diesel fuel question

The 2013 and above CTD are designed to use B 20 The years I believe 2007 thru 2012 pollution equipment EGR etc are designed to run on no more then B5. I sent an email to Ram and they replied with a well written response. In short it stated that anything above B5 will damage my fuel delivery system ie: injectors etc. and they will not honor the warranty. The older diesels can use the higher bio diesel. The politicians that mandate the bio diesel limit rules don't care about your issues only the contributions from the bio and ethanol industry. One of the benefits of having a 60 gal RDS aux. tank is that it gives me 95 gallons of fuel and I can fill up with non bio and travel thru the states that only allow it.

Chrysler says the new VM 3.0 liter diesels in the Ram and Grand Cherokees are OK with B20 although oil changes need to be more frequent.

deltabravo wrote:
My 09 Duramax recommends no more than 5% bio, so I stick to that guideline. If a station I pull in to says they have a higher than 5% mix, I go elsewhere.

To each his own, and YMMV. Do be aware that several states, among them MN, IA, TX, OR, mandate biodiesel blends in the 2-5% range. Others, IL being the one I know about, have set up the taxes to encourage 11% so strongly that anything else is almost impossible to find. So there are many states where you'll find no other option on this score.

The VW forums lit up with concern when IL first went 11%, and VW's much publicized response was that residents of that state need not worry, VW would continue to sell diesels there and cover warranty issues. This suggests to me they weren't all that concerned with the higher concentration, in spite of sticking with the 5% max for the rest of the country.

Finally, I' d like to point out that out of spec (aka "bad") fuel is a problem with all fuels. Get a tankful of bad go-juice, whether gasoline, diesel, biodiesel, gasahol, or fruit punch, and trouble will ensue. Algae can be a problem in petrodiesel, too, if there is water in the tank, it is just more likely in biodiesel because that fuel does attract water more readily. In either case, trouble comes from poor maintenance of the facilities.

So at the risk of repeating myself, YMMV, and in the end put the fuel you prefer in your truck; it is YOUR truck.

My 09 Duramax recommends no more than 5% bio, so I stick to that guideline. If a station I pull in to says they have a higher than 5% mix, I go elsewhere.

Biodiesel tends to attract and hold more water than straight diesel. So it's logical that it can be more conducive to growing microbes.

mpierce wrote:

Led 67 wrote:
OK my experience with biodiesel that went bad...Algea and trust me what a freakin nightmare from hell that one was. Complete system flush including disassembly of the fuel processor, flush and steam tanks and primary fuel lines, 2 months of fuel treatment with algeacide to kill any remaining algea.
Yeah biodiesel is good for your engine until it blooms and then you are in trouble. So please tell me who won that paycheck.

And, the EXACT same thing has been happening for DECADES with 100% Diesel, before bio even existed. Have you stopped using 100% diesel too?

Really...That is strange considering my Dad has been driving since 1956 and his Uncle Jhonny before that. Yes they had diesels back then just not as many and they never had a problem and the people that I have known through the years likewise had no problem until the biodiesel showed up. So you wanna try again

Unless it is B20 it does not have to be labeled at the pumps so no one really knows what they are getting. The B20 is what will cause the problems with gelling and the problems are not covered by your warranty. I will not put B20 in my truck though fortunately there is not a lot of it on the market out in the west.

gmcsmoke wrote:
that's why I have a rolling chem lab in the bed of my truck. I extract a sample from the pump test the WIF content, biodiesel and cetane value. this test typically takes about 30 minutes to complete but if it doesn't meet my rigid standards I move to the next station. Yeah it takes me the better part of the day to fill up but at least I know I'm getting top quality fuel.

Now that is funny! :B

iawoody2 wrote:
Corn is for gasoline. Soybeans are for bio diesel.

Even after you said that, some guys are still mixing it up. Sugar cane is only for gas/alcohol too. I don't think corn has enough oil to warrant replacement/supplement of diesel, could be wrong.

On the bright side, I recently read where Texaco has been working on multifuel military engines for quite a while (since the '70's). Another white paper said that it might be possible to burn gas-or-diesel in future consumer multifuel engines. Whatever is cheap. All this tech is just starting to show up outside the lab, but the crux was that the non-hybrid internal combustion engine wasn't anywheres near done competing with electricity. One would think heavy towing may demand it indefinately anyway.

Wes
...

Exactly... Stick to name brand stations whether ULSD or BIO and 99.999999999999% of the time you are going to be fine assuming your filtering is adequate.

Some people are way to anal about this stuff. And I bet they don't even pay half the attention to what they put in their own body. LOL

I am not going out of my way to buy fuel, either locally or while on the road. To much trouble and a lot of extra miles. It has worked for 10+ years and 162+k miles.