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My understanding is that the problems with water in fuel are not so much related to the affects on combustion as they are on the fuel system itself. Particularly the latter end of the fuel system - the injectors and high pressure pump.
These have very tight tolerances and depend on the fuel itself for lubrication. Water, or a water and fuel emulsification, make lousy lubricants. So get too much water (whatever that "too much" is according to the engineers), and you have fuel system problems and failures.
That's my understanding too. In extreme cases water in fuel can even crack injector bodies and nozzles.
That's my discussion here. Water doesn't seem to automatically build up in our tanks. Are we all
always getting perfectly dry top quality fuel? That seems pretty doubtful. ALL diesel fuel can carry a bit of water. Some types (biodiesel/blends) can carry more. Temperature affects the water capability. I would expect that the heat/cool cycles that most tanks see would tend to precipitate out the water at one time or other.
The fuel in our Sprinters is heated and circulated back to the tank. The heated fuel will hold more water than cold fuel. Assuming that the fuel we pump into our tank is not very "wet", does that heat and circulation process help to keep the free water from accumulating in our tanks by taking the moisture away in very small doses?
The OEM filter membrane is designed to trap free water. As I mentioned earlier, it must not be trapping the "in range" amount of water in the fuel or else we would all be regularly draining our WIF filter system. Originally "dry" at lower temperature biodiesel when heated may be more efficient at water control than is heated dino diesel.
Granted, sufficient amounts of water in the combustion chamber can cause problems, too.
It would seem to me that the amount of water would need to be pretty high for that to become a real concern. Our WIF monitor should be warning us before that is a problem. I have no data.
vic
vic
