> >
> > I do not know the specifications for the
> Multifuels feeding but I'll bet
> > someone in the group is very knowlegable! I seem
> to remember,I believe
> > it was Richard Notton (sp?) giving a wonderful
> explication of gasolene
> > standards during WWII involving a tanker full of
> gasolene and the
> > tankers name got incorporated into the name of the
> standardised fuel
> > etc, etc.
> >
> Well, thanks for the kind credit, it was really only
> an illustration of the
> problems specifying gas/petrol by octane rating
> alone.
>
> Dr. Rudolf Diesel never had diesel fuel as we know
> it in mind when he made
> the first CI engine, he was striving for two things,
> an efficient engine
> running on the ideal heat cycle theorised by Sadi
> Carnot and the use of an
> embarrassingly abundant waste product of the time -
> coal dust.
>
> Notwithstanding the flawed patents Dr. Diesel took
> out, quite obviously the
> perfect engine could not be made, indeed his first
> attempts would give
> insufficient power to even overcome their own
> friction. Ultimately his
> first practical engine was so far removed from the
> precepts of the initial
> patent that he was heavily criticised and felt
> hounded for the rest of his
> life.
>
> These early diesels used HP air from a compressor to
> effect the injection
> and solid injection as we now know it didn't come
> about until 1919 due to
> the work of Prosper L'Orange working then for Carl
> Benz, the first
> production engine with solid injection was on sale
> in 1920 and a diesel
> powered truck followed in 1924.
>
> Air injection has the advantage of allowing powdered
> solids to be injected
> although Dr.Diesel soon found out the ash left from
> coal dust injection was
> seriously unfriendly to pistons and bores, whilst
> almost any combustible
> fluid could be used for the diesel engine some
> surprising solids/powders
> will work too.
>
> There is no doubt that most oils, vegetable or
> mineral will work with due
> allowance and adjustment, indeed the truly gigantean
> cathedral (they are
> that big) diesels in super tankers producing
> typically 25,000 shp often use
> the crude oil cargo they are carrying, Kuwait crude
> is like candle wax at
> room temperature and needs heating to 100C just to
> be pumpable.
>
> Ordinary flour, air injected, will diesel quite
> happily, indeed the
> anti-ignition precautions in a flour mill are
> similar to deep mining
> operations. Make a small cloud of flour dust and
> hold your Zippo to it and
> see what happens when each speck has enough air
> around it to burn, beware of
> a goodly woomph though.
>
> Reputedly South Africa largely ran on sunflower oil
> during the years of
> anti-apartheid trade embargo, a prolific plant in
> their climate. A common
> rain forest tree, the Codiaba Ferra (or something
> like that as Latin names
> are beyond me) produces refined diesel oil when
> tapped off like a rubber
> tree.
>
> The upside is that CI engine fuel will never run
> out, simply grow it as a
> crop and indeed most combustible oils with due
> design will operate a diesel
> engine, just need to remember the devices we see
> today are very highly
> developed for a single specific fuel type.
>
> Richard
> Southampton - England
++++++++++
Its really more a matter of building an engine to run
on what fuel is available.
Do a search on "sour gas engines" and see what is done
to use natural gas with a high hydrogen sulfide
content to keep it from ruining the engine.
These are used in remote areas where to run
generators, etc. on the gas right from the well head.
Joe
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This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Sun Sep 02 2001 - 11:15:38 PDT