When does gasoline get old?

[David.Ullrich at ferguson.com]

My extreme case is from my boat. Anyway, the boat had been in storage for over 5 years when I got a hold of her. She's an old Century Thunderbolt. Anyway the gas in the tank was over 5 years old, and I had no idea whether the carbs had been run dry or put away wet. This boat has no real exhaust system, just 6 brass pipes that go directly from the block to the outside of the boat. It doesn't even have a real exhaust manifold. Anyway, I charged up the battery, and cranked her up. After about a full minute of cranking, she fired up! I was shocked! Ran like crap, and the exhaust smelled TERRIBLE! And it looked like somebody had set off a dozen smoke bombs at once, but it ran. I ran her up and down the river until she was almost on empty then filled her up with 105 racing fuel, and carb cleaner. Purred like a kitten! Well, maybe not a kitten, more like an angry lion...have you heard an inline 6 with no exhaust system at WOT? Eek! It made those girly men in those ugly loud cigarette boats look over... Oh, a pic of them boat in question can be see here: http://www.geocities.com/MotorCity/Speedway/2668/thunder.JPG
;)

Dave
1987 Coupe GT 2.3
1998 VW Passat 1.8T mit UPsolute (for sale)


-----Original Message-----
From: Bob [mailto:mx at snet.net]
Sent: Thursday, February 07, 2002 8:00 PM
To: Pat Dooley
Cc: quattro at audifans.com
Subject: Re: When does gasoline get old?


2 extremes but: (and one normal one) :)

-Found a 69 Boss 302 in a barn, bought it in 93. The tag expired in '70! It was pure varnish and
almost anything fuel related was replaced...
-My spider was in storage for 5 years.. when I took it out, only the fuel tank needed to be drained
and cleaned. Everything else was ok (Carbureted)
-My snowmobiles usually go cruddy from the last time I use it in march to the first time the next
year which is about nov/dec. Even with stabil it gets a little green and I have to rebuild the carbs
every damn year.

Conditions seem to have a lot to do with it.

Bob

Pat Dooley wrote:

> *This message was transferred with a trial version of CommuniGate(tm) Pro*
> I bought my Merkur in 01 with a tag on it that expired in 96.
> The gas tank was very rusty, fuel pump locked solid and injectors frozen.