Fuel Question

[Bluebasser86]

With my Optimax Pro XS, I know it says to use 87 octane but would it be better to use ethanol free or stick with the 87?

[Doc-Drew]

Good luck finding "ethanol free"

[BrianinMD]

Think most will say Ethanol free, but only places I know which have it are marina's.

[Dwight Hottle]

Definitely ethonal free if you can get it. The ethonal free at marinas & the one station I found is usually higher octane. Maybe Way2slow can shed some light.

[gardnerjigman]

Good luck finding "ethanol free"

 

Can't remember if it's the casey's or QT in gardner that offers ethanol free. 

 

 

Blue, I've always been told to stick with what it's been ran with. I'd think you could stick with 87 and some additive every other tank. 

[tomustang]

ethanol free is always better but almost nonexistent. if you can't find it going at 7 and make sure you use a treatment Lake sta bil, quicksilver quickstore , or star tron

[Bluebasser86]

The QT right by my house has several ethanol free pumps, so it's not hard for me to get.

[BassnChris]

The QT right by my house has several ethanol free pumps, so it's not hard for me to get.

We have several stations around here close that have ethanol free.......but QT is my favorite.....the have double long fuel lanes with a pump at each end......I can fuel my boat with ethanol free and fuel my truck with ethanol at the same time!

But I agree.....ethanol free for my boat.

[joefish]

The QT right by my house has several ethanol free pumps, so it's not hard for me to get.

 Definitely ethanol free if you can get it.  QT gas is good.  Pays my retirement !!!

[lmoore]

http://pure-gas.org/

 

This has a list by state and then city of ethanol free gas.   Also shows what octane the station has for ethanol-free.  Use it quite a bit planning trips.

 

 

I specifically mentioned this to my mechanic this last fall when I took it in for service.  His response was "ethanol free, no question."

[tstone]

I run strictly ethanol free in my 250XS. There's quite a few stations that sell ethanol free 89 in my area.

[Way2slow]

I personally ONLY run top tier brand gasolines in my vehicles and boats. If you knew what this junk some of these discount stations sell was doing to your engine, you would give second thoughts about using it also.

In my neck of the woods, I don't know of a place that's sells non ethanol gas.

if your motor was built to run 10% ethanol, which I think most were for the last 10-15 years. The earlier ones that thought the were have found problems like some gasket material was not and some fuel lines gave problemsI but I don't overly concerned about it.

I would be much more concerned about running a higher octane than the motor is rated for. Doing that actually creates more problems than that little bit of ethanol. It can actually hurt performance and increase fuel consumption.

The higher the octane, the slower it burns, meaning you won't be getting a full burn on each firing stroke. It's also burns cooler. This leads to faster and heavier carbon build up which can cause particles to break loose. You know how hard carbon is, what do you suppose it's goiing to do to that much softer aluminum piston and cast iron sleeve when it gets between them and is going up and down several thousand times a minute. I've seen motors with 500 hours on them that ran cheap oil and gas they had more wear on them than some with 2000 hours that were properly run and maintained.

For those that don't know, you should do a web search on what "Top Tier" gasoline is. It meets very high standards for burning clean and a few other things. I think Cheveron was the first, then A number others, like BP, Exxon, Cosco (believe it or not) and several others. I had to pull the intake and heads off a 1998 Lincoln Town Car with 69,000 miles, and tear the heads down just to clean the heavy tar like crud in the whole intake track. It had actually made a couple of valves stick and the push rod came out from under the rocker arm. An elderly woman mostly just drove it in town, and used cheap gas gasoline.

[RustyShackleford]

I'll settle this. Most of your Exxon/Mobil stations will sell it. Check your local Co op fuel depot and see if they have it. Ours offers all three Octanes in ethanol free. And being a Co op, they have to advertise what they have. No gimmicks, no hidden lies. 93 ethanol free is 93 ethanol free. Granted, I'm paying close to 3.50 a gal, but the boat is loving it. Made to run low Octane and it isn't having problems. Then again, I rebuilt our engine personally, so I don't have to worry about what I run. I know what my baby likes and she'll get what she needs.

[Sam]

Darn, Blue, I could have asked the Mercury guys at the Classic your question.

 

May I suggest contacting the motor's manufacturer and ask one of their guys for their input.

 

Don't want anyone to change fuel and void their warranty.

 

And please let us know what you find out.

[Siebert Outdoors]

Ive alwas been a stick to the om kinda guy. I would run the 87 and use sea foam or similiar product.

We do not have access to ethonal free fuel around here.

[Brian6428]

Is it true that running a higher octane fuel can make 2-strokes smoke more? I've been running 91 E-free in my '07 EFI and it runs good but smokes a lot.

