Gasoline Quality

[Kenneth B.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

Long story, but illustrative of past issues.

My employer has an electric substation in downtown Chicago next door to a gas station. The substation dates to the early 1900s and was originally built as a direct current station. It is now Alternating Current, but it has three basements each of substantial height (12 to 15 feet). Those basements contain large circuit breakers that carry 13,000 volts. Some years back (before all this tank change-out) we began to smell gasoline in the basements and the part of the ground floor that is enclosed. This was reported, and the report went rapidly up the chain of command in the utility. You might imagine our concern should the atmosphere become explosive and one of those circuit breakers operate, as they are supposed to. Lots of people visited (I was involved in escorting many of them.) and lots of air quality tests were made. Amazingly the station owner initially denied any responsibility. Ultimately it was necessary to get government officials involved and the gas station was closed for many months. As I remember that was one of the first places I saw the fiberglass tanks.

RUN TERRY RUN & don't lite a match. LOL In Indiana about a lot of the stations closed because they didn't sell enough gas to warrant replacing tanks. I think BUT I DON'T KNOW FOR SURE that they had the choice of replacing the tanks or filling them in. If they replaced them they had to have all the contaminated soil removed. I was told that corn is not the most efficient plant to produce ethanol & that sugar cane& beets were better.

[Duke W.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

I was told that corn is not the most efficient plant to produce ethanol & that sugar cane& beets were better.

My understanding is that sugar cane imported from the Caribbean and South America is a more economical raw material, but the "renewable resources" legislation also called for domestically sourced raw material and production. So much for "free trade" that politicians of all persuasions preach about. The congressional farm lobby is very powerful - certainly more so than the oil industry.

Duke

[Tony S.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

About 2 months ago, I found a website that showed, state by state, ever gas station in a particular state the sells ethanol-free gasoline. If anyone is interested, I can try and find the site again and post a link on here. It's been nice knowing that I can put ethanol-free gas in my 65.

[Joe L.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

About 2 months ago, I found a website that showed, state by state, ever gas station in a particular state the sells ethanol-free gasoline. If anyone is interested, I can try and find the site again and post a link on here. It's been nice knowing that I can put ethanol-free gas in my 65.

Tony------

It's www.pure-gas.org

Hope you don't live in California, though; there are only 5 stations listed and all are in extreme northern California.

[Timothy B.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

We removed a 3000 gal gasoline tank at my shop that was in the ground for approx 20 years and there was no leakage. The inspector from Md. dept of enviroment used a ice pick and showed me a spot where the tank must have sat on a small pebble and made a rust indentation, he stuck that ice pick right through into the tank. I am glad we got it out of the ground when we did as there were no problems associated and the issue is closed.

As far as my 67 Corvette and the problem I encountered with the accelerator pump gasoline boiling, I am going to try a better grade of gas just to see if the problem repeats itself and if so then advance the inital timing to 10-12BTDC, and last if needed wire the hear riser valve full open. I have never had this problem with the car before..

[Paul J.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

I think BUT I DON'T KNOW FOR SURE that they had the choice of replacing the tanks or filling them in. If they replaced them they had to have all the contaminated soil removed. I was told that corn is not the most efficient plant to produce ethanol & that sugar cane& beets were better.

In my State (NC), filling the tanks is only an option for home heating oil tanks, and then sand is sufficient for the fill material. All abandoned or non-conforming commercial tanks must be removed. If abandoned tanks are on site, this can trigger lower values and testing of the area during a sale of the property. For home heating tanks, VA and FHA loans require removal of any unused tanks, filled or not.

Last year I worked with one of the million proposed ethanol plants that are looking at my State. They wanted several hundred acres to grow a certain type of South American grass. Turns out that this is listed as an invasive species by the USDA. Oops!!!!!! Needless to say, I have'nt heard from them since.

Paul

[Terry M.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

I am just curious Paul, if you can say. Would that be Switch grass?

[Gary N.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

I was recently told by a friend that was having trouble with his boat engine to try using Marine Sta-Bil (Blue). It says that its for gas with ethanol. I tried it and it really made a difference in the way it ran. Much smoother and seemed to be even more responsive. I have a 66' with an L-79. Give it a try and let me know if you see any difference.

[Paul J.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

I am just curious Paul, if you can say. Would that be Switch grass?

It sure looked like switchgrass, but it had a different name and was'nt native to North America, like switchgrass is. It was native to South America and I believe that the temperate zone that includes North Carolina was as far north as they felt it would grow.

You probably know this, but North American switchgrass can also be used as a feedstock for ethanol, although corn provides a higher yield. I think that these guys preferred this other grass because it gave the same yield as corn, but was a lot cheaper.

Paul

[Michael W.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

I was recently told by a friend that was having trouble with his boat engine to try using Marine Sta-Bil (Blue). It says that its for gas with ethanol. I tried it and it really made a difference in the way it ran. Much smoother and seemed to be even more responsive. I have a 66' with an L-79. Give it a try and let me know if you see any difference.

I got curious:

http://www.fuel-testers.com/review_gas_treatment_products.html

[Stuart F.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

To your original point Tim, welcome to the real world of Ethanol Laced gas - the problems for which you and I have communicated about over the past few years. I guess my problem was more acute here in the warm Florida climate. I was wondering if you had any similar experience with your 63 and the AFB on it. I believe the AFB heat soak problem may be more acute than the Holley as it is more of a direct metal to metal heat conduction rather than a close proximity ambient heat source. The AFB being all aluminum seems to heat cycle quicker. That is why, in my efforts to deal with the problem, the first thing I did was eliminate all metal to metal heat sources, i.e. steel fuel line and choke hot air tube. Then I went to the 3/8" (L-75) phenolic spacer sandwiched between 2 standard L-76 base gaskets. As I've noted before, most of my problem was under control, but I have since gone to non-ethanol fuel and really don't think about it any more. Yes, I did do some internal carb changes on my regular 3721SB, and I intend to get back to sorting out my 3461S again soon to positively correct that lean surge problem with it.

Stu Fox

[Stuart F.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

BTW, Shell gas with sugar based Ethanol is called "Etanol", according to the pumps shown in their TV commercials. It's probably just in their Brazil operations, but I kinda like the name.

Stu Fox

[Michael W.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

'Etanol' is the Portuguese spelling of the word ethanol.

[Paul J.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

BTW, Shell gas with sugar based Ethanol is called "Etanol", according to the pumps shown in their TV commercials. It's probably just in their Brazil operations, but I kinda like the name.

Stu Fox

"Etanol" is both the Spanish and Portuguese spelling of ethanol. It's all ethyl alcohol. Brazil uses sugar cane for their feedstock, and their alcohol content is supposedly higher.

Paul

[Duke W.]

Re: Gasoline Quality

In decades past all cars sold in Brazil were required to run on 100 percent ethanol fuel. This was because they had no foreign exchange (dollers) to buy oil on the world market, and they could produce ethanol from sugar cane domestically at an economical price.

Starting a carbureted engine on straight ethanol, even in a tropical climate, is difficult, so their cars did have a small gasoline supply for cold start and warmup.

Given the recent crude oil discoveries off the Brazilian coast, this may have all changed.

Duke