| > Some Cold War era fighter engines were able to run diesel for a while, tge reasoning was to allow quick re-location of the aircraft to safety. They needed basically a full rebuild if run on diesel for too long. Interesting, haven't heard of that. But yes, I can imagine with diesel containing heavier hydrocarbons than kerosene, there could be a buildup of soot deposits on the hot parts of the engine. Might also be some certification issue, that if you operate with out-of-spec fuel then you need to overhaul the engine before it's considered flight worthy again (even if there might be no problem with the engine per se). Then again, don't these naval ships with gas turbine engines run on something like standard light marine diesel oil? > And all multi-fuel engines the military tried, e.g. in the Chieftain (if memory serves well), were rather underwhelming and ran mostly on diesel anyway. The Chieftain engine was designed to be "truly" multi-fuel, being in principle capable of running on both diesel, petrol, and anything in between like kerosene. If you limit the multi-fuelness to diesel and the current day narrow cut kerosenes that are used as jet fuel, it's a much simpler problem. E.g. Western military diesel vehicles tend to be specced to run on diesel or JP-8 (the military variant of standard Jet A-1 jet fuel, with a few additives). And aviation diesel engines used in some GA aircraft tend to be certified for Jet A-1 (and they are often modified versions of standard automotive diesel engines). |
There's also the difference between "will it work" and "will it work for continual use".