Fuel

quincy

quincy

Member
Chatting with my neighbour earlier this evening about diesel engines. He was telling me that he runs kerosene in his old MF tractor with no ill effects, in fact he was told it is a cleaner alternative to agricultural diesel and better in general for the engine?

I thought this was interesting so I googled it just a while ago (howstuffworks.com) and it seems in the chain of things, kerosene falls between Gasoline and diesel in the refining process, a lighter, lower carbon product?

oil-refining-diagram.gif


Do you think kerosene would a bad thing to use in your tractor??? Or do you all use it and I just never knew??
 
I have heard of people cutting diesel with Kero, but I wouldnt want to run it straight for the same reasons I wouldnt put petrol in a diesel.
Seeming as most people use thier tractors off road only, you could get a barrel of red diesel, save a bit of moey that way, its about 60p/litre when you buy it in a drum.
 
Ineteresting post Quincy. I've never heard of that before. Is Keresine priced much lower than diesel fuel?
 
I have a diesel generator....Large trailer single axle with flight tar mack lights. 2 cylinder Onan engine.

It says (on the fenders) use Kero-A, JP2, JP3, JP4 or Diesel. I suspect ANY combustible low cetane filtered fuel will work in a diesel engine. Well, in that engine anyway :>
 
I dont think its about saving money. His tractor is oldish, (late 70's) and he doesnt use it that often. I think its just something that was recommended to him by someone. Kerosene is only a little cheaper than agri diesel here. I use kerosene in my home central heating (1000 ltr tank around back of the workshop) but would never have thought it could be used for a tractor? I filled up my CH kerosene tank recently and I paid 62cent (euro) a litre. As for agri, my local fuel station sells agri (green diesel) for 67cent/litre. So theres not a huge saving to be made. Just thought it was interesting....
BTW, diesel for cars is selling at the fuel station for 112cent/litre and petrol sells for 115cent/litre.
 
Mark777 said:
... I suspect ANY combustible low cetane filtered fuel will work in a diesel engine. Well, in that engine anyway :>
Click to expand...
Mark, what do you make of this?

I've always used Power Service (Cetane improver) and had easy starting. Finally I filled a near-empty tank with fresh diesel but didn't dope it this time. It starts terrible.

This sound/video file ColdStart (1mb file) illustrates what I mean. Does that sound normal, or do I have a problem?
The first third of the recording is spinning it with the compression released. You can hear the injector pump clatter but it's always done that. Then it cranks a few revolutions where it doesn't want to run and makes heavy smoke, which I've never seen before. Finally one cylinder fires with tremendous fuel knock, then the second cylinder. [2 cyl engine.] That is in contrast to the easy starts I recorded a while back: Yanmar Start (1.5mb file) so I'm wondering if the Thermostart has burned out or this is just normal for low-cetane fuel. It hadn't been run for a week, and air temp was ~55.

Those files may take several seconds to download.

Any comments?
 
I would remove my intake tube and watch, dribble a little fuel on the igniter and key activate it, just to make sure it's smoking like it should.

I'm a big believer in Power Service, use it in every tractor I own. At first when you've used it there doesn't seem to be any noticeable difference...but after a few tank fulls of treated diesel it seems to have an accumulative effect as it improves starting, cleans injectors and somehow neutralizes water (and algae) contamination.

I noticed it most when I ran out and didn't use it for awhile. My diesel stuff knocked, hard started and the overall performance WAS noticeably decreased. Which led me to pick up more on my next trip to town. IMO, it IS one of the few products that live up to it's advertised promises.

The military generator, on the other hand, would probably run on diluted waste oil providing there's enough flammable chemicals for ignition.

Mark
 
A diesel engine will run on almost any combustible liquid.

HOWEVER: Most diesel engines need the lubricity that the fuel provides to lubricate the injector pump an injectors. Running straight kerosene (or gasoline, or veggie oil, or whatever else) will work, but only for a while. Then the fuel savings will be spent (several times over) in buying a new injector pump and injectors.

Additionally the lower temp flash point of kerosene or gasoline will cause the timing to be way off and possibly destroy the motor entirely.

Some engines are (were) designed as "multi-fueled" engines and have specially designed components to handle these variations, but a older tractor (70's?) probably is not.
 
Kerosene = bad... ok! I know what I wont be running in my machine then. So, should I relay this information to my neighbour (an experienced tractor owner) or keep my mouth shut... I would hate to think he was running something that could destroy his engine...
 
Good info Av9tr. :thumb:

Quincy,
He might be using certain (or whatever the additive is) that aids in lubrication.
 
I did meet a guy a few years back that was running his van on filtered chip fat cut with kerosene. Maybe your neighbour is doing this, but doesnt want you stealing his chip fat sources? :D
 
Kerosene is similar to diesel, and is blended with diesel to prevent fuel gelling in extreme cold weather. I've read it is a suitable replacement for diesel, with the following limitations:

Less energy per gallon.

Less lubrication. You need to supplement the missing lubrication.

I found 'odorless heater fuel' on closeout at a building materials store. It was less than half the price of diesel. In the fine print it declared it met specification for kerosene. I bought four gallons and added that to a gallon of diesel already in the tractor. I also put in 3 small cans of 2-cycle oil.

The tractor ran smoother than normal and the exhaust was odorless. This blend would be ideal fuel for an indoor forklift, inside a mine, etc.

But power was noticeably less. Normally I use the tractor mostly for the mower, loader, or trailer pulling in the orchard and never need full throttle maximum power. I wouldn't have noticed the power loss. But that was the year I tried discing and needed every bit of horsepower to pull the 6 ft disc at reasonable speed. It was a little short of what I needed to pull the disc uphill. I took half the water ballast out of the tires to reduce the weight I was hauling uphill and to allow some wheel slip instead of bogging down, but overall I wasn't getting full performance with that fuel.

In summary it's not a fuel for heavy work.
 
I know lots of folks used to cut their diesel with Kerosene in the cold, but now it is cheaper to put in anti-gel.

Bio diesel though is MORE viscous than diesel. New Holland and Dodge now support b-20 to be run in their rigs. Many Chinese manufactures state you can run straight kerosene or bio-diesel. In fact it extends oil changes as it doesn't have the carbon to dirty your oil. Bio-diesel is actually better for your engine than good old dino-diesel, especially the new low sufur stuff

When veggie oil is good it's great, but sometimes used oil is contaminated with oven cleaner and such. If you refine grease into biodiesel you burn contaminates and water out. If you simply heat the old grease up in a seperate tank (greasel) and run it when it becomes liquid you do run some risks. Either way the exhaust smells ALOT better... and it doesn't come from the middle east.

I have run 20-50% biodiesel (more in summer, less in winter)in my tractor, excavator and f-350 w/out problems
 
Here is what I got straight from a local refiner a while back. I was looking for a bulk source of kerosene for space heating.

He said that their best grade of diesel was comparable in quality and burnability as kerosene for my heater. He said thats what a lot of locals buy to use. Low smoke, low emission type oil.

I can only presume that there would be some use of kerosene then in the tractors. Maybe mixed with some diesel as a precaution. But the above is truely what I was told by the refiner.
 
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