A wide-cut fuel combines light, volatile fractions like gasoline with heavier fractions like kerosene into a single product. Refiners produce these blends to maximize the yield of aviation fuel from a barrel of crude oil. Because of the lighter components, wide-cut fuels have a lower flash point and ignite much easier in extremely cold temperatures.
The military specs call for a wide-cut jet fuel to guarantee the engines will start on the tarmac in subzero weather.
Jet B and JP-4 are the classic wide-cut aviation fuels, favored for cold-weather starting but largely phased out of commercial aviation due to their higher flammability risks.
Do not mix it up with
- Narrow-cut: Narrow-cut fuels have a tight boiling range targeting specific hydrocarbon weights, whereas wide-cut spans across multiple fractions.
Related terms
Narrow-cut
Describing a refined petroleum product distilled within a very tight boiling point range.
Cut
A specific fraction of hydrocarbons separated during the distillation of crude oil.
Distillation
The primary refinery process that separates crude oil into different hydrocarbon groups by boiling point.
Naphtha
A highly volatile, flammable liquid hydrocarbon mixture distilled from crude oil.