Jet Fuel Additives - Composition and Usage

[Mick]

The fact that there are various additives sometimes added to Jet Fuel often comes up in discussion of the Chemtrail Theory. There's often some debate as to what the additives are, and if they contain barium or aluminum, and how much is added to the fuel. So I'm starting this thread to proved a useful list of these additives, their ingredients and their usage.

First a query, wikipedia says:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium_borohydride

Content from external source:

Aluminum Borohydride is a volatile pyrophoric liquid which is used as rocket fuel, an additive in jet fuel, and as a reducing agent in laboratories.

And yet the only reference I can find for anything like this is using AB as a chemical ignitor in jet engines, not as an additive to the fuel:
http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/ie50599a044

There are several additives found here:

http://www.skygeek.com/fuel-additive.html

One of the most frequently mentioned is Prist:
http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/style...36437-msds.pdf

Content from external source:

TRADE NAME: PRIST® HI-FLASH HI-FLO Anti-Icing Aviation Fuel Additive
SYNONYMS: Diethylene Glycol Monomethyl Ether, DEGMME; Methyl Carbitol
MILITARY SPEC MIL-DTL-85470B
CHEMICAL FAMILY: Glycol Ethers
FORMULA: CH3-OCH2CH2O-CH2CH2OH

There's also a low-flo version. Both seem to be 99% volatile hydrocarbons.

Content from external source:

Prist Hi-Flash Hi-Flo Anti-Icing Fuel Additive is less toxic, less volatile and easier to use than conventional additives. It controls icing in aircraft fuel by depressing the freezing point of water, reducing the occurrence of suspended ice crystals and ensuring that fuel will flow freely through lines and filters. Prist Hi-Flash additive is recommended for every refueling at a dosage rate of .10% minimum to .15% maximum by volume. Hi-Flo delivers the product at a rate compatible with a 40 to 55 gal. per minute fuel nozzle rate.When dissolved water separates from the fuel, some amount of Prist Hi-Flash additive quickly leaves the fuel and preferentially dissolves in the water. This depresses the water's freezing point. As the fuel gets colder, and more water particles appear, more Prist Hi-Flash additive leaves the fuel and enters the water, and your aircraft's fuel lines stay clear.

Note the dosage rate: 0.10% to 0.15% (1 to 1.5 parts in a thousand, or 1,000 to 1,500 ppm). Also note no aluminum or barium.

Then there's Hammonds Biobor JF Diesel and Jet Fuel Microbicide - MIL-S-53021A, used for killing bacteria:
http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/style...borjf-msds.pdf
Compostion: Substituted dioxaborinanes 95.0% Naphtha 4.5%
Usage 135ppm to 270ppm

[Billzilla]

I've used Prist before a few times but it's not very common. It's also very nasty stuff and after reading the warning label on the back of the can I decided to simply never go near it again. You know how on the back of some nasty chemicals you often see "..... this product may harm you"? Well on the Prist tins back in the 90's they were more like "..... this will kill you". Nothing nice about it, just a plain warning that it's a tin of death!

[Rico]

The datasheet in the link provided by Mick doesn't seem too bad in regards to Prist. Doesn't seem anymore toxic than the glycol used for de-icing aircraft by the looks of it, but then things may have been different back in the '90s .

I was trained on how to use Prist in refueling aircraft, but never really see it used too often. It's a bit of a manual process to apply and really isn't worth the effort in most cases. Depending on the conditions of course.

[Mick]

I'm thinking Wikipedia must be wrong here. Is it at all possible that Aluminum Borohydride could be a fuel additive? It seems like the antithesis of what you'd want in your fuel.

[JFDee]

The ACS paper looks more like a proposal and a study of feasibility (judging from the first page). Furthermore, in this proposal the igniting substance is not "added" to the fuel in the sense of mixing it in fluid state, but rather as a "chemical spark" directly into the combustion chamber.

