if diesel fuel becomes unavailable for any reason, can diesel powered farm equipment function on alternate fuels from energy crops that are available on the farm. this project sought to gain some insight into this question through the use of once-refined cottonseed oil as fuel in a typical unmodified agricultural diesel engine. the engine used for test was an international harvester model dt-436b 6 cylinder, inline, direct injection, turbocharged engine of approximately 175 brake horsepower at 2500 rpm. the engine was run on a stationary stand using blends of reference diesel fuel (df-2), once-refined cottonseed oil (cso), and transesterified cottonseed oil (esco). the latter is cottonseed oil which has been processed to give a methyl ester instead of a glyceride. the volume percent blends of fuels used in the tests ranged from 100 df-2, to 20/80 df-2/cso, 50/50 df-2/esco, 50/50 cso/esco, and 100 esco. the test procedures and results are presented in this volume. the results suggest that esco would probably be a satisfactory substitute for diesel fuel, but more testing is required. none of the fuels tested is a cost effective alternative to diesel fuels. esco presently costs four to five times as much as commercial diesel fuel. (era citation 08: 012656)