DB—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, January 14,1984
With petroleum fuel prices rising
each year, Pennsylvania farmers
have taken a critical look at ethyl
alcohol for tractor fuel, says
James W. Garthe, Penn State
Extension agricultural engineer.
But many farmers have
discovered that most engines will
not operate with alcohol as fuel,
unless certain modifications are
made.
Most problems with alcohol as a
fuel relate to its chemical
properties. First, pure alcohol is
difficult to make. The highest
grade attainable through
distillation is 190 proof, or 95%
alcohol. Pure alcohol, 200 proof,
requries an industrial process
available only at large facilities.
Alcohol is also tricky to store,
because it is hygroscopic, meaning
alcohol absorbs water quite
HAVING
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more lime each apt
soil that tests to pH
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Blue Ball, Pa. (717) 3!
Gap, Pa. (717) 442
Energy
diets
By James W. Garthe
Penn State Ext. ag engineer
readily, often moisture from the
air.
To burn straight alcohol requires
several engine modifications,
while petroleum fuel and alcohol
mixtures also have problems.
When mixed with diesel fuel or
gasoline, alcohol will mix' with any
available water, and settle out.
This separation will result in
erratic engine performance, since
the engine will be burning alcohol
and water one minute and
petroleum fuel the next.
To bum straight alcohol in a
gasoline engine requires
modification of the carburetor and
a few other engine components.
Since alcohol requires about two
and a half times more heat to
vaporize than gasoline, the car
buretor must be warmed almost
constantly to prevent icing. A
CARLISLE - The Bush Hog
Squealer line of inexpensive
Rotary Cutters were introduced in
1982 with a single 60” model
available. Due to tremendous
customer acceptance, this line has
been expanded to five widths; 36”,
42”, 48”, 60”, and 72”.
The 315” and 42” models have
gasoline engine also requires about
one and a half times as much
alcohol to run properly. This
means the carburetor jets must be
enlarged about one and a half
times to allow greater fuel flow.
The best way to burn alcohol in a
diesel engine is to mix 100 percent
pure ethyl alcohol fuel to get a fuel
called diesohol. Diesohol is 90
percent No. 2 diesel fuel and 10
percent alcohol. This mixture
results in satisfactory engine
performance with no modifications
to the engine. Other fuel mixtures
or straight alcohol in diesel
engines require extreme
modifications and may result in
unacceptable performance.
Alcohol can and will continue to
be used as a fuel. However,
precautions must be taken to
ensure that engines are not
damaged and satisfactory per
formance is had, especially if you
do the modifications yourself.
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The Squealer Rotary Cutter line from Bush Hog includes
five models of varying widths.
modified Cat. 0 - Cat. 1 three point
hitch, shear pin protection on the
drive line and optional round blade
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The 48”, 60”, and 72” models
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All models come equipped with
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PHILADELPHIA - Neil
DeStefano has been named
Product Manager for Insecticides
and Fungicides for Pennwalt’s
Agchem Division.
Prior to joining Pennwalt,
DeStefano was a Product Super
visor with FMC Corporation’s
Pennwalt names manager
attention":
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two years. The rest of the machine
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The Squealer line of cutters are
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sm&U acreage to maintain. They
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Agchem Group.
A resident of Medford, N.J.,
DeStefano is a member of the
American Marketing Association,
the National Agricultural
Marketing Association, and the
National Agricultural Aviation
Association.