Kerosene for heating oil

General Questions
#1

Hi everyone, I know that there are a few minor differences between home heating oil, diesel and k1, but my question is more specific than just if I can use them. I’ve had 20 gallons of k1 in my garage since 2008. It’s been kept in blue gas containers the whole time but the garage gets very cold in winter, and pretty hot in the summer. I’ve run out of oil before and have used diesel to get me by and as bad luck would have it, I’ve just done it again.

Here’s the deal. I had 5 gallons of diesel in the garage that I just poured in to get it running for the night. I’m buying oil now, but it won’t be delivered till wednesday, maybe Tuesday.

  1. Is that k1 still good to burn? I didn’t put any stabilizer in it or anything.
  2. Is it ok to add to the diesel I just put in?

My house was built in 1925 and the furnace is the old “snowman” type. Don’t know if that makes any difference.

Thanks in a chance for any help!

#2

I would use it. Kerosene is just a higher grade Diesel fuel.
As for stabilizer, well there are anti gel additives for diesel but stabilizers are generally for gasoline.
I just ran out of fuel oil last week and took the 5gal can up to the truck stop and restarted, and i have a habit of doing that at least once every winter.
As long as you have stored the fuel i might be very careful and not stir it up and not pour in very bit just so as to get a lok at what kind of sediment there is in the bottom of the can. If there is a lot of particulate maybe a filter change in the near future would be in order.

#3

You should be okay with the exception of possible sediment accumulation in the oid fuel but the only potential harm I can imagine might be a clogged furnace injection nozzle. If that happens, the furnace should shut down but the nozzle is easily replaceable.

#4

I’ve used k1 exclusively one winter mainly because I was mad at my oil company for always delivering during a price spike. The stuff was almost clear, just the smallest hint of red. No issues. And actually I did save quite a bit of money, but it was a royal PITA doing it that way.

#5

Many, many years ago, the company I worked for was leasing tractors to a big private hauler…and had a shop just off site where the tractors were maintained. During the winter, to heat the maintenance buliding, we drained off a gallon or two of diesel from each truck passing through the shop and dumped it into the fuel oil tank. We also dumped filtered used engine oil into the tank, as well. Seemed to work just fine.

Many years later I did business with a fellow in NW PA who took in used oil and did some amount of truck maintenance as well. He always used the filtered used oil in his boiler, claiming it needed no dilution with diesel to burn well, but sometimes had to be relit with diesel to get the temperature up. I think he had a preheater for the oil.

#6

Used to be, but is that still the case? Around here, Kerosene has higher levels of Sulpher than Diesel fuel. If you use Kerosene in your truck, the sulpher forms sulphuric acid, which corrodes out your engine and exhaust system. Diesel truck engines are a lot pickier than they used to be.

#7

Yes, I totally didn’t think about the low sulfur engines, actually what was in my mind at the time of the post was the Military Multi-fuel trucks.
When we picked up a fuel tanker from the surplus despot to convert into a Fire Department Water Tender there was still a lot of Aviation jet fuel that we had to drain before leaving and when we asked what they would use that fuel in were told they had a couple diesel tractors that burned it just fine.

#8

Best not to take any risk .

Kerosene has as strong smell, it lets off a gas…

Do not use a kerosene in an oil burner because it may emit gases and explode.
In the past, there were safety tests published in newspapers
“Acme Pty Ltd is selling Kerosene that ignites at a low temperature” … :frowning:

(and the "Mr Smith was using cazoline to replace kerosene, and he now has third degree burns to 70% of his body. " )

You could get rid of kerosene by diluting the diesel/oil with it.