Transportable fuel treatment saves tax dollars and the environment

San Antonio -- July 12, 1996 -- A mobile fuel filtration/additive demonstration unit (FAU), designed and built by engineers at Southwest Research Institute^® (SwRI^®) in San Antonio, has been delivered to the U.S. Marine Corps Blount Island Command in Jacksonville, Florida, after successfully completing validation testing. The FAU will provide field and maintenance support for Marine Corps vehicles and equipment carried on 13 maritime prepositioned ships.

"This apparatus not only contributes to combat readiness by ensuring fuel quality, but saves the military and the taxpayer money in fuel replacement and fuel disposal costs. It is also environmentally friendly," said SwRI Project Manager Gary Bessee, a research engineer in SwRI's U.S. Army TARDEC Fuels and Lubricants Research Facility.

"The problems of maintaining fuel quality and of having access to the right fuel in the field were again recognized during Operations Desert Shield/Storm," adds Bessee. "There were instances in that conflict of fuel contaminated by sand, water, and other debris. There were also occasions when the military had no convenient means of converting more widely available commercial Jet-A fuels to the military jet fuel, JP-8, the single fuel on the battlefield."

Historically, fuel filtration problems in military applications have resulted from a range of contaminants that include particles, plastic and rubber components, tarry substances, fuel deterioration byproducts, unknown fuel additives, and microbacterial growth.

The FAU solves these problems within a single, compact, transportable apparatus mounted on an 8 by 17 foot M-1073 trailer that incorporates a filtration system, a fuel storage tank, an additive injection system, and a self-contained power source. Within half an hour, the filtration system can filter and treat the front fuel cells of a M1-A1 combat tank.

"Other potential uses for the FAU," says Bessee, "include any place where small quantities of fuel are stored for extended periods of time making the fuel susceptible to deterioration, locations where waste minimization is critical, or sites where there are severe constraints such as emergency standby power generators."

The FAU is highly flexible and has multiple configurations. The filtration unit, however, is the heart of the system. Hose reels mounted on both sides of the unit are used to pump fuel from one or two vehicles. The fuel is filtered and then returned after the contaminants are removed. The filtration system has three components: the first uses pleated paper filters to remove the larger particles; the second eliminates water; and the third, a polishing filter, is used to remove very fine particles. In a second application of the FAU, up to four additives can be injected into a fuel, including a corrosion inhibitor, a fuel system icing inhibitor, and an anti-static additive to convert Jet A-1 fuel to JP-8. In another potential application, a biocide can be added to the filtered fuel to discourage microbacterial growth.

The all-electric FAU is powered by an 1,800-rpm generator powered by a 10-kw air-cooled diesel engine.

At Blount Island, the Marine Corps typically completes routine maintenance of an individual ship's load approximately every 45 days. Each ship carries between four to five hundred vehicles and pieces of equipment including combat tanks, construction equipment, personnel carriers, and other inventory that has to be available on the battlefield. The Marine Corps estimates that the FAU will save between $25,000 and $30,000 per shipload in fuel saving costs from fuel reuse and from the reduced costs of fuel disposal with the added benefit of confidence that all equipment fuel supplies are battle-ready.

For more information about the fuel filtration system, contact Deborah Deffenbaugh, Communications Department, Southwest Research Institute, P.O. Drawer 28510, San Antonio, Texas 78228-0510, Phone (210) 522-2046, Fax (210) 522-3547.

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