Do you trust an ethanol fuel treatment?

Discussion in '1st & 2nd Generation 1983-1989' started by RobVG, Oct 20, 2014.

  1. RobVG

    RobVG Member

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    And if so, which one?

    I've been riding out of my way to buy ethanol free fuel. I'd really like to fill up anywhere and wonder if I can just add something like sta-bil with every tankful?
     
  2. FJ12rydertoo

    FJ12rydertoo Member

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    Why? Having trouble? Or thinking you might avoid trouble?

    To be honest I've not met anyone who had trouble running standard gas, or what passes for gas around here. I've heard it's hard on fuel systems, but have yet to see any issues myself.
     
  3. RobVG

    RobVG Member

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    No, no issues but the shop that rebuilt my carbs recommended using only 0 e gas. I'd rather not risk running into problems again.

    Do carb rot, and rusty tanks only happen after storage or could ethanol blends cause these problems with regular riding?
     
  4. FJ12rydertoo

    FJ12rydertoo Member

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    Man, I couldn't really say. The only thing I can say is that I've not personally seen any problems that can be directly blamed on the slight ethanol blend. Not that it hasn't happened but I've not seen anything.

    OTOH I have seen problems with improper storage of bikes and tanks that ended up with rust and then carb problems. But I think that can be directly attributed to poor storage techniques, like leaving the tanks empty for a couple years with no prep what so ever.

    The last few years my bikes will sometimes sit for a couple months in the winter, in the garage, and they always start up in the spring with no problems. Sometimes they have a full tank and sometimes they don't, just depends. I try to leave them full for the winter, but sometimes I forget.
     
  5. 74ullc

    74ullc New Member

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    Marine stabil. I've been using it and no problems when I do. About two months ago I forgot to add it to my kz1000 after a fill up. 1 month 2 days later when I went to ride the bike it was running like crap. Turned out the gas had separated. The water/ethanol mix fell to the bottom and that's why it wouldn't run. My neighbor said he had the same thing happen with only two week old gas in his lawn mower.

    If you have a choice I would run ethanol free gas. Unfortunately in Texas we don't have a choice. The epa has it out for us and is using ethanol, amoung other things, to try and punish us for being economically successful. The north east is jealous of us. :tongue-new: lol
     
  6. NormK

    NormK New Member

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    We are reasonably lucky out here, they shoved ethanol pumps into heaps of servos but the people refused to buy the shit so most of the pumps were removed, and only a few still exist, I think they are trying to worm it back in lately but the majority of people won't use it
     
  7. ridervfr

    ridervfr Member

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    It may go the way of the doh doh here too hopefully. Farmers want to grow sub-standard corn and get gubberment money for it though :sad:

    I run e-free gas in my 91 which is fairly easy to get, my other two bikes which get used regularly get high-test at the regular pumps. :vtr2:
     
  8. Arnzinator

    Arnzinator New Member

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    I've always stored bikes or anything eles gas powered with a full tank & Stabil. Never had a problem firing up after storage. My bro-inlaw is a long time small engine mechanic & boat guy. He swears by Enzyme Fuel treatment. As others have said some ethanol problems can be attributed to poor storage techniques.
     
  9. duccmann

    duccmann Member

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    Just did that with stabil . Filled her up and ran it for five minutes. Never ever had to do this but rather be safe then sorry. Or what I like to say is
    Dont be cheap in the wrong way.....

    .
     
  10. Pliskin

    Pliskin New Member

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    Anytime someone brings up a thread about Ethanol, it gets me worked up and I rant on like a broken record. Like this:

    Ethanol sucks. Its alcohol. Phase separation is what fuel treatments are designed to combat. Basically, changes in temperatures result in condensation. Ethanol exacerbates this process, meaning, condensation can form quicker in your tank (more so in metal tanks vs. fiberglass). Because water is denser than gas, the water now sinks to the bottom of your tank. You fire up your engine, and the first thing it does is suck in water. No bueno. Phase separation can occur in as little as two weeks. Everything depends on the environment you are in (i.e. being in a coastal, humid area can accelerate the process).

    Any quality fuel stabilizer will help - StarTron, StaBil, Enzyme, etc. But the problem is, despite their "creative" advertising, none of them can REMOVE the ethanol (alcohol). Over time, alcohol will slowly deteriorate rubber hoses, bushings, gaskets, etc. Unless your vehicle (car/bike/boat) has been retrofitted with "ethanol approved" rubber parts, you can't avoid this. Most ethanol approved hoses and such came about around 2007.

