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| | | | Joined: Aug 2005 Posts: 1,186 Shop Shark | | Shop Shark Joined: Aug 2005 Posts: 1,186 | Does kerosene ever go bad? I have an old 5 gallon can about a 1/3 full probably 50 years old.
Bruce | | | | | Joined: Nov 2006 Posts: 2,544 Shop Shark | | Shop Shark Joined: Nov 2006 Posts: 2,544 | I'd use it for cleaning up greasy parts and then use the rest to help burn my brush piles. | | | | | Joined: Jan 2011 Posts: 212 Shop Shark | | Shop Shark Joined: Jan 2011 Posts: 212 | Old Kerosens should be just fine...it does not spoil or go bad. | | | | | Joined: Dec 2001 Posts: 14,522 Moderator: Welcome Centre, Southern Bolters, Legion Hall | | Moderator: Welcome Centre, Southern Bolters, Legion Hall Joined: Dec 2001 Posts: 14,522 | ...but some of it will have a smell if you burn it in a kerosene heater. | | | | | Joined: Jan 2010 Posts: 378 Shop Shark | | Shop Shark Joined: Jan 2010 Posts: 378 | Speaking of Kerosene, I had to quit using my Kerosene heater here in Mississippi. The cost of it is like $8.00 per gal. I put in a propane heater and it's ONLY about $3.00 per gal. Just thought I'd throw that in. | | | | | Joined: Oct 2006 Posts: 9,671 'Bolter | | 'Bolter Joined: Oct 2006 Posts: 9,671 | Speaking of Kerosene. For every gallon of kerosene burned in an unvented kerosene heater, 1.1 gallons of water is produced. Don't ask me how it does that, I got that information from the Clemson U site: http://www.clemson.edu/psapublishing/pages/fyd/HL256.pdfI do know that the new salamander that I bought to take the chill off in the pole barn, produced enough humidity that literally all of the bare metal in a 42x50x12 building rusted over in a couple of days of using it. Needless to say, it was a mistake and I should have put the money toward a vented wood burning furnace. Now all of my wood, and metal working machines and steel stock is covered with rust. DG
Last edited by Denny Graham; 08/15/2014 3:57 PM.
Denny G
Sandwich, IL
| | | | | Joined: Feb 2002 Posts: 12,029 Cruising in the Passing Lane | | Cruising in the Passing Lane Joined: Feb 2002 Posts: 12,029 | LPG and LNG also create more humidity, it's a result of the 'splitting' of oxygen in the combustion process, replacing it with CO2 and H2O, un-vented open flame heating is never a good thing
Bill | | | | | Joined: Sep 2008 Posts: 872 Shop Shark | | Shop Shark Joined: Sep 2008 Posts: 872 | It will probably have high sulfur and stink a bit.
Use it as a parts cleaner. | | | | | Joined: Aug 2012 Posts: 28 'Bolter | | 'Bolter Joined: Aug 2012 Posts: 28 | Bruce --
Kerosene is a petroleum distillate not unlike gasoline, fuel oil, etc. All these distillates are composed of a range of different length hydrocarbon chains. Shorter chains, lower boiling point, more fumes. Assuming the container isn't perfectly sealed, the light fractions will evaporate leaving a higher percentage of the heavier stuff.
Your old Kero is fine but it may behave a little more like No. 2 Fuel Oil, e.g. a little more stink, little more soot, little harder to light than it really should.
As for the humidity, Mr. Graham is right on. Hydrocarbons are just that -- a bunch of hydrogens bound to carbon atoms. When they burn the H-C and C-C bonds break and form new ones with oxygen. The carbon mostly winds up as CO2 and CO but the hydrogen mostly winds up as water (H2O). There's a lot more H than C hence all the water.
Sorry for the chemistry babble. Short story is that it should be fine for nearly all purposes but may stink a bit.
Pete P.
Harborcreek, Penna.
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