I think if this paper is the only connection between the substance and jet turbines, it is given undue weight here.

[nextgen]

I'm thinking Wikipedia must be wrong here. Is it at all possible that Aluminum Borohydride could be a fuel additive? It seems like the antithesis of what you'd want in your fuel.

I don't know about fuel additives but aluminum can be used in rocket fuel. And lithium aluminum hydride and Borohydride together would be an expensive way to process alcohol based fuels, but not to my knowledge it's not used as a fuel additive.

Who knows, you might be able to use aluminum as a substitute for copper sweetening. But again I don't know if the end product would have anything left over.

So it's an interesting hypothesis but it seems impractical.

[Trigger Hippie]

I don't know about fuel additives but aluminum can be used in rocket fuel.

I believe aluminum is only used in SOLID rocket fuels.

[F4Jock]

I believe aluminum is only used in SOLID rocket fuels.

Contemporary liquid rocket fuel is hydrogen and oxygen. No additives.

[lotek]

this is the thing where there is a whole separate system to manage this, the whole thing is horribly dangerous to fill use and handle, doesn't create enough of a benefit to be worth using vs risk. Think along the lines of N2O, methanol, nitromethane, or O2 injection into an internal combustion engine to improve performance, only much more dangerous. someone more familiar than i has spoken about it here before. i think about an aluminum compound experiment specifically. Search the forum for the term pyrophoric, that should find the thread. same concept and problems tho. nothing to do with the fuel.

and yes, the comment on solid fuel rockets is valid. would be MAD expensive tho. just mad expensive.

id LOVE to see a normal person handle LiAlH.... the fallow of many a skilled drug cook... hahaha.

for a good idea what its like to work with this class of chemicals, google tert-butyl-lithium demo. it takes more skill to just get it out of a bottle than most lab techs can muster, let alone work with it. or non specifically trained aircraft employees....

[F4Jock]

I'm thinking Wikipedia must be wrong here. Is it at all possible that Aluminum Borohydride could be a fuel additive? It seems like the antithesis of what you'd want in your fuel.

The entire premise is ridiculous. Not only do you not want this crap in your hyper-expensive high-precision turtle-works but at the concentrations listed the effect on anything atmospheric would be negligible. Didn't you somewhere use the comparison of a a fart after a barium enema?

[MikeC]

The standard for jet A1 is Def Std 91-91, currently at Revision 7 amendment 1.

All fuels must meet the standard, which requiers:

Content from external source:

4.2 Only additives approved by and on behalf of the MoD’s Aviation Fuels Committee shall be permitted. Details of approved additives are given in Annex A.
4.3 Additives shall be identified by the appropriate RDE/A/XXX number shown in Annex A. The amount, including NIL additions, of all additive additions shall be reported to the purchaser on batch quality certificates or as otherwise directed by the purchaser and/or contract.

the list of qualified additives is in appendix A - the following is all the additives listed:

Content from external source:

A.2.4 The following antioxidant formulations are qualified:
Formulation Qualification Reference
(a) 2,6-ditertiary-butyl-phenol RDE/A/606
(b) 2,6 ditertiary-butyl-4-methyl-phenol RDE/A/607
(c) 2,4-dimethyl-6-tertiary-butyl-phenol RDE/A/608
(d) 75 percent minimum, 2,6-ditertiary-butyl-phenol RDE/A/609 25 percent maximum, tertiary and tritertiary-butyl-phenols
(e) 55 percent minimum, 2,4-dimethyl-6-tertiary-butyl-phenol RDE/A/610 15 percent minimum, 4 methyl-2,6-ditertiary-butyl-phenol Remainder, 30 percent maximum, as a mixture of monomethyl and dimethyl-tertiary-butyl-phenols
(f) 72 percent minimum, 2,4-dimethyl-6-tertiary-butyl-phenol RDE/A/611 28 percent maximum, mixture of tertiary-butyl-methyl-phenols and tertiary-butyl dimethyl phenols

Metal deactivator:

Content from external source:


A.3.1 An MDA, of a type detailed in A.3.2 and at a concentration detailed in A.3.3, may be added to fuel to counteract the effects of metals known to be deleterious to thermal stability, such as Copper, Cadmium, Iron, Cobalt and Zinc, provided that the nature of the contamination is reported. Where metallic contamination is unproven, an MDA may be used to recover thermal stability provided that the JFTOT Test (in accordance with Table 1, Test 7) is determined before and after MDA addition and reported on the test certificate.

