My sister put gasoline in her diesel car and now she might have to get a new car. I don’t even have a driver’s license and have a rudimentary understanding of how simple combustion engines work. Why is the car maybe dead, can it be fixed?
In: Engineering
True eli5.. your engine is a metal box with metal parts in it. Those metal parts have to move in a certain sequence to spin the tires. The diesel and the gas cause a little explosion at a certain time to push the parts around and spin the back tire.
The diesel moves around in the engine more than the gasoline moves in a gasoline engine. If the gasoline gets into a diesel, it moves too much for gasoline and it will ignite and go boom out of sequence. If it’s out of sequence some of those metal parts will push and turn at the wrong time and stuff breaks.
Also gasoline explodes aloooot bigger than diesel so the metal box may not be ready to handle all that.
Don’t run it drain out the mixed fuel 🙂
Lack of lubrication is a good point…
However, the big one I’m not seeing here is that Petrol is a solvent and will eat away at the seals in the fuel system within the engine… I believe this is generally a case of a new engine as opposed to replace and rebuild if they’ve been damaged enough to warrant replacing them.
But some other issues include damage to the injectors, catalytic converter
Can it be fixed? Sure… It might cost a bit, it might cost a lot. It really depends on how much damage is done.
Usually it causes issues on the fuel pumps on a diesel.
Diesel lubricates, gasoline doesn’t.
Saying that it’s unlikely to kill an engine as it probably won’t even start on gasoline.
Gasoline has a much lower octane number than diesel fuel, which indicates how much the air-fuel mixture can be compressed before the fuel ignites uncontrollably. Diesel engines run with very high compression ratios, meaning that if you put gasoline in a diesel engine you’re going to get a lot of uncontrolled pre-ignition (fuel igniting before it’s supposed to). That creates a lot of heat and random combustions, which can destroy an engine.
By comparison, putting diesel fuel in a gasoline engine is not nearly as problematic. In all likelihood, the engine will just not run very well or not run at all. So, if you accidentally put diesel fuel in a gasoline car, just drain the tank and flush out the fueling system and you should be fine.
Diesel in gasoline engine. For a brief moment, smoke, sputter then the engine stop working. Initially there will be some mix gas/diesel. Then the diesel will be too much and the spart of the spark plug will not be able to light it up, and the engine stop working. Diesel require a higher compression for it to ignite, and gas engine just don’t make that compression, even with a turbo or supercharger. Diesel may react with some rubbers and plastics, like hoses and orings. It may destroy those. The diesel may also affect the catalytic converter, killing it. But chance is that if you drain, rince and change the gas filters, chance is that it will be fine. Long term is unknown.
Gas in diesel. Diesel is an oil, and lubricate many key components. Gas also explode instead of burning, so when injected it goes bang instead of “whoosh”. This excerce some massive pressure inside the cylinder, and also some extreme heat. This destroy the pistons and valves. Also, the diesel lubricate a bit the top of the cylinder walls, while gasoline wash out the oil on it. Since the engine is designed for oil on the cylinder wall and now there is none, it also add alot of wear to it. The high pressure pump required for the diesel (like 10k psi pressure or more!) rely on the diesel for the oil. Gas actually wash out the diesel, so no more oil. Now it is metal on metal, so extreme wear, and the high pressure pump get destroyed quite fast. Metal shaving will also flow to the injectors, clogging them. The injectors also rely on the diesel to oil themself. Now no oil so extreme wear. The exhaust system will also be quite hotter, melting the cataliser.
I can tell you what happens when you put diesel gas in a lawn mower. Your mother yells at your brother for putting diesel in a red gas can and not telling her.
A diesel will run on gas for a short time but gas doesn’t lubricate the parts it needs to. A gas engine can’t ignite the diesel because diesel ingnites fron compression rather than ignition.
Late for work and sleep deprived, I did this one morning with my motorcycle. Took about a mile before engine quit. Had a tow service pick it up and bring it to a bike repair shop.They called about an hour later to inform me that my bike runs on gasoline not diesel. The only damage was the humiliation I felt when I had to pick it up.
Latest Answers