Just use the ethanol blend. Any issues with it are over-blown. We've had it here for years and I've never had a problem. I never use Sta-Bil over the winter either. Just shut it off in the fall and forget about it til spring when it fires right up and I ride away. Been doing it that way for 25+ years. No this post is not a joke. You may think so, especially the over-fussy people, but it's the truth.

 

That clogging thing is a myth.

I just broke a fuel injected Yamaha out of storage, sitting idle for a YEAR and it fired right up and ran like it was brand new.

I know many people here who have stored vehicles for a long time with tanks full of ethanol gas (stabilized, stored for up to two years) with no clogging issue.

 

The problem with the ethanol in gas is that it collects the water. That is what can cause the rust and fuel system problems. It is also more volatile than the gasoline, so it will cause carb clogging and stuff a lot sooner than regular. You are fine for at least a month though. (That's the longest my bike has sat unrun without stabil...I hate parts delivery, man!)

Also, for winterizing just use the recommended amount of Stabil or some sort of stabilizer and you're good.

As far as ethanol goes, it gives you worse gas mileage because it has less power. It takes more barrels of oil to produce one barrel of ethanol than one barrel of gasoline. It raises the cost of food and everything else ag. related because more land is dedicated to corn than other crops. It's just overall the stupidest decision ever.

 

Agreed on all of those points, my point was that 10% eth gas definitely does not clog stuff in a matter of days, weeks, or even months. I've personally ran 10%eth gas after a year of storage and it was good to go.

Of course, I regularly dose my gas with Seafoam, and just like HEAT, it has a dehydrated alcohol in it that absorbs water to form burnable alcohol.

 

No clogging issues so far with ethanol in my '06 Dyna and '10 Softail. My only complaint with ethanol is that it lowered the highway mileage about 4-5mpg on my '06 Dyna.

It's probably the same for my '10 Softail since it gets about 7mpg less than the rated highway mileage (46mpg vs 53mpg). The local stations switched to ethanol by the time I bought my '10 softail. So there's no way to determine how much of that could be related to overly optimistic fuel mileage ratings vs ethanol (probably a bit of both).

Anyone else notice the lack of separate Premium pumps with newer gas stations? They use the same shared nozzle for regular, mid-grade, and premium pump gas. Makes you wonder how much 87 octane your putting in your Harley's tank when you're paying for premium.

And it gets worse for bikes vs cars that require premium because of how much smaller our tanks are. Unless the last vehicle at the pump was using premium (unlikely), you're probably pumping a decent amount of low octane into your tank.

 

One of my pet peeves! I would think that hose and assorted internal crap (possibly filters) would hold a gallon or so. And like you stated, the previous customer probably didn't use premium, so you're paying the higher price while only getting maybe 2/3 of a tank of the better fuel.

 

Unless the goal is to help hobble the economy, then it makes perfect sense.


RAL

 

Obviously a LOT of misinformatin out there...

#1 - ethanol blends will NOT clog anything, in fact it will help clean your fuel system and help keep your valves carbon free.
#2 - ethyl alcohol DOES absorb water, which keeps the water in gasoline from separating from the gas and keeps it blended.
#3 - Yes ethanol will hurt gas mileage, but ONLY if blended above 30% by volume, otherwise no difference.
#4 - Ethanol INCRESES octane in the fuel, which allows the petroleum companies to use less aromatics in their gasoline, which in turn they are able to produce lower quality gasoline because they blend 10% ethanol into it in increase oxygenates rather than having to utilize expensive aromatic production process to increase the quality of their gasoline. FYI - octane prevents pre-ignition which is very bad for your engine H-D or otherwise...it does not make it produce more power, that's where the btu conversions come into play and how well your engine converts heat and combustion to power.
#5 - 10% ehtanol blends are approved for use in anything street legal, but YES ethanol and rubber do not mix...note your older lawn mower/weed eater fuel lines, they will dry out and deteriorate.
#6 - The food vs. fuel thing is a bunch of BS! The corn grown to produce ethanol is corn that would be otherwise used for ANIMAL feed stock, not the corn you eat at the table, which is all "sweet" corn produecd for human consumption only. During the production of ethanol, the starch in the corn is converted to sugars, which are then fermented to alcohol...the rest of the product is dried and put right back in the animal food chain in the form of dried distillers grains (DDGS), which is a high protein feed.
#7 - Ethanol will actually increase the HP your engine generates, not decrease it. (See #4 heat conversion) My cage (2011 Chevy truck), which is flex fuel makes more hp & torque running on E85...says is right in the owners manual. My mileage is worse, but I can feel the power gain & it's much cheaper here, so economically E85 is more efficient to run in my truck. There is no visible carbon in the tail pipe whatsoever and it smells great. I had a 2008 which I drove for 36,000 using nothing but E85.

I'm not pulling some kind of pro-ethanol bs...just stating the FACTS. I work at an ethanol plant, and I also worked at a refinery for 10 years so I know both sides of both industries from a technical, economic and environmental standpoint. IF petroleum companies did not use ethanol to blend into their fuels, they would have to produce more aromatics to blend in, which is an extremely expensive and time consuming process. Gas prices at the pump would be in the $5.00+ range if that process was currently used. Ethanol is used rather than aromatics because of the environmental impacts of aromatics...ever heard of Benzene?

 

+1 to everything said here.

Although on the food vs fuel issue, it is true that growing corn for fuel does produce a year round demand for that corn, and makes proper crop rotation schedules that much harder.

But I agree on all your points.

 

I had enjoyed YEARS of trouble free service on the two boat engines I own....that came to an end with ethanol. I will keep it short. I have an external fuel filter on the larger boat that uses a spin on filter not unlike an oil filter. I changed it yearly and the fuel in it ALWAYS looked clean, usually with NO water in the filter at all period. After I started using ethanol my engine started running poorly less than half a year in. I limped back home to trouble shoot. When I pulled the fuel filter off it was full of the foulest crap I have ever seen in a fuel system. I have run fuel cleaner through but on of the carbs is screwed so I have to pull it off and clean it up. Ethanol draws water out of the air it breaks down and seperates WAY quicker that regular fuel. My truck runs fine on the crap other than loosing 3 MPG but that fuel gets used pretty quickly. My bikes are ok but I stabilized the fuel if the fuel will not be burned quickly.
If you burn it quickly than you only have to deal with loss of power and mileage. Having to add stuff just to keep the fuel from breaking down and clogging the works up if you might let it set for more than a couple weeks is NOT acceptable. When you factor in the FALSE economy and that MORE energy is actually used to perform the work, much more when you factor in the prodution methods, it makes even less sense.

RAL