Summer brought several notable events to the Ukrainian fuel market, including an incident at the Pidkamin oil depot and the emergence of the new Amic Energy chain, which previously operated under the Lukoil brand. At the same time, experts spoke about the growth in volumes of illegal fuel, which mainly comes from the temporarily occupied territories in the east. In recent years, there have been no serious complaints about the quality of diesel, but the situation has changed, and experts from the Institute of Consumer Expertise decided to find out how well things are currently going with this type of fuel at the country's gas stations.
Testing
IPE specialists took branded and unbranded diesel fuel for research from eight retail chains: ANP (Energy), KLO (Ventus diesel), Socar (Nano Diesel), OKKO (Euro DP), AMIC (Euro DP), WOG (Mustang Diesel), Luxwen (Euro Diesel), as well as BRSM Euro and BRSM DP. Special attention was paid to the latter - there have been periodic statements in the media about problems with its product. Laboratory tests included four parameters: fractional distillation, flash point in a closed crucible, sulfur content, and water.
Fractions
How diesel separates into fractions directly affects engine operation. If there are many light fractions in the composition, the critical ignition pressure of the mixture increases, knocks appear in the cylinders, and the oil in the crankcase thins out. Heavy fractions, on the contrary, do not burn completely, causing carbon deposits to accumulate in the combustion chamber. Also, this parameter indirectly shows how well the fuel evaporates: the lighter the fractions, the faster evaporation occurs. For automotive diesel, the optimal product is considered to be one that boils off in the range from 200 to 360 degrees Celsius. The narrower this range, the more complete combustion in the engine. According to this criterion, all participants showed similar results, and no deviations were found in anyone.
Flash Point
The next important parameter is the flash point, determined in a closed crucible. It shows at what temperature the fuel ignites. If a car filled with fuel with a low ignition threshold gets into an accident, it is difficult to talk about driver safety. Moreover, this indicator helps to identify whether foreign substances have been mixed into the diesel. The best result was demonstrated by WOG (Mustang Diesel) - 69 degrees with a minimum norm of 55. Diesel from KLO was slightly inferior to it, and high figures were also recorded for Luxwen.
Sulfur
Sulfur content is the main environmental indicator for diesel fuel. True, the products of its combustion harm not only nature but also the engine itself. Sulfur remains sulfur at any time of the year. Ukrainian standards allow different sulfur levels for different types of fuel: for type II (analog of Euro-4) - no more than 50 mg/kg, for type I (analog of Euro-5) - a maximum of 10 mg/kg. Almost every year, records are set for this indicator, both positive and negative. This time, the results pleased, and in some places even surprised: almost all samples reached the highest Euro-5 standard. The best were WOG samples - only 2 mg/kg, in second place was KLO diesel - 5 mg/kg.
Conclusions
The main result of this study boils down to the following: talk about the widespread distribution of surrogate among "heavy" fuel, to put it mildly, turned out to be exaggerated. Large chains currently sell products from European factories, and their quality is very high. It is pleasant that small local players, for example Luxwen, also try to keep the bar. And leaders like WOG still set the standards that the entire market looks up to.