    There is no reversing of phase separation. What the (combustible) product actually does is bond with the H20 on a molecular level, thereby allowing it to be passed through the combustion chamber in small amounts and be burned off.

    Unless your motor is specifically tuned to run on ethanol, its actually less efficient than gasoline - meaning you use more gas than if you were only running "un-blended" gas. (In my personal experience, using 89 octane with 10% ethanol my truck gets about 14.8mpg on the highway at 73mph over a 265 mile trip. When I run 91 octane with 0% ethanol, on that same trip I get 16.2 mpg).

    Another interesting part of this whole process is that ethanol takes about $9-$11 a gallon to produce. Gas is way cheaper than that per gallon. But yet, when we buy gas without ethanol, the price is always more than when its blended. That's nothing more than typical government BS.

    Bottom line in my opinion: Fuck ethanol. Its the debble's work (ala Bobby Bouchier). Its expensive. It's less efficient. And if it hasn't caused you problems yet, it will. (Not that I wish that on anyone). Fuck ethanol. Rant over.
     
  11. 74ullc

    74ullc New Member

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    This is copied from my thread on the kz forum right after my experience with phase separation a few weeks ago. This is in my 1977 KZ1000LTD, there was a week from initial problem until I had the chance to dig into it deeper and found the bad gas.

    Setup = Last Saturday started up the bike and it was running very bad, backfire, spit, sputter, couldn't get it off choke....just would not run. Started up instantly but was running like very dirty carbs. Drained the 4 carbs to check for crud, a little bit of very fine sediment but not much. Checked plugs and #1 wet fouled, other 3 good. All four have good strong spark.

    Didn't have time to mess with it again until today. Cleaned #1 plug and seemed to be running a little better. Had to turn the idle speed knob in to get it to idle at 1,000 - it was wanting to idle around 5-600. Haven't had to adjust that knob since the last carb cleaning probably over a year ago.

    Went for a ride and bike is running very poor except for WOT which feels strong. At a steady 80 mph it feels like its running out of gas, surging, sputtering and such but is still ride able, just not right.

    So I get home and decide to drain a fuel sample from #1 carb again to see if there is more crud in it. No crud but what looks like tiny water droplets are collecting at the bottom. So I sit it on the work bench and go clean the bugs off my helmet. When I come back I lift the container up on a corner to let the droplets collect. When I did this the fuel instantly clouds up! It looks like clouds of steam rolling around in the gas! Very angry looking, rolling around! WTF? Then I notice its getting cold...ice cold! The outside of the container starts to sweat, its beer can cold now! Remember I drained it right after a ride so it was warm. Now its cold....I've NEVER seen plain gas do that before! From hot to ice cold in maybe 10 minutes.

    Right now its 71 deg and 80% humidity outside.


    A little more info.....my dad was over when I started it up that first time it was running bad. I started it up, then immediately went inside the house to put on my helmet. When I came back out the bike was off, so I asked my dad what happened? He said it had a big cough and started running bad then died, like it had water in it. I kinda blew his water theory off, but turns out he was right. Should have listened to dad huh?

    The initial sample I drained, about 10 ounces worth, almost all evaporated within an hour, by the next morning all that was left was a glob of water in the container. Gas does not evaporate like that. I know now that the sample was ethanol with some water mixed in, not gas. I ended up emptying out the tank and refilling with fresh gas, letting fresh gas drain through all 4 carbs and now all is good.

    I've never had this happen as long as I use stabil, but like Pliskin said, it won't help with the ethanol attacking rubber parts in the fuel system. Just helps with phase separation.

    Yes, ethanol is junk and its all political. Mileage suffers when using it, I don't think anyone will argue that, even the ethanol supporters admit it. So using logic one could assume that emissions would increase with the increase in fuel usage? But they will argue it burns cleaner in vehicles designed specifically to get more energy out of ethanol fuel. So I guess all the regular vehicles burning E10 are polluting more?

    Look at this quote....

    So, yeah – in your car ethanol might get you 25% less energy … but in a high-boost turbo car like the Chevy Cruze or the tiny new Ford EcoBoost 3-cylinders? Optimized to run ethanol-specific software? That ethanol will burn cleaner, last longer, and make more power – making “No. 5″ crap, too.

