Investigation of Some Base Oil as Biodegradable Water-Cooling Two-Stroke Engine Oil

Abstract

According to statistics, a large portion of used lubricants remain as potential hazards for the environment. Particularly, about 30 to 50% lubricant used in outboard marine engines is not burned completely and released into the water. As a result, consumers demand environmentally compatible lubricants due to concern about loss of mineral oil-based lubricants to the environment which can result in water contamination and pose a threat to animal and plant life. To prevent bioaccumulation of these materials in aquatic plants and animals, many agencies are considering regulations toward to biodegradable two-stroke outboard marine engines oil. Vegetable oils and ester oils are very suitable to develop “green lubricants”. Ester oils usually show excellent high temperature stability, low temperature fluidity, high viscosity index, very low volatility, good miscibility and biodegradability, but they are expensive and also produce many poisonous materials to environmental during produce process. Vegetable oils are biodegradable, nontoxic and renewable, moreover, their cost is reasonable compared to ester oils. Accordingly, vegetable oils are considered as potential candidates to replace conventional mineral oil-based lubricating oils, but the poor oxidative stability limits their utilization in large scale. Investigation of this work have found that proper percentage rapeseed oil can meet the requirements of biodegradable water-cooling two stroke engine oil, futhermore this two-cycle engine oil has good miscibility without need any miscibility-enhancing solvents. Research results indicate that two-cycle engine oil, which comprised rapeseed oil, ester oil and low viscosity hydrocracked oil as well as functional additives, exhibits good oxidative stability, easy biodegradability and good miscibility.