Cars now suffering from Diesel Bug?

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VicMallows

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Surprise,Surprise. Today's You-and-Yours (Radio 4) had a feature on blocked diesel filters in cars. Apparently garages were blaming 'waxing because some filling stations are not stocking winter diesel yet'. An AA spokesman sensibly commented that temperatures have not yet been low enough anywhere in UK for waxing to be an issue but offered no other explanation. No mention of 'Diesel Bug' and bio-ethanol until numerous people emailed in! (Boat owners? :p)

Poor research by BBC .... or deliberate pot stirring?
 
VicMallows said:
Surprise,Surprise. Today's You-and-Yours (Radio 4) had a feature on blocked diesel filters in cars. Apparently garages were blaming 'waxing because some filling stations are not stocking winter diesel yet'. An AA spokesman sensibly commented that temperatures have not yet been low enough anywhere in UK for waxing to be an issue but offered no other explanation. No mention of 'Diesel Bug' and bio-ethanol until numerous people emailed in! (Boat owners? :p)
Poor research by BBC .... or deliberate pot stirring?
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IMO could turn out to be good for us. The car and oil industry will spend millions to solve this if it turns out to be true and we can benefit for a change :-)
 
Yes, my Land Rover , (which I use when we have too much snow and ice) had its filter blocked twice with black jell staff as a result of diesel bug which sets like jell when the temperature drops below about 7 degrees C. The best solution is to add a fraction of petrol into the diesel which acts like poison and kills the diesel organic bugs and stops them from reappearing.
 
CAPTAIN FANTASTIC said:
Yes, my Land Rover , (which I use when we have too much snow and ice) had its filter blocked twice with black jell staff as a result of diesel bug which sets like jell when the temperature drops below about 7 degrees C. The best solution is to add a fraction of petrol into the diesel which acts like poison and kills the diesel organic bugs and stops them from reappearing.
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7 Celsius??? that's hot!!! and rarely seen (just S of Stonehaven) between mid November and mid April. I have never resorted to adding petrol yet, despite using diesel since about 2001. I think if you have plenty of fuel through the system, and are using the vehicle it is entirely less of an issue. Leave it un used for weeks - well you might have some problems. So I haven't seen bug -and don't want to either, but the introduction of bio into diesel is a concern. And more so in boats where fuel lies about for longer.

Graeme
 
in the handbook for my old mercedes 406 d van----add 10% petrol to diesel in very cold weather----did for 3 months ---norwegian winter----regards lenten ------ps thats what i did----not recommnding it
 
Surely the "bug" only lives at the interface between water and the hydrocarbon "food", So, where is the water coming from in these car fuel tanks ?

For once, I feel smug. having a thirsty V6 petrol powered car and an even more thirsty V8 petrol powered boat. no signs of any bugs, they clearly don't regard petrol as food.
 
temptress said:
IMO could turn out to be good for us. The car and oil industry will spend millions to solve this if it turns out to be true and we can benefit for a change :-)
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Aye, after the oil cpmpanies hike the basic cost of the fuel to recover the $Billions they spend on fixing the problem.
GrahamHR said:
Surely the "bug" only lives at the interface between water and the hydrocarbon "food", So, where is the water coming from in these car fuel tanks ?
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Condensation and from the fuel itself every time you top off the tank.
 
richardabeattie said:
You add a "fraction" of petrol to a tank of diesel and it kills the bugs? Is this right? Sounds too good to be true. What's a fraction?
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I was given to understand by a lorry driving removal van friend, that it is best restricted to 1 gal in 50, so about 2% of a tank of diesel. Any more and you could get problems significantly worse than diesel bug. I'm not sure the idea was to kill diesel bug though, more likely to help the viscosity in cold weather. Another lorry drivers trick is to set fire to an oily rag placed under the diesel tank to heat it up when it gets waxy. I guess you would have to be a real luny to try that in your boat though. In Canada they leave tractors running on idle all winter to keep the shed, (and therefore the tank), warm.

Regards
 
From Oldbilbo's wiki link ..... Hydrocarbon Utilising Microorganisms ...... colloquially known as HUM bugs.

Very good.
 
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GrahamHR said:
Surely the "bug" only lives at the interface between water and the hydrocarbon "food", So, where is the water coming from in these car fuel tanks ?

For once, I feel smug. having a thirsty V6 petrol powered car and an even more thirsty V8 petrol powered boat. no signs of any bugs, they clearly don't regard petrol as food.
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U
Naaah! It's just that the petrol doesn't last long enough for the bug to grow! :) ( I'm the same with a 5l V8 car )
 
reeac said:
Hasn't anyone warned them about glazed bores?
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Running at tickover once the engine is warm almost certainly has no effect at all so far as glazing is concerned. It's running at low revs from cold that causes the problem, when exhaust products in gaseous form condense on the bores. There is insufficient gas flow to blow them away on tickover, so the condensed stuff evaporates and forms a hard layer.
 
Glazed Bores

Thanks for that - finally a comprehensible explanation. As so often happens the phenomenon gets exaggerated to the extent that people state firmly that you MUST run your engine near max. revs. or you'll get into dire trouble.
 
GrahamHR said:
For once, I feel smug. having a thirsty V6 petrol powered car and an even more thirsty V8 petrol powered boat. no signs of any bugs, they clearly don't regard petrol as food.
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That's OK as long as you keep using them both regularly.
But petrol these days only has a useful life of about 2 months before it goes off, by which I mean it degrades and starts turning to jelly.
As with diesel, modern petrol also has bioethanol added, so it's also become hygroscopic, which is a total PITA for all owners of classic cars because of the consequent corrosion caused to the bottom of petrol tanks. (Not a problem in modern cars with plastic tanks).

Diesel has a much longer shelf life than petrol, but is prone to getting the bug. Swings and roundabouts...

Edit: I suspect the cause of the problems in the OP's post is bug growing in diesel cars whose owners use them infrequently.
No need to panic for the everyday driver; but the occasional once-a-week-down-to-the-shops-and-back driver I would deem at high risk, just as much as a boat owner.
Bug risk is as much about fuel turnover as anything else.
 
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lenten said:
in the handbook for my old mercedes 406 d van----add 10% petrol to diesel in very cold weather----did for 3 months ---norwegian winter----regards lenten ------ps thats what i did----not recommnding it
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Alot of people do this in north of Sweden,because it is easyer to start when the temperature is very low.
Nothing to do with killing dieselbug,as far as I know.
 
Seems no has mentioned the fact that the return line to the tank in diesel engines returns hot fuel, condendate forms as the fuel cools providing the water for the dreaded bug to breed in.

Frequent use should in theory should heat up any water and it should be able to escape or be trapped in a water trap.

I wonder if adding a splash of Acetone would help, it's water soluble and apparently reduces the surface tension in diesel.

I have also heard that trucks put moth balls in the fuel tank to keep the bug at bay.

Good luck and fair winds. :)
 
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