Discussion
TBH unless there was a considerable content of red I doubt they could do anything.
Im not a chemist, but personally I dont believe that using it once, stains/marks the tank forever.
generally speaking, if you are than unsure, keep all receipts for legal fuel purchased. That way you have considerable proof you are being legit.
Im not a chemist, but personally I dont believe that using it once, stains/marks the tank forever.
generally speaking, if you are than unsure, keep all receipts for legal fuel purchased. That way you have considerable proof you are being legit.
IOLAIRE said:
What would be the most expensive piece of kit with a diesel engine? - probably the earth moving plant on road construction sites etc. What fuel does this run on - RED. Do you think the operators would take a chance of engine failure - thought not.
Anyone know what fuel railway locomotives run on?
Steve
Steve,
loco engines run on heavy oil, the same that is found in large marine engines that power ships.
Well, it depends on how big the ship engine in question is... generally, the larger the engine, the heavier the oil it runs on. Certainly in the early days of railway dieselisation, [some of] the engines used were originally intended for marine applications - which caused a certain amount of trouble because the power demand of a locomotive is much more variable than that of a ship, and the constant cycling gave rise to engine failures. The fuel for these engines is little if any heavier than "ordinary" diesel. Modern locomotive engines are mostly smaller and higher revving, and run on ordinary diesel.
The heavy ship fuel stuff is cheaper, and one of the objectives of the Great Western's gas turbine locomotive experiment was to run on this stuff. Accordingly the Brown-Boveri gas turbine loco was intended to start on ordinary diesel but run on the heavy ship fuel stuff. Unfortunately it wasn't very successful as running on the heavy stuff rapidly shagged the combustion chamber (which was a sort of dustbin thing made of sheet steel) - after around 100 hours running the combustion chamber looked as if it had been attacked by a team of gorillas with sledgehammers. (I must confess I'm not entirely clear why this happened.) This was one reason why the experiment was abandoned.
Hi I stumbled across this thread whilst searching for a way to remove the "red" colour from red diesel as I know where to get it but did not want to get into trouble if my tank was "dipped". i have learnt from all you helpfull peep's that it is not worth using "red" but instead you are better of using "heating oil". all i gotta do now is find somewhere that sells it. !! thanks for all your helpful comments. another thing is, in regards to claiming that if you get caught with red and showing bonafide "white diesel" reciepts if you get caught - on the latest logbooks - when you buy a new car - it asks you to declare the present milage. you dont have to do this but there are no guarantees that the previous owner did not do this for you. so if you milage is out of proportion to the reciepts that you have to show - then you are going to get shafted! - so if you are going to use red - and come up with some lame excuse if you get caught - then you better not have the vehicle registered in your own name. In fact the only way you are going to get away with it is if you dont register the vehicle in your name and have a insurance policy that allows you to use any vehicle. you could then say the vehicle was borrowed - and claim you were unaware. proof is in the pudding - this is what my mate does! lol
Govt departments don't do evasion by legal doodlings, if you are caught using red, they will shag you properly and that's that. If you're loaded, you can keep £5K for when you do get caught and just say "Yep, I was playing the game and I lost", of course, you might have made £5K savings before you get caught. It is a lottery though.
stevieturbo said:So, a bit of maths.
As far as my locality is concerned, for private motorists, first offence is usually a £500 spot fine.
If you are a commercial user, your in a spot of bother.
Diesel is 90p/litre now, of which 75% is tax (rough figures.) This therefore is 67p tax per litre.
£500/0.67 = 740.7 litres. (i.e. £500 fine is equivalent to tax on 740.7 litres of derv.)
Assume 42mpg, which makes 31,111 miles.
So, if you get stopped and fined less often then once every 31k miles, you are quids in.
That's about once every 3 years, or less.
Diesel drivers, how often do you get stopped and tested?
Oli.
love machine said:
Govt departments don't do evasion by legal doodlings, if you are caught using red, they will shag you properly and that's that. If you're loaded, you can keep £5K for when you do get caught and just say "Yep, I was playing the game and I lost", of course, you might have made £5K savings before you get caught. It is a lottery though.
Out of all the govt depts Customs & Excise are the ones you don't want to annoy. They have the power to rip your house apart on a tip off & not have to recompense for damage
Seeing as diesel is so expensive, you can get diesel dye to stop it getting stolen from your car (clear diesel) or tractor (red diesel).
Adding the dye turns both diesel, red or clear, to a blue colour.
Just thought I'd chuck that one in!
www.dervdye.com/
Adding the dye turns both diesel, red or clear, to a blue colour.
Just thought I'd chuck that one in!
www.dervdye.com/
[quote=gallen (bph)]www.dervdye.com/[/quote]I do like the FAQ page on that site!
