Heating oil

Anyone run it in their old diesels. Most my tractors sit and I think this new diesel looses it's umph! Also the governor is acting up on 3 of them. I think that may be caused from sitting to much but not sure. The throttle just doesn't seem the same and two of them shut down if I return the to low. They didn't do this about a year ago. Also the fuel in one seems to get cloudy in the sediment bowl. I just drain it out again and planning to start with new fuel. I hate to top them off as I probably won't use 10 gallons in a year. Any thoughts?

One of the problems with modern diesel is
the lack of sulphur and biodiesel content
allow a certain bacteria (often called
the 'diesel bug') to grow. I'd read about
it for years, but never really paid it
much attention until I went to fire up an
old Massey 555 that had been sitting for
a year or so. Everything from the tank
through sediment bowl and up to the I
ejection pump was full of this awful
green slime, which is a byproduct of the
bacteria. The remainjing diesel was
cloudy, murky, and when I used it as a
fire starter in the burn barrel I could
barely get it to catch.

The bacteria feast on the hydrocarbons in
diesel, and take away it's potency. That
could very well be the case with yours,
though luckily it doesn't sound too far
advanced (probably no slime forming yet).
You can buy an additive (I think called
'Biobor JF') to kill the bacteria and
prevent it from growing if the fuel's
going to sit.

I've run heating oil in diesels: My
mother's cousin converted a house to
propane and had a nearly full tank of
heating oil to get rid of. Ran just fine.
Whether it's better in storage than
regular diesel, I'm not sure.

thanks, I run a few different additives. Power services or stanadyne. It is getting fuel as it's blowing smoke. Just doesn't fire like it did before and throttle just seems to make move very free.

Some states here in the Northeast are transitioning to low-sulfur
heating oil.

I'm wondering if they already have here. I don't know if there is difference. Probably comes from the same place.

What do you call heating oil?

Gas oil or kerosene? The latter will not be apprpriate.

Heating oil they use here is diesel. Just wonder if it has higher super and less bio.

I put fresh fuel in the super 88 without any change so I got look around and bumped the shut off cable a few times and it nearly died. It wasn't hooked properly with a chain so I cut it loose. Runs like a raped ape again. Now I need to drag the super 77 out and dig into the steering box then check out the fuel. Still not sure how that cable tightened up. Fix one prob and create another

In my area of North Central Wis if you order Heating oil, or #2 Diesel it will be dyed and come out of same tank on truck. it will
also be same price. Our local rural church switched our old fuel oil furnaces to LP. I pumped out the old fuel and dumped it in my
diesel tank at home. I have ran it in my JD 455 lawnmower/snowblower with no issues. I also have several diesel Oliver and White
diesel tractors that all run fine with normal fuel filter changes. Steve.

Ollie,. These guys do not know much about
diesel. #2 diesel and #2 fuel oil are 2
completely different fuels. I spent 13
years owning a farm fuel business, went to
every class on fuels that I could find.
#2 diesel has additives in it to make it
burn clean, less smoke. The cetane in #2
diesel is far higher than #2 fuel oil.
These are just a couple of differences.
There are far more. You should be using a
premium #2 fuel in your farm tractors.
Most truck stop fuel is at the far lower
end of premium #2 fuel. Premium #2 fuel
has additives in to to keep it fresh while
in storage. It should easily keep up to a
year or more. Truck stop fuel is made to
be used almost immediately. I used to
have a lab that would test fuel, I sent
many samples of competitors fuel in for
testing. It's been over 32 years since I
sent in fuel, the lab I used has been
closed for years. Perhaps you can find
someone locally.

Thank you for the good explanation. Unfortunately I don't know where to get good farm diesel around here. I know people that get "farm diesel" from suppliers but I don't know if there is a real difference out here.

I just buy red (dyed/farm/ag/whatever) diesel and run Stanadyne Lubricity formula. I save on the tax but it's probably a wash given the Stanadyne. I just assume the red diesel is the same as the on road fuel and lacks the lubrication qualities needed by our older equipment.

I use stanadyne or power services. Use to use atf but think it has to many additives now. A friend used marvels in his old trucks..

I literally had this conversation with my fuel delivery guy on Thursday when he was here. On road and off road, and heating oil(through them) all comes out of the same tank. The only difference is the dye for tax purposes. Not saying that it's this way everywhere, but at least with this company it is. I've run 15 year old diesel in some things without any issues, but I wouldn't put it in a common rail system, and would most certainly inspect it for ANY signs of algae or water in it, maybe even put a biocide algae treatment in it as a precaution(and have a spare set of filters on hand).

My friend use to deliver heating oil. I'm pretty sure it was just off-road diesel. I bought heating oil years ago from someone switching to electric heat. Ran it in my power stroke no problem. That may have been prior to bio diesel or near the very beginning.