nomad wrote:I know this is not the answer you're looking for but I never have used Stabil. Of course I'm talking about carbureted engines but I have often had cars stored for years and still got them to run well enough to get the tank down to where I can add fresh fuel. My storage regimen amounts to filling the tank so that the area inside the tank where water can condense is reduced and that is it. If the gasoline still smells a bit like gas rather than varnish it will burn. Maybe a little black smoke and you won't win any races but it will burn.
Kurt.
Stale fuel burning is not the issue, I have aviation gas without ethanol that sits around for a while with no issues, but something about the pump gas with ethanol causes it to gum up with a brownish sticky subtance over a short period of time (6 months). I have a 71 Porsche 911S and the fuel pump is always getting stuck. If I'm lucky, I could tap on it to get it started and run sea foam through it, if not, I have to remove it, disasseble the pump, use brake clean to wash away all the brown gunk and it does not come off that easily. It stays sticky and when you wipe it, you don't get all of it and when it drys it gets real hard. If it had gotten into the mechanical injectors or injector pump, that is a real pain, you have to soak the injectors for days and the pump requires pulling the unit and manually un stick all the injector pistons. The worst experience I had was on my Alfa Spyder. Car had a primary pump in the tank. the ethanol ate away at a 2" section of hose designed to be submerged in the fuel and turned it into mush. The tank was covered in that brownish goo, destroyed my fuel sender, or should I say dissovled parts of it away (the copper windings). The brown varnish covered the entire tank. And I have had this car for 30 some odd years and never had these problems before ethanol came on the scene. Even my carburated motors suffer with stuck needle valves and blocked passages in the carb. I use Avgas in my generators and motorcycle as they don't get used that often, but when I'm stuck with a full tank of gas, I use stabil and pray. But the plastic tubes in our cars are pretty hard and may not be affected by the ethanol, but not sure. There has been a lot of litterature on what reacts with ethanol and these tubes may be ok, or can be replaced with material Viton or Nylon. As I mentioned, most of the guys at my marina are replacing as much line with Stainless as possible and the flex line with that Gates barrier rubber hose made especially to counter the effects of ethanol. I'm trying to keep the car close to original, so would like to use some kind of plastic tubing, but don't want a crack developing in the line in the chassis down the road.