Diesel fuel additives

[ted frater]

Some yrs ago , must be 20, i read an article on ignition improvers for diesels.
the current additive at that time was nitro benzine with a 1to 2% by volume.
I tried it and it didnt seem to make a lot of difference. I increased the percentage to 10 % and tried that, well,it melted the clear plastic fuel filter body!!.
so we didnt try that again.
now, theres an other additive , in liquid form, nitro ethane, its supposed to have over 40% oxygen in it by weight.
Has anyone tried this ?
Theres no point of course if its cost outweighs the extra burn efficiency that might be obtained.
Await your interesting replies.
The other possibility is to add say 5% gasoline to the diesel fuel. This would increase the cetane value considerably.
At a steady state speed, the fuel efficiency is determined by the total drag the car has and the efficency of the engine to turn thefuel into net work available .

[tasdrouille]

Hi Ted,

Additives in diesel do not improve fuel economy in my opinion. They might improve lubrication, but that's pretty much where it stops.

Cetane has nothing to do with fuel economy. The car must be tuned to the fuel, lower cetane fuel requiring more timing advance.

[viio]

I've used a few different treatments, but I prefer Millers diesel power sport 4. Can't say it's ever affected my economy though, I just do it as a cleaning additive.

[Arragonis]

I would agree with the others here - I've tried a few different ones since 1992 when I got my first TD and none have enhanced FE, certainly not enough to pay the cost back that I can detect.

Some have solved some rough running issues but that was in the days of mechanical pumps and not common rail etc.

[gone-ot]

Cetane is not related to energy content, which is what really defines mpg.

Cetane is about ignition delay...similar to how Octane is about detonation delay in gasoline.

[frottage]

has anyone tried Aderco 5000 - its a drivative of the Aderco product used widely with heavy fuel in shipping - as i understand its a surfactant/detergent that improves separation and atomisation of the fuel which improves the combustion process. I have been reading about it on a website in the uk called ecofuelplus

[UFO]

Biodiesel !!!

[ted frater]

I tried biodiesel shortly after I got my vitara.
Here are my observations.
I was paying 90p a UK gallon for it. It ran smoother than regular mineral diesel fuel. It returned less mpg than regular diesel to the point that there was no financial advantage in the price difference.
Especially as I had to go some 20 miles each way to fetch it.
Ive been experimenting with various fuels and find the following gives the best mpg.
10 parts of regular diesel
2 parts of bio diesel
1 part rapeseed oil
1 part kerosene.

theres no doubt that the common rail electronically pulsed fuel injection controls the burn rate to the ideal prerssure diagram of the power stroke. Resulting of course in much improved torque as well as fuel economy.
However all the indications ive had about common rail are that its prone to primary pump pressure failures Mazda in particular have had problems at 50,000 miles to the point a class action seems likely.
The peak of a diesel torque curve has to occour when the burn rate of the fuel matches the piston speed on the power stroke.
This gives te lowest peak combustion pressure with the longest burn rare to give the longest steady pressure on the piston.

[UFO]

I've run a 2005 "Cherokee" CRD for 50,000 miles on B100 and blends down to B20. I've, nor has anyone else I know, had such pump failures with the possible exception of the new VW common rail TDIs -- those are apparently failing because of the lack of lubricity in the pump diesel; no one running biodiesel blends has had a pump failure.

90p a UK gallon is an excellent price for biodiesel. That's what we pay here for a US gallon of petroleum diesel. With the crap diesel I get, my mileage is actually better on biodiesel especially in the winter.

In your experiments, I would leave out the vegetable oil, that will definitely cause problems with ring coking and sump oil polymerization.

[euromodder]

Originally Posted by UFO

I've run a 2005 "Cherokee" CRD for 50,000 miles on B100 and blends down to B20. I've, nor has anyone else I know, had such pump failures with the possible exception of the new VW common rail TDIs -- those are apparently failing because of the lack of lubricity in the pump diesel; no one running biodiesel blends has had a pump failure.

Biodiesel is a better lubricant for the fuel pump than regular de-sulphured diesel.
It's one of the advantages of using blended diesel (B5 at the moment in the EU) over straight fossil diesel.