Monitoring fuels and combustibles has become very important since the arrival of new diesel injection systems, such as common rail and pump injection. Here it is the fuel itself which is the lubricant and, with the lubrication of these new systems, the sulphur content of diesel is substantially reduced. This reduction is essential with regard to environmental pollution but is not so good for lubrication because sulphur has very effective lubrication properties.

Examples of available analyses

Emission spectrometry to monitor the sulphur content in fuel.

Water content to prevent distribution or high pressure pumps from seizing up.

TAN to prevent oxidation or abnormal contamination of the fuel.

Fuel filtering onto a membrane to observe through a microscope whether there are any external solid contaminants, often the cause of filter clogging.

Bacteria and fungi are cultured in an aqueous state with diesel on an agar surface. Like water, they are especially destructive for metal parts because they impair lubrication.  

Flash point in isolation to detect any slight fractions of petrol in the event of a tank filling mistake. The presence of petrol can cause a pump to seize up, a hole in a piston and damage to the cylinder head gasket or glow plugs.  

Infrared spectrometry to detect and identify the presence of a range of contaminants.

sample report

Density  which is often a sales measure for diesel because it is more exact than volume, so it is important for substantial bulk purchases.  ;

Hexadecane number which represents a fuel's propensity to ignite.

Filterability temperature limit used to assess behaviour at very low temperatures (e.g. -15°C).