[Krappiehog]

Here is the problem even with ethinol free .... They all use the same trucks, so your going to get some in any fuel you run. The only thing you can do is use a quality additive and maintain things. The marine industry is going to have to step up a little on there fuel side to compensate for the crappy fuels being produced today. I work in the automotive industry and I have never seen so may problems with seals and catolitic converters as I have the last few years with the push of ethinol.

I have always run sea foam it is a awesome cleaner, and it works great. Use it couple times a year on EFI engines and your good to go. Keep your normal additive to combat the ethinol and you should be good, but running the high grade runs cooler anyway, so it sure want hurt anything,

[Al Wolbach]

I live in a two traffic light town in East Tennessee and ethanol free gas is available in all grades and at several stations. Although each station may have only one octane available.

 

Not long after I bought my 98 Yamaha VMAX, I was at the dealership and two Yamaha engineers from Japan were there on a tour of U.S. dealerships. They ask how I liked my Yamaha and a few other questions. I asked them which octane fuel I should run since it called for 87 octane and I was using 91 octane. I thought I was helping the engine and improving it's performance. They told me to stop and only use 87 octane. I will not argue with anyone about their answer because I'm not sure, but here's what they said. They said that the higher octane changed the timing of the engine due to the burn rate and would cause carbon build up on the pistons at a faster rate. Which would cause premature engine failure. They also recommended use of ring free which is yamahas decarbon fuel agent.

 

Not sure what difference it has made, if any, but my engine has only had routine maintenance since I bought it except for fuel pump replacement.  Oh, and a new lower unit thanks to a rock pile on Cherokee Lake. I followed their advice except I run Sea Foam rather than Ring Free. It still runs like new.....Al

[scbassin]

I run a 2007, 250 hp Yamaha HPDI & their engineers told me the same thing that Way To Slow & Al had to say in their post. To run 87 octane because of the carbon build up. I have been using ethanol free 89 octane & adding Sea Foam to every tank. I have now found a station that carries Ethanol free 87 octane So I am going to switch.

[AQUA VELVA]

I use marina gas in both my 94, 60hp, Merc 2 stroke on the bass boat and 05, 50hp ,Yamaha 2 stroke on the pontoon. I noticed a difference on the first tank as they both run much smoother and start easier. Marina gas is $5.50 a gal. where I'm at but a full tank in each will usually get me through the season and I think it's worth it. I still use Stabil in both engines throughout the summer as per the motor mech's recommendations at the marina. I haven't run across a gas station in my area yet that carries ethanol free gas.

[Way2slow]

It's raining and sitting here board so decided I would explain the octane bit a little better and how it affects the engine.

The higher the compression, the higher the octane needs to be to prevent pre detonation, Spark Knock, which can damage Pistons and break top rings if severe enough.

In the late 70s-early 80s when they had to remove the lead from gas, the primary octane booster at that time, the quick, easy fix was to just drop the compression to as low as 85-90 pounds in some Motors and back the timing off a couple of degrees. This helped those poorly casted, high production motors burn even more fuel. That's why motors like the Johnson 200GT picked up the saying GT stood for Gas Thursty. They took a 300 hp design and used it for a 200 hp motor, so they could keep. quality of the castings to a minimum, thus cost to build. Gas was still somewhat cheap back then, so who cared.

As the years have past, and they have found replacements for lead as octane boosters, though still none as good, and the cost of gasoline is no longer cheap and very much a factor in what motor you buy, they had to come off the engineering dollars, greatly improve quality control and their technology to build the most fuel efficient motor they can.

The first step was much more advanced engine control systems. With this they were able to increase the compression with much smaller error margins to allow for bad gas. Those old motors that used to run 85-90 pounds now run 125-128 pounds to run 87 octane. You can run approx 135 pounds with 87 octane but they have to leave some room for those people that thinks it's OK to run that crap that has sat in the tanks for months-years on end, or buy that marina gas that's no telling what. The higher the compression gives better fuel economy, more bottom end torque, and more horse power.. The two strokes of today are nothing like the two strokes 20 years ago, nor the four strokes.

In the old days, you could just bump your timing up a couple degrees and burn higher octane if you felt that's what you needed. Today's motors it's not so simple. The advanced design has no way of knowing you have added higher octane, and the manufacture has invested major sums of money in engineering and testing so that motor performs at its peak with their recommended octane.

Now, you can always do like the racers do, put it on a Dino and try to tune it for the octane fuel you plan to run, but short of that, I would just run what the manufacture recommends. It is however your motor, and if you feel you know something the manufactures engineers didn't, you can 107 octane race fuel in a 87 octane motor if you feel that's best.

[blackmax135]

Every time I put gas with ethanol in it my motor starts acting up.  Only non ethanol gas around here is 93