<snip>

Product Qualification Reference
N,N’-disalicylidene 1,2-propanediamine. RDE/A/650

Static dissipator:

Content from external source:

Product Manufacturer Qualification Reference
Stadis® 450 Innospec LLC RDE/A/621

Lubricity enhancers:

Content from external source:

Product Manufacturer QualificationReference Minimum Maximum (both mg/l)
Reference Hitec 580 Afton Chemical Ltd. RDE/A/661 15 23
Octel DCI-4A Innospec LLC RDE/A/662 9 23
Octel DCI-6A Innospec LLC RDE/A/663 9 15
Nalco 5403 Nalco Chemical Co. RDE/A/664 12 23
Tolad 4410 Baker Petrolite RDE/A/665 9 23
Tolad 351 Baker Petrolite RDE/A/666 9 23
Unicor J Dorf Ketal Chemicals RDE/A/667 9 23
Nalco 5405 Nalco Chemical Co. RDE/A/668 11 23
GE Betz Spec Aid 8Q22 RDE/A/669 9 23

Icing inhibitor:

Content from external source:

Diethylene Glycol Monomethyl Ether RDE/A/630

Leak detection additive:

Content from external source:

Tracer A(LDTA-A) Tracer Research Corporation RDE/A/640

[MikeC]

Who knows, you might be able to use aluminum as a substitute for copper sweetening. But again I don't know if the end product would have anything left over.

As above it sems copper is actually a problem in jet fuel, so ther is an additive to counter it!

[Jay Reynolds]

or non specifically trained aircraft employees....

I see that Dane Wigington or geoengineeringwatch is claiming that ordinary jetliners are being loaded with chemtrail chemicals by the same people that empty the toilet waste from the plane. He is basing this on a decade old anonymous email promulgated by Clifford Carnicom.

I can only imagine that the people who do that job are not skilled as you say and are simply not paid enough.

This graphic is actually used on his site:

[lotek]

"Lubricity enhancers"

giggity?

unless there is a separate, experimental additive system, all metals would have to be organometalic compounds.

Jay ive read that BS email, it is clear from the writers obvious lack of familiarity with the jargon or proprietary lexicon he never worked in an aircraft shop. ditto for his asinine ideas about the hierarchy.

[MikeC]

There's no accounting for smutty minds!

The actual term used is:

Content from external source:

A.5 Lubricity Improver Additive (LIA): previously cited as corrosion inhibitor/lubricity improver additive

[nextgen]

If by 'solid' you mean liquid and solid then I suppose you are correct. It's kind-of a grey area with aluminum because it must be mixed with something else. For instance, aluminum powders make excellent rocket fuels having characteristics of superior velocity due to a slower burn rate. Often this type of fuel is used in military rockets because its so inexpensive to manufacture. In-fact. It's(Aluminum/Magnesium based fuels) still in use today despite several veteran lawsuits filed over problems due to long term exposure. The gas is deadly and the powder is harmful to plants and animals due to the reaction it has with proteins. And despite the fact that lithium is the most common metal in the universe, aluminum is the most common metal in the earth's crust.

Typical Fuel Contains:
16% Aluminum Powder
65% Ammonium perchlorate
17% HTBP polybutadiene
1% Iron (II) oxide as a stabilizer

It can vary 1-2% and Iron is not the only stabilizer, but you get the point.