    Taken from here.....

    http://gas2.org/2011/07/02/5-common-ethanol-myths-exposed-as-crap/

    I think this is great.....the article actually proves the biggest myth they are claiming to disprove by saying that regular cars do in fact get less mileage using ethanol fuel. The article author thinks he's being smart and debunking the myth but he actually proves it by admitting that normal cars mileage suffers using ethanol blended fuels. Whats the percentage of these normal, i.e. "your", cars on the road vs specially made tiny turbo ethanol cars? 99-1....1,000-1....I bet more like 10,000-1? He's not talking about cars with the E85 badge, that means they can use it, not that they get better mileage with it. Another quote....from here....

    http://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/flextech.shtml

    Flexible fuel vehicles (FFVs) are designed to run on gasoline or gasoline-ethanol blends of up to 85% ethanol (E85).1 Except for a few engine and fuel system modifications, they are identical to gasoline-only models. FFVs experience no loss in performance when operating on E85, and some generate more torque and horsepower than when operating on gasoline. However, since ethanol contains less energy per volume than gasoline, FFVs typically get about 15%–30% fewer miles per gallon when fuelled with E85.2

    So its apparent that on a whole we are burning much more fuel than we would if ethanol was not in the mix. I would like to see a study that says just how much more. I bet its a huge number.
     
    Last edited: Oct 21, 2014
  12. Pliskin

    Pliskin New Member

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    Good info, 74ullc. Did I mention, Fuck ethanol?

    And I am aware of the benefits of running E85. With my car ('87 Grand National, and therefore a Turbo) there are several guys that have made a full conversion to E85. It burns much cooler, and allows you to pump up the # of turbo boost. I can't consider making this change because nowhere in the state of NJ can I find E85. NY and PA, yes, but not NJ.
     
  13. 74ullc

    74ullc New Member

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    So E85 does have its place, in specialty vehicles specifically equipped to take advantage of it. But for the rest of us and E10? It's obvious exactly what's going on the more I read about ethanol blended fuels. Its simply just a way to 'cut' our gas, just like a coke dealer cuts his supply to make it go further and make more money. Throw 10% ethanol into the gas? = You get an admitted to by supporters 3-4% loss in mileage, drivers who have compared mileage in their own real world experience report 9-10% loss in mileage. Imagine that. The ethanol is doing nothing but taking up space in the best case scenario.

    Even the ethanol supporters admit this, just in a round about way. Start searching and reading for yourself. Start with the two websites I linked to....they are hard core supporters and even they admit the loss of energy and mileage.

    But nothing will be done and it will continue to be the new 'normal'.
     
  14. NormK

    NormK New Member

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    Must be the circle that I live in, who are these faceless dickheads that promote this stuff, everybody I know won't touch the stuff, faceless bloody fools in government getting a kickback somewhere along the line
     
  15. MichaelD

    MichaelD New Member

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    For lawn mowers , weed eaters, dirt bikes ect. I add 16 oz of water to 5 gallons of gas. Shake well, flip the container upside down, let it sit about a half hour to a hour. The water and ethanol will seperate from the gas and sink to the bottom. I use a clear glass 5 gal bottle my brother used for making wine. You will see the layers of color difference. Drain the water / ethenol out and there you have straight fuel. Depending on the octane you use you may have to add a octane booster. The ethanol raises the rating so by removing it you will lower the rating. I only do this for my mowers ,dirt bikes ,and tractors. I buy 91 octane ethonal free for my street bikes.
     
  16. Glenngt750

    Glenngt750 New Member

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    If you use the higher grades of fuel, they put less Ethanol in it. In Alberta, Premium uses zero ethanol, mid grade 5%, and Regular 10%. When I was in the N.W. U.S. this summer it looked the same there. I left ethanol fuel in my bikes, and not used them for a month or two, and the fuel was already rotten.It smelled bad and ran worse. I've since stopped using it in my bikes. Any vehicle BEFORE 2008 should NOT use ethanol blended fuel. That is from the Manufacturers.
     
  17. Lint

    Lint Member

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    I don't like ethanol, but my Honda owner's manual for my 2005 VFR clearly states that 10% Ethanol is just fine. I have no choice but to run it, as that is the only fuel available to me for at least 100 miles.
     
  18. Arnzinator

    Arnzinator New Member

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    Same here. Some marine & power equipment shops sell it 1 & 5 gallon containers. But that isn't very convenient. When I bought my Suzuki I had to sign a warranty waiver. Basically if a failure was attributed to fuel containing more than 10% ethanol I would be on my own.
     
  19. nookiaz

    nookiaz New Member

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    I'm lucky enough to have 3 retailers in my area with ethanol-free gas but it's only their premium line. Sta-bil, I only use that when storing for the winter (3+ months).
     
  20. pbg07

    pbg07 New Member

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    Have been told by a number of mechanics and by the bike dealer principal to NEVER use ethanol in engines. Apparently damages the internals of the engine over time.
     
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