Ethanol additives

[Tim]

I found this article in a recent Practical Sailor issue. I have not tried any of the additives they tested, just passing on some information some may find useful.

[hanleyclifford]

The article in PS seems to make much of the problem of copper and zinc in the fuel system suggesting they are reactive in the system, but this does not seem to be an issue until ethanol is introduced. This is understandable since gasoline is not an electrical conductor, but water is when it carries a bunch of ions along which are readily available if a galvanic cell starts to operate in the carb. The protocol of emptying the carb at shut downs is looking better and better.

[joe_db]

Agree 100% and I have had good luck with running the fuel out. This is also the standard way to shut off an airplane, you pull the mixture to full lean and wait for it to stop.

[ndutton]

Due to family issues (I'll be glad when 2015 is over) my boat has not left the slip this year. I'm getting close to wrapping up my obligations so I've started performing long overdue routine maintenance on the A-4. Today I reinstalled my cleaned up HX, rebuilt carburetor and changed the fuel filter.

A fuel filter change involves polishing the entire tank contents through the filter before replacement, then placing the contents of the old filter in a clear glass container to examine for contaminants or phase separation. Like I said, it has been sitting a year, like all of us the tank is vented to the marina atmosphere, I fuel with E10 from a local high volume gas station (NOT the fuel dock, NEVER!), aluminum tank, no polishing filter, no additives.

The old filter contents were clean and pure, no particulates, no water, no discoloration, no striation in the glass container. BTW, I never run my carb dry and there was nothing indicating an internal problem there either.

[Dave Neptune]

Neil, no real surprise that your system was still good. A good clean system should be able to sit at least that long.

Tough year for me to as I only made 4 trips to the island with moving and all else.

Dave Neptune

[hanleyclifford]

Neil, no real surprise that your system was still good. A good clean system should be able to sit at least that long.

Tough year for me to as I only made 4 trips to the island with moving and all else.

Dave Neptune

Having that recirculating loop doesn't hurt, either.

[joe_db]

There is a bit of YMMV with climate. In Maryland the humidity and temperature swings are great enough that condensation on the outside of the tank rotted the wood base it sat on
I always make sure tank is kept full in the winter to prevent a ton of water condensing on the inside.