One question. "Does your product dye red diesel?"
One answer. "Yes, but it's illegal."
Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
OLi.
One question. "Does your product dye red diesel?"
One answer. "Yes, but it's illegal."
Are you thinking what I'm thinking?
OLi.
Just a point of interest, (great thread BTW) we use heating oil at work and it's red......dunno if the price is any different compared to clear heating oil, if indeed you can still buy it.I know one thing, if my boss could get it any cheaper, he would, don't you worry.
Maybe the authorities got wise to folk using clear heating oil, and now dye the lot red......anyone know?
Maybe the authorities got wise to folk using clear heating oil, and now dye the lot red......anyone know?
An update is that I know of someone who ran their modern diesel on red for many, many miles with no ill effects at all, was seen filling their car with red diesel, reported to HMRC who paid a visit. The fine was £500 payable immediately or the car would be confiscated and an additional payment on the estimated lost duty that should have been paid.
Mind if I add something here?
First off, many years ago when in the employ of Her Maj, we used to have little 'competitions' while at sea. Long boring trips and all that, it heled pass the time. Before a certain trip, the decided competition was to see if any of us could turn red derv white. Having heard all the 'strain it through a gas mask' and 'cat litter' rumours, we took appropriate kit away with us, thinking we'd win, and tried all that. Guess what.
None of it works. I say that again; CAT LITTER, ACTIVATED CHARCOAL AND ALL THE OLD WIFE TALE B0LL0X DOESN'T BLOODY WORK.
All those who have 'mates' who have tried all that boll0x and claim to have had a result, slap your mate. Someones telling lies, so lets just leave it at that. He did NOT get a result with cat litter.
The only way to get it out was figured by one chap on board who had a serious affliction in his life called chemistry. He did a degree in Chemistry, and also pursued it as a hobby. He was quite mad, frankly. Then again, his job was working out decay products from the reactor, so it kinda went with the territory. He worked it out, and it was no easy task. As been alluded to on here, many pages before, it's serious chemicals you need. You do not want to be trying that at home.
Next, this thing about it being the same as white diesel. No it bloody isn't. I dont give a monkeys how many gazillion lites of it anyone has sold, it's IS different. We had a certain publication on board, called the MOD Fuel and Oils book, which gave a chemical breakdown (usually into 2 pages worth) of all the fuels we would ever come into contact with. Red is very different from normal, white diesel, most specifically in sulphur content. It's far higher in sulphur than white. As sulphur is a lubricant in Derv engines, this might also help explain why some agricultural and plant machinery lasts forever and a day. Sulphur is sh!t for the enviroment, but great for your diesel. It's also why road cars with EGR valves get clogged up right quick when run on red. Sadly, you can also smell it a mile away being burnt in a road car, so it's like a big neon sign to the Customs boyo's. Sadly for me, I used to live near a pikey council scheme, where road cars a plenty are using Red derv. The customes van was a regular visitor.
Lastly, this thing about re-dyeing it. Of course you can, but why bother? The red is still there, and Custom's can see it when they analise it in the back of the van.
End of the day, it's your choice for your road car. £200 banger, maybe. BMW 335d, err..nah.
First off, many years ago when in the employ of Her Maj, we used to have little 'competitions' while at sea. Long boring trips and all that, it heled pass the time. Before a certain trip, the decided competition was to see if any of us could turn red derv white. Having heard all the 'strain it through a gas mask' and 'cat litter' rumours, we took appropriate kit away with us, thinking we'd win, and tried all that. Guess what.
None of it works. I say that again; CAT LITTER, ACTIVATED CHARCOAL AND ALL THE OLD WIFE TALE B0LL0X DOESN'T BLOODY WORK.
All those who have 'mates' who have tried all that boll0x and claim to have had a result, slap your mate. Someones telling lies, so lets just leave it at that. He did NOT get a result with cat litter.
The only way to get it out was figured by one chap on board who had a serious affliction in his life called chemistry. He did a degree in Chemistry, and also pursued it as a hobby. He was quite mad, frankly. Then again, his job was working out decay products from the reactor, so it kinda went with the territory. He worked it out, and it was no easy task. As been alluded to on here, many pages before, it's serious chemicals you need. You do not want to be trying that at home.
