DETERMINATION OF CRITICAL PROPERTIES (T-C, P-C) OF SOME JET FUELS

The critical temperatures of some petroleum- and coal-derived jet fuel s were measured with good reproducibility, using a rapid heating seale d tube method. A critical property estimation method was used to calcu late the critical temperatures and pressures of the jet fuel samples. Five other methods were also used to estimate the critical temperature s of the fuels. While most of the estimation methods give satisfactory predictions of the critical temperatures of the petroleum-derived jet fuels, they all fail to give acceptable results for the coal-derived jet fuels. The larger differences between the measured and estimated c ritical temperatures for the coal-derived fuels are attributed to the different composition of these fuels, dominated by cycloalkanes. On th e basis of properties of the compounds found in the coal-derived jet f uels, a new correlation is proposed to calculate the critical temperat ures of the coal-derived jet fuels.