor. Easily adaptable to a diesel. Another option would be aftermarket cruise controls. Works off a magnet attached to any rotating part. The cheap ones use a vacuum actuator, there is no vacuum available on a diesel. Get one with an electric actuator.

Bio fuel might be a problem also. The injector nozzles on small diesels are tiny tiny. Doesn't take much to plug them up. There are all manner of stories about people running left-over un-refined cooking oil in diesel engines. The ones that doing it successfully are almost always running large truck and tractor engines. Pumps and injectors not near so picky as the small engines.
None of these problems are insumountable, sounds like a real interesting project. Please keep us informed ..

[jpgreen]

I've been fooling around with WVO (waste vegetable oil) and diesels, and the thing is if you run pure WVO you have to start on diesel fuel, switch over to WARM fluid oil, then switch back to diesel on shut down to clean your injectors.  You guys prolly already know this.

The thing i've found is most peopled don't know when they fool around with this stuff is the WVO has to be completely de-watered. No water whatsoever should be in that oil, as that tears up injection pumps in the long run.

Another thing that is detrimental to running WVO is hyrdogenated oils. This stuff is nasty beyond belief. It leaves a hard- varnish like gum (term called "waxing") on steel, lines, tanks, and components. This is one reason I have abandoned running WVO as every restaurant in the county uses this crap. It is also a major cause of American's heart disease IMO, and should be avoided in foods at all costs, but it is everywhere..  :

Pure oils like soy and peanut and canola, etc., are clear, don't turn white and hard, and burn beautifully in a diesel.

I've seen serious damage done to some expensive rigs using hyrdogenated oils, that have not been properly de-watered..  ;)

[Fla._Deadheader]

  YUP  smiley_heh_heh

[Murf]

With all the hassles (read: down time) in doing the swap, I almost think it would be easier to use the big honkin' (relatively speaking) diesel to power a genset, which just might real handy to have anyways, and then replace the gas-burner with an electric motor.

Big 407 or 575 volt 3 phase motors can usually be had pretty cheap, and generator heads meant to run off a farm tractor PTO are the same, pretty plentiful and not too spendy.  :

[pineywoods]

I did consider going electric, especially since there is a 3 phase power line across one end of my sawshed. When I added up all the extra stuff I would need besides the motor(new electric service, meter base, breaker box, breakers, motor starter, electrical cable, etc), it was just as cheap to use the kawasaki. Down time??? I was sawing the next day, it really is a very easy swap.