methylated spirits in fuel tank

On the basis that water in fuel tanks is an ongoing issue, a good water trap in the fuel line would seem to be a better long term solution?

Cheers,
Peter
OKA196 Motorhome

We used to put it in the tanks of our Hamilton jetboat as quite often a bit of water slopped in when filling from jerrys. about 2 litres or so in 24 gallon tanks
Was 1960's so is a bit hard to remember. Wouldnt put it in a modern injected car though.
Ours was an old pushrod Chev V8 with a 4 barrel Holley on it

Muzbry I think all the metho did was dilute the water into a combustible solution such that it would pass through a petrol engine without the engine conking out

Metho or ethanol is "hygroscopic" it absorbs moisture from the atmosphere, it causes transportation problems for the massive US biofuel industry. I don't know what the colouring personal consumption additives they add to metho will do over pure ethanol.

E10 is 10% ethanol and some say you can go to 15% (like Brazil just has) if that helps
No I don't know the ratio though to get rid of water in a tank
Depends on your engine, but if it was anything bigger than a lawn mower I'd be draining the tank!

Mark

On carby models we used to wait until the tank was down to about quarter full, then chuck in one bottle of the stuff. It does alter the octane rating and burn temp a bit but nothing that would worry any engine.

If you look up the properties of ethanol (apart from the obvious effects on people) it will be described as "miscible with water in all proportions". You can try this in a glass container if you like. Partially fill with petrol, add a teaspoon or so of water and see how the two remain separate. Add a decent shot of meths and shake. When it has settled, the water will have mixed with the ethanol, and the ethanol/water mix will be dispersed throughout the fuel - not as globules. This passes through the fuel system without drama.

Never tried it on an injected one, but the ECU should accommodate the changed characteristics.

Hoses were not a problem for us as it was a once-in-a-blue-moon treatment, unlike running E10.

Gday
Sorry to muck you all around fellas, i did mean a diesel tank ...

Gday
Thanks fellas. I keep the litre of metho for mozzie bites and to take up space in the shed.

YEars ago (too long to remember when), I had a Citroen Ds21 Injection model. I was towing a 17.5 ft 4 wheel caravan and filled up at Narooma. I got a bad dose of water in the fuel and the engine was running on 2 cylinders instead of 4. The slightest little bump of a hill and it was back to second gear and a steeper hill was in first. I had to get up Brown Mountain... I was rather worried.

I limped into Cobargo and went to the hardware store. I bought 2 bottles of Metho and poured them into the tank. By the time I got to the end of town (only about 1 km), it was running on 4 cylinders and it ran better than it ever did before. I had about 60 L of petrol and I put in probably a Litre of meths. It seemed to be picked up immediately and cleared the blockage really well.

An extract from a US Natl Renewable Energy Lab report on the use of diesel ethanol blends (http://www.afdc.energy.gov/pdfs/barriers_ediesel.pdf)

'A 500-hour durability test using PEC 15% e-diesel
was recently completed by the University of Illinois (Hansen, et al., 2000) using a Cummins
B5.9 engine. Because the expense of running a controlled study was too great (i.e. running two
500-hour durability tests in parallel) the study relied on examination of engine components for
abnormal wear and analysis of the lubricant for abnormal levels of wear metals. The study found
that e-diesel promotes abnormal wear and corrosion on certain parts of the Bosch fuel pump and
fuel injectors. There was also a materials incompatibility problem with an electronic sensor on
the fuel pump. The excessive fuel pump wear was thought to be caused by excessive backlash in
the timing device because of high fueling rates, and thus may have been caused by the lower
energy content of the e-diesel. On the positive side there was no increase in metal contaminants
in the lubricant and use of e-diesel appeared to reduce the amount of injector nozzle coking
relative to petroleum diesel.'

Aircraft have a fuel drain underneath the tank, usually in the wing, that you could drain water from before flight.

Not sure why this can’t be done on vehicle fuel tanks as most tanks will have condensation overnight and the likelihood of the presence of a certain amount of water.

Mind you, I can’t see people doing a “pre-flight check” on their vehicle, especially as it would require them to get underneath the vehicle – perhaps it could be something added for those who are concerned?

Cheers, Baz - The Landy

Ya know guys, the more I read about the modern 4WD the less I want to pension off my old 1991 ute.
Maybe I'll keep it until one of dies (;=))

Cheers
Pop

With Petrol, yes you can add some metho to move the water thru and burn it in the combustion process.

DO NOT DO THIS WITH DIESEL as the metho will react with the diesel and form 2 seperate types of liquid out of the diesel and it will seperate out in the tank.
This is not good

As mentioned, drain the tank a bit from the tank drain and check for water, and then check your water traps in the diesel filter assy.

If you must, or want to add something, use 2 table spoons of Acetone to 70lt tank , this will enable the water/ moisture in the fuel to be absorbed by the fuel, for want of a better word, and be burnt in the combustion process.
less is more in this case.

Please dont use metho in diesel.
For an experiment, just add some to a glass of diesel and watch what happens.

hope this helps

cheers

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