As most of you know, I run my Xj600 diesel bike purely on WVO (Waste Veg oil). I mix it with 5% Petrol, but during the winter its still very hard to start. This is mainly down to the thickness of the vegetable oil at low temperatures.

To counteract this, I have installed an injector line heater. I used Kapton tape and nichrome heating wire. Kapton tape  a thermal limit of about 250 degrees C and is very thin so aids heat transfer better. I wrapped 2 sections of nichrome wire after wrapping the injector line in kapton tape. Each coil draws around 4 amps.

The temperature aim is around 75 degrees c, to measure how long I would have to run the coils for, I crimped one end of a copper pipe and wrapped it with kapton tape, then the heating coils. I filled it with WVO and inserted a temperature probe. It took approximately 1 minute and 50 seconds to reach 80 degrees C.

As a result, I have coupled the heating elements with a 12v timer circuit and a relay. The timer is set for aproximately 1 minute 45 seconds. The output of the relay also triggers the oil pressure light on the dashboard so I can see when the coils are energised, when the light goes out I can start the engine.

With pre-heating, the engine now starts within 3 cranks rather than 10-15 as before. Even at 0 degrees c.

Some pictures below:

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