Next, this thing about it being the same as white diesel. No it bloody isn't. I dont give a monkeys how many gazillion lites of it anyone has sold, it's IS different. We had a certain publication on board, called the MOD Fuel and Oils book, which gave a chemical breakdown (usually into 2 pages worth) of all the fuels we would ever come into contact with. Red is very different from normal, white diesel, most specifically in sulphur content. It's far higher in sulphur than white. As sulphur is a lubricant in Derv engines, this might also help explain why some agricultural and plant machinery lasts forever and a day. Sulphur is sh!t for the enviroment, but great for your diesel. It's also why road cars with EGR valves get clogged up right quick when run on red. Sadly, you can also smell it a mile away being burnt in a road car, so it's like a big neon sign to the Customs boyo's. Sadly for me, I used to live near a pikey council scheme, where road cars a plenty are using Red derv. The customes van was a regular visitor.
Lastly, this thing about re-dyeing it. Of course you can, but why bother? The red is still there, and Custom's can see it when they analise it in the back of the van.
End of the day, it's your choice for your road car. £200 banger, maybe. BMW 335d, err..nah.
.Just to add my two penneth worth: I currently run my Sunny diesel on a 50/50 mix of vegetable oil and diesel with no ill effects whatsoever. I change the oil very regularly, but then I do that with every car I own- usually around 3000 miles.
There is an exception to the law regarding duty and the use of vegetable oils. You may use up to 2500litres of vegetable oil in a year providing you retain receipts for reference to prove to C&E that is what you've done. How they calculate that you haven't thrown another 2500litres worth of receipts in the bin I really don't know!
Problem is, the vegetable oil trick has become common knowledge and now the oil is up to 98p/l
B*stards.
It's now as cheap for me to use Biodiesel from the manufacturer a couple of miles down the road @ 95p/l.
By the way, don't, under any circumstances try to run your modern, common rail diesel on a veggie oil mix or even neat. The higher viscosity of the vegetable oil will very quickly destroy the pump and injectors that are barely capable of running on normal diesel fuel in day to day life. A common rail diesel runs up to 600bar of fuel pressure and the extra thickness of the veggie oil will ramp that up to beyond breaking point unless you're really, really lucky!
Given that common rail pumps and injectors fail with alarming regularity anyway, why risk it?
Oh, and it does smell like a chip shop- makes me hungry every time I drive it!
There is an exception to the law regarding duty and the use of vegetable oils. You may use up to 2500litres of vegetable oil in a year providing you retain receipts for reference to prove to C&E that is what you've done. How they calculate that you haven't thrown another 2500litres worth of receipts in the bin I really don't know!
Problem is, the vegetable oil trick has become common knowledge and now the oil is up to 98p/l
B*stards.It's now as cheap for me to use Biodiesel from the manufacturer a couple of miles down the road @ 95p/l.
By the way, don't, under any circumstances try to run your modern, common rail diesel on a veggie oil mix or even neat. The higher viscosity of the vegetable oil will very quickly destroy the pump and injectors that are barely capable of running on normal diesel fuel in day to day life. A common rail diesel runs up to 600bar of fuel pressure and the extra thickness of the veggie oil will ramp that up to beyond breaking point unless you're really, really lucky!
Given that common rail pumps and injectors fail with alarming regularity anyway, why risk it?
Oh, and it does smell like a chip shop- makes me hungry every time I drive it!
My brother has a Mondeo TDCi
His mix is:
30 liters kero (parrafin)
9 liters new vegi oil (3 x 3 liters)
30 liters proper road diesel.
he has some thing like 200k miles on the clock.
TBH, there aint no running difference, and there aint no smell.
The Mondeo runs just exactly the same.
His mix is:
30 liters kero (parrafin)
9 liters new vegi oil (3 x 3 liters)
30 liters proper road diesel.
he has some thing like 200k miles on the clock.
TBH, there aint no running difference, and there aint no smell.
The Mondeo runs just exactly the same.
Edited by uk_vette on Sunday 23 March 19:35
BB-Q said:
By the way, don't, under any circumstances try to run your modern, common rail diesel on a veggie oil mix or even neat. The higher viscosity of the vegetable oil will very quickly destroy the pump and injectors that are barely capable of running on normal diesel fuel in day to day life. A common rail diesel runs up to 600bar of fuel pressure and the extra thickness of the veggie oil will ramp that up to beyond breaking point unless you're really, really lucky!
I was arguing that scenario with a diesel fitter just last night. He's apparently running 2 common rail engines on new svo without problems, a Merc Vito (Non-Turbo) Cdi 108 and a modern Range Rover.Evidently it's a simple case of "opening up" a metal reducer in the fuel line, on the pump entrance side, to allow the more viscous veg oil to flow more freely to the injectors.
He tells me he's been doing it for 6 years now, a statement corroborated by his partner. If that's so, then it also overcomes the problem of "gelling" which home produced Bio is prone to in the winter months.
His family are bulk buyers of vege oil currently at 70p a litre.
Smoke and mirrors, or a new avenue to explore?
Thoughts please, and, thanks for such an informative and interesting read.
H
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