Thread: Price of kerosine

Can buy bulk kero at gino's auto repairs where i work. $2.99.99L. Cheaper than bunnings or stratco....lol. just saying.

Cheers Rod

I wonder if there's a way to source small quantities of kero from the aviation industry- it is definitely not obsolete there.

Originally Posted by POD

I wonder if there's a way to source small quantities of kero from the aviation industry- it is definitely not obsolete there.

It’s not quite pure Kero though - Avtur has additives IIRC

I used to get a trailer load of blue kero out of shell at Clyde occasionally, most of the time the kero was off line so I’d load Jet A1 then the storeman would tip in a bit of blue dye in each compartment.This was 30 years ago but I doubt Jet A1 has changed much.

I have an American 'flying' magazine from June 1945, there is an article that predicts that a cheaper jet fuel than kerosene will soon be found so that private jet aircraft will become a very economical form of transport...
There are additives to lower the freezing point, don't know what effect they would have on a tilley lamp or kero stove.

Originally Posted by POD

I have an American 'flying' magazine from June 1945, there is an article that predicts that a cheaper jet fuel than kerosene will soon be found so that private jet aircraft will become a very economical form of transport...
There are additives to lower the freezing point, don't know what effect they would have on a tilley lamp or kero stove.

I suspect that rather than additives, it is simply a tighter specification, with less wax, similar to summer/winter diesel.

Originally Posted by JDNSW

I suspect that rather than additives, it is simply a tighter specification, with less wax, similar to summer/winter diesel.

There are several additives for A1

Antioxidants
Anti static agents
Corrosion inhibitors
FSII agents
Biocides either Kathon FP1.5 Microbiocide or Biobor JF
And
N,N’-disalicylidene 1,2-propanediamine

Hardly a basic Kero!

It is interesting to look at the beginning of the present petroleum industry. While the popular idea is that it started with Drake's well in Pennsylvania in 1859, in fact, that well was only feasible because the industry already existed - largely as a result of the work of James Young in England in 1847. He found a use for oil that was seeping into a colliery (and being a nuisance). Distilled, it produced a lamp oil, which the English call paraffin, but most others call kerosine (or kerosene, which my spell checker prefers!). This rapidly increased in demand as a replacement for whale oil, which had been the lighting oil of choice in a rapidly industrialising England. Kerosine was a lot cheaper than whale oil. Lamps that burnt it efficiently were invented about the same time.

This demand stimulated the Pennsylvanian oil boom about a decade later, and the plummeting price of crude that resulted meant that kerosine became really cheap. Kerosine remained the major product of the petroleum industry worldwide until not long before the start of WW1, when the increase in numbers of motor vehicles led to petrol production overtaking kerosine. As noted earlier in this thread, the use of kerosine for lighting, heating and cooking in this country has been almost completely displaced by LPG and efficient electric lighting, but in some parts of the world it remains a major item of commerce.

As far as additives being a defining difference between kerosine and Avtur :-

"The DEF STAN 91-91 (UK) and ASTM D1655 (international) specifications allow for certain additives to be added to jet fuel".

These are not required, but are often added, mainly to deal with trace contaminants (including bugs) or to inhibit icing from suspended water (which is virtually impossible to completely remove), or to provide antistatic properties.