24 Facts About Diesel fuel

Diesel fuel has many colloquial names; most commonly, it is simply referred to as diesel.

Diesel fuel originated from experiments conducted by German scientist and inventor Rudolf Diesel for his compression-ignition engine he invented in 1892.

Originally, Diesel did not consider using any specific type of fuel, instead, he claimed that the operating principle of his rational heat motor would work with any kind of fuel in any state of matter.

At first, Diesel tested crude oil from Pechelbronn, but soon replaced it with petrol and kerosene, because crude oil proved to be too viscous, with the main testing fuel for the Diesel engine being kerosene.

Later, Diesel tested coal tar creosote, paraffin oil, crude oil, gasoil, and fuel oil, which eventually worked as well.

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In sea-going watercraft, where diesel propulsion had gained prevalence by the late 1970s due to increasing fuel costs caused by the 1970s energy crisis, cheap heavy fuel oils are still used instead of conventional motor-vehicle diesel fuel.

Diesel fuel is produced from various sources, the most common being petroleum.

FAME used as Diesel fuel is specified in DIN EN 14214 and ASTM D6751 standards.

The produced fuel has many properties that are similar to synthetic diesel, and are free from the many disadvantages of FAME.

However, development of high-performance, high-speed diesel engines for cars and lorries in the 1930s meant that a proper fuel specifically designed for such engines was needed: diesel fuel.

Diesel fuel is similar to heating oil, which is used in central heating.

In Europe, the United States, and Canada, taxes on diesel fuel are higher than on heating oil due to the fuel tax, and in those areas, heating oil is marked with fuel dyes and trace chemicals to prevent and detect tax fraud.

Diesel fuel, or marked gas oil is dyed green in the Republic of Ireland and Norway.

In India, taxes on diesel fuel are lower than on petrol, as the majority of the transportation for grain and other essential commodities across the country runs on diesel.

Since diesel fuel is not well-suited for otto engines, passenger cars, which often use otto or otto-derived engines, typically run on petrol instead of diesel fuel.

However, especially in the 1920s and 1930s, numerous series-production aircraft diesel engines that ran on fuel oils were made, because they had several advantages: their fuel consumption was low, they were reliable, not prone to catching fire, and required minimal maintenance.

Diesel fuel is commonly used in oil and gas extracting equipment, although some locales use electric or natural gas powered equipment.

Spark ignition engines did not start as well on distillate, so typically a small auxiliary gasoline tank was used for cold starting, and the Diesel fuel valves were adjusted several minutes later, after warm-up, to transition to distillate.

Poor quality diesel fuel has been used as an extraction agent for liquid–liquid extraction of palladium from nitric acid mixtures.

Diesel fuel is often used as the main ingredient in oil-base mud drilling fluid.

The average chemical formula for common diesel fuel is C12H23, ranging approximately from C10H20 to C15H28.

Unlike petrol, the flash point of a diesel fuel has no relation to its performance in an engine nor to its auto ignition qualities.

Automotive diesel fuel is covered in the European Union by standard EN 590.

Once the water inside the Diesel fuel tank has started to freeze, gelling is more likely to occur.