As I see it, there are quite a few problems with it being added to Jet Fuel as ascribed in the chem trail hypothesis. Although jets burn their fuel at 90% efficiency, they don't achieve the temperature necessary to turn Aluminum to a gas(2518.85 C). Aluminum based fuels burn at 3500 C and at that temperature would easily melt the engines. The physics just don't match up with the premise for chem trails. In order to be effective in the environment(i.e. not inert) Aluminum gas would be necessary and if that were the case we would also find traces of potassium chloride gas where ever the jets flew. Not to mention the fact that all the jets would produce an apparent vapor trail even at lower altitudes and thus would be easy to detect. While the science behind using aluminum in the atmosphere would be plausible and has even been suggested by environment scientists as early as the 90's as a way to avert a global warming catastrophe. I still can't see how chem-trails could produce the effect. Even those scientists suggesting using it warned that it's use could cause larger storms and significant environmental damage. The payoff would be in a 20% reduction in the sun's rays being reflected back as Aluminum is the most reflective metal. The downside would be more pollution probably worse than the alternative.

[lotek]

I believe he was talking about more typical rocket engines not rockets/missiles, so SRB not solid/liquid hybrid motors, but either way all of everyone's points on Al, your's especially, still hold. There are loads of different combinations for solid, solid/liquid, and liquid only motors, many of which would send hippies screaming. RFNA being a sell favorable option. LOX/H2 being the most 'green'. many of the small sub orbital companies have been having awesome success with hybrid engines which play a large role in reusability. the recent introduction of a piston style pump instead of the traditional turbopump will help bring a new era of small/cheap/reusable motors(i hope, hope, hope!).

On a side note i have a slow side project going on right now trying to make a small scale(D/E) hybrid motor using N2O and bacon fat :P no real point, i just have far too much bacon fat from work(2-4gal/week) to do anything useful with. it melts too quick to not mix with another absorbent solid(cellulose at this point) when used as the fuel grain.

[F4Jock]

If by 'solid' you mean liquid and solid then I suppose you are correct. It's kind-of a grey area with aluminum because it must be mixed with something else. For instance, aluminum powders make excellent rocket fuels having characteristics of superior velocity due to a slower burn rate. Often this type of fuel is used in military rockets because its so inexpensive to manufacture. In-fact. It's(Aluminum/Magnesium based fuels) still in use today despite several veteran lawsuits filed over problems due to long term exposure. The gas is deadly and the powder is harmful to plants and animals due to the reaction it has with proteins. And despite the fact that lithium is the most common metal in the universe, aluminum is the most common metal in the earth's crust.

Typical Fuel Contains:
16% Aluminum Powder
65% Ammonium perchlorate
17% HTBP polybutadiene
1% Iron (II) oxide as a stabilizer

It can vary 1-2% and Iron is not the only stabilizer, but you get the point.

As I see it, there are quite a few problems with it being added to Jet Fuel as ascribed in the chem trail hypothesis. Although jets burn their fuel at 90% efficiency, they don't achieve the temperature necessary to turn Aluminum to a gas(2518.85 C). Aluminum based fuels burn at 3500 C and at that temperature would easily melt the engines. The physics just don't match up with the premise for chem trails. In order to be effective in the environment(i.e. not inert) Aluminum gas would be necessary and if that were the case we would also find traces of potassium chloride gas where ever the jets flew. Not to mention the fact that all the jets would produce an apparent vapor trail even at lower altitudes and thus would be easy to detect. While the science behind using aluminum in the atmosphere would be plausible and has even been suggested by environment scientists as early as the 90's as a way to avert a global warming catastrophe. I still can't see how chem-trails could produce the effect. Even those scientists suggesting using it warned that it's use could cause larger storms and significant environmental damage. The payoff would be in a 20% reduction in the sun's rays being reflected back as Aluminum is the most reflective metal. The downside would be more pollution probably worse than the alternative.

Forget the atmospheric analysis. The engine would either seize or disintegrate in short order.