Bad diesel fuel cost!!!

Last week I posted about how we had been delivered a bad batch of fuel. I still do not know with 100% certainty what was in the diesel fuel. It looked like rust would in gas. It will settle to the bottom. If shook up it will float for a time. It feels like tar between your fingers. It would plug filters but some would go through them. The larger deposits I found in the filters would not dissolve in any petroleum product. Gas would not cut it. Mineral spirits would not. Paint thinner would. Muriatic acid will cut it. It is not the algae that will grow in diesel fuel.

The fuel guys says they think it is something left from the refinery. They got it through the pipe line coming to here.

I have sent a sample to an independent lab for results.

We have over 200 man hours of labor, so far, in clean up and repairs. Close to $1500 in parts cost so far. Looks like one injection pump may have gotten it into it. JD 4020 with the old style pleated cartridge filters, had one tear and allow the gunk go right to the injection pump. The only good thing is that pump I can clean and repair myself. Injectors will need replacing.

The main fuel tank I replaced with a new one. The old one the fuel company pumped it dry and paid me for the cost of the new tank.

I gave them a bill for the labor and parts Friday. I got a check hand delivered today. I told him that I may still have more cost after I tear into the injection pump. He said to just let him know. He has been 100% great on this. He has my future business even though he delivered the fuel. He just picked it up at the tank farm. There are many companies shipping out of there so any of them could have had it happen to them.

We did put a double filter setup on the tank pump. They are in series. The second is real fine. I wonder if it will restrict flow soon??? I have tried real fine filters on the tank before and they would only work a short time at full flow.

I'm curious if you always buy all of your fuel from the same company. I suspect that you do or they would be trying to blame another fuel delivery.

I have boughten all the fuel for the last two years from this same company. I still get quotes from several companies but this one has been either the cheapest or equal the last few years.

The delivery guy is terrific. He is the main reason we have stayed too. When we are running away from the home farm he will usually stop in the evenings and fuel everything up. We have had to haul very little fuel in the pickup tanks the last few years.

Sounds like a good company to stay with. I know some farmers that buy from questionable sources now and then, such as old fuel that has been stored for a long time. With their repairs to fuel systems, they don't come out ahead and nobody will stand behind a load as there are too many haulers involved.

The residue is like clay based mud?? Has a chemical more than fuel smell? If so it is the "crap/chemicals" they mix with unleaded gas to make it EPA compliant. The only way to protect yourself is to install Bag filters that the supplier must pump the product though before it goes into your tank. Bottom line - someone isn"t cleaning the pipeline, tank, hauler out as they should between products. Been there, done that. Taking care / monitoring an airfield fuel farm for 25+ years. You need to "white bucket" inspect every load/tanker compartment of fuel before it is unloaded. Along with a specific gravity test of the fuel.

_steve

We have not found that Yet but we did have a gelling problem that we have not had since 1978 . and i am fluffing that one off due to the fact that the last load of on farm fuel we got was back in late Sept or early Oct.

We got fuel with fertilizer in it one time it had a fertilizer smell would almost burn your eyes . They move it in the same pipeline with water in between and they didn't get it flushed right ours was put in the furnace tank and we had to replace the tank and pump.

oh and it was sticky and gritty.

JD do you know which terminal that load would have been loaded? I hope it was not Coralville.

Coralville is where my fuel supplier loads.

Gary

Have not heard of getting bad fuel since the 70's when supplies were short.

Supplies of #1 have been short here in eastern Iowa. As well as short supplies of LP.

Gary

I'm surprised you don't have a filter(s) on your pump a good filter would have caught the stuff you are talking about.Also at the concrete company I worked at we filtered fuel as it was going into the storage tank as well as when it came out and we kept of sample of fuel each time it was delivered in case we had a problem.

Also seems like the practice of having them fill directly into your tractors needs to change too.

Put it in a big tank first and let it settle and have a drain on that tank too. Then only pump it into your tractors thru filters. It will surly slow things down ,but then how slow was it when they were all stopped up ?

We had the regular single filter setup. Those filters DID not catch this stuff.

IT came out of Dubuque. The Williams Pipeline terminal first. Then McGrew's distribution tanks at Key West.

Could also be algae; I think that they are doing research at ASU that they are testing algae to produce an alternate fuel. I think algae will grow in Diesel fuel, but not gasoline.

I had a big black blob of algae grow in the windshield wiper fluid, so I switched to All-Season fluid that the stores here are not longer selling. They tell me that it has been recalled off of the market.

I now use the summer blend of windshield washer fluid and dump some rubbing alcohol in it to prevent the algae from growing.

Mike this problem came from fuel that was dumped into the tank at the farm. Then we pumped it through the normal single fuel filter that we have always had.

When we are combining your looking at maybe 500 gallons of fuel each day. So that is a lot of hauling in pickup tanks.

I have had more troubles in the past form the small truck tanks than the main fuel tank.

JD,

Who is your supplier?

Nice to know good people in the area that take care of things.

At least they're working with you on it... I've gotten to like using the little plastic inline suction filters between the tank and the lift pump as long as you don't have a gravity system. They usually plug easily enough to catch most stuff and the engine takes the staggers... so you just swap the filter out and continue on without having the change as many main filters... Alcohol is also an sob for carrying just about anything through a system in suspension. I got a slug of water in one machine here... it's got an inline suction, two primary filters on the high side of the lift pump AND a return inline filter and it's got a mess in each one.... the water seems to travel through with the alcohol...

I'm trying to think of the name of the compound you have in yours.... it seems like it's probably a varnish that builds up in storage tanks, etc. Regardless, not good stuff.

Rod

Wow, we've bought from te same place since the mid to late 1960s. Farm coops are a lot stronger here in the upper Midwest than other places?

In that time, we have had 3 truck drivers delivering here, the first two retired from the job, the third one is younger than me so might be the last for me.

Paul