JF,
Given the fact that you are not able to use a headspace analyzer or to trust yourself to use SPME, then I have another solution which may meet your fiscal requirements. My assumption is that your analytical requirements, the number of analytical measurements ie samples is relatively low.
Buy a simple GC capable of performing packed column analysis.
Buy a porous polymer column, almost any will do.
Dilute your biodiesel samples with methylene chloride for high concentration methanol samples. Use undiluted samples for extremely low concentration methanol samples.
Given good sampling and standard addition techniques (if you don't know what I mean then take a class or read a book) you should have no problems analyzing for methanol with excellent accuracy.
Historically, I have analyzed both solid and liquid samples for methanol at levels far below 1000 ppm accurately and with minimal sample dilution you should be able to reach 50 ppm without difficulty.
Now accuracy of analysis with a large sample load requires a headspace analyzer, but if you are only testing several samples a day, a packed column solution will suffice. What do you think people did for such analyses in the 60s, 70s. and the 80s, before the common use of capillary columns ?
You should rotate the column on a daily basis and bake out the end of the column overnight at a temperature well below the max temp of the packing.
But tell your bean counters, if you have a large number of tests, and will be performing the tests over a long period of time, it will be poor economics to NOT use a headspace analyzer, unless of course, you work at less than minimum wage and don't object to working 80 hours a week.
If you are not permitted to do the tests properly, then send out the samples and see what they cost then. Maybe your bean counters will talk a different story at that point.
wishing you the best with your financial, not an analytical, problem,
Rodney George
consultant