Gas-additive question

I can almost predict what the Tractor Vet is going to say. I have the following IH gas tractors, 706, 656, 574, H, 140 and working on a 340. I have been slowly working on my dad to understand that the new gas we buy in bulk is not the same as what he used to buy years ago. I have asked him to look into what Tractor Vet has been stating about getting 93 gas for these older gas engines. However, as the old saying goes, "You can always tell a German but you can't tell him much!"
Someone told him that he adds a bit of diesel fuel to his farm gas and it does a good job for his tractors. So my dad goes to Fleet Farm and found Stabil for ethanol fuel. What are your thoughts and experiences with this product or other additives for farm gas with ethanol in it? Thank you!! Tractor Vet--I am slowly getting him to look for 93 farm gas!!

Waste of money, 87 octane will work fine.

I know another guy who puts diesel in his gas for his old tractors. No idea if it works or not (his stuff still runs). I finally gave up putting lead additive in my 87 octane about 5 years ago and haven't noticed any difference yet.

Much of the cheapest gas that was common when many old tractors were new was crap by today's standards. That's why just about all farm tractors with gas engines have very low compression ratios (except a few Olivers). Then gas got better. Now - with 10% to 15% ethanol it's getting low BTU and low octane again. So, back to where it all started in a way. Low compression farm tractors do fine with it and 93 octane gas is a waste of money.

Local station in my town sells 91 octane pure gas (no ethanol) for $4.36 a gallon. Come and get it.
If I had an Oliver 1800 gasser (high compression), I might consider it.

Makes you wonder what the oil companys are doing with all the money they are making at $4.36 a gallon. They could probably pay off the national dept in six months.

I use Stabil in all of my gas that may not be used in a couple of months. If I don't use it in the 10% ethanol that we get my small engines won't run. I've only got 1 gas tractor and I put it in the gas for it too but it may not be as necessary.

No one was trying to stop you from buying Exxon stock.

I use 87 octane in every gas engine i have. I add stabil for all my chainsaws, snowmobiles,boat and ATV's that sit 6 months or more--seems to keep the cards clean and problem free.

(quoted from post at 21:57:47 09/27/13) Local station in my town sells 91 octane pure gas (no ethanol) for $4.36 a gallon. Come and get it.
If I had an Oliver 1800 gasser (high compression), I might consider it.

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We run regular in our 2 gassers, one of them being a 1600 with oversized pistons/sleeves installed. There times I think it may be good to put some high octane in it, but not being available for farm gas, I'm fine with that. If it's starting out in a higher gear with a load, I can hear it knock a little bit. For the longest time I really didn't know what I was hearing till I thought about it a little.

Donovan from Wisconsin

Snake oil works well, with a little MMO, acetone, and ATF.

Given the repleis so far, most have hit the nail on the head. For an older engine, with relatively low compression, using high octane gas is a waste. You can check out the link below to tell you everything you ever wanted to know about octane numbers, how they are figured, etc, but ultimately it comes down to one thing. The higher the octane number, the more resistant to detonation the fuel is. This being the case, engines with higher compressions need the higher octane fuel so it has the ability to resist premature detonation (basically resist compression ignition)and not actually ignite until hit with the spark from the plug. Too, high speed engines can benefit from higher octane fuel so the fuel/air mix doesn't ignite until hit by the 'hottest' part of the spark. Since the spark sets the timing, the closer you can get the fuel to detonate to the optimal part of the pistons stroke, the better off you are. So,using a fuel that has the ability to resist detonation until that time is what you need to do so.

In either case the idea is for the fuel not to ignite until the optimal time in the compression cycle. At several thousand RPM the net result of the fuel igniting early, or late for that matter, is a knock in the engine and a reduction of performance.

In the end high octane gas is great for high compression engines, high speed engines (ie-small 2 stroke engines, etc) but there really is need to, or benefit of, using it in an old, 'slow' turning, low compression engine.
What octane numbers really mean

being old myself ive heard many stories about the "new" gas ,so many that i really dont know what to believe so what is working so far for me is i use stabil in any engine that sees only ocassional use and i only keep enough gas or diesel on hand so that i run it in something by the end of the month i bought it in, not much of a deal i guess but neither is having fuel related problems on a critical piece of machinery just when you need it the most

One the 34089 will work fine as that is what was needed for that sires same as in 460-560 UNLESS like on a lot of 560's that were upgraded to 706 C263 pistons then ya needed to go to the higher. The old M- 450 will get by on 87 but here again depending on WHAT pistons were used . On my S/MTA i can get by with 87 as it had M&W 4 1/8th flat tops , my buddy's S/MTA with the 4 1/8th 8500 ft. high alt. pistons and a 450 gas head that one needs the 93 , What people forget that back in the 60's reg gas was 95 octane and hightest was 105 octane and FARM gas was guess what 93 same as the good old fashioned GULF TANE that was three cents a gallon less then reg. at the rest of the stations , down side of the old 93 gas was that even the OLD 6 cylinder Chebby pick ups would rattle and ping on it . the 93 octane is the MIN octane for the 06-56 gas tractors and when they nolonger made gas tractors people started to forget , then along came unleaded gas and lower compression cars and trucks and down went the octane around 76 is when all cars and light trucks were all unleaded and on into the 80's compression ratio's went down and so did the octane . The 87 octane burns much hotter then the 93 also. I had a old Massey 300 combine with the 225 slant six and i was having a problem with it running hot so i did the usual new water pump , new T stat pulled the rad and had it cleaned and rodded out checked ing. timing did it all . Still ran HOT Then i bought some gas out in In. that was FARM gas as i was coming home from a equipment sale and i had bought two 105 gallon pick up tanks at the sale and had them on the back of my truck and gas in Hoosier land was twenty cents a gallon less then here it was a 92 octane and i put that in the combine and instead of the temp gauge setting at 210 now it was running at 180-190 . When that gas was gone i put the 93 in it and same results . I have always run the hightest in my gas tractors as that is what i ran in my pickups and never had a problem and never gave it much thought as when i was going to farm i would fill the truck then fill the tank at the same time with the same gas . Not till i had and engine go down that i had rebuilt did this come to mind about the gas till i saw the damage and i knew it was a fuel related failure . At the same time this happened i had just bought two 706 at a sale and the owner of the one came up to me and gave me the org. operators manual . In all the tractors i have owned bought and sold i never had and operators manual before and i sat down and read it and in the back under FUEL it stated that the Min. Fuel req, for a 06 was 93 in the research met. I showed this to the customer who is also my personal friend and that is when we had his fuel tested at a lab in Columbus Ohio and the gas that was brought to the farm was 87 octane laced with MTB and the people at the lab also said that this was the cause for the melt down . One other thing here back when these OLD tractors were new they had FORGED pistons in them , now today the rebuild kits come with a CAST piston . a CAST piston can not and will not shed the heat like a FORGED piston will and they are not as tough . So for all the tractors in the gas end that were built in the sixtys to the mid 70's they were the HIGH COMPRESSION engines and were high RPM . There is a world of difference between a working engine in gas then the one in your car or pick up .I will say it again IF you use as much gas as we do thru our tractors it will cost you around 80 -100 buck a year more over the 87 and that amount over will not buy one piston or the gskt. to replace just on smoked piston . Same as usen the low ash engine oil yep Case I H is real proud of that OIL BUT you will not eat exhaust valves . I have also found that we have longer plug life and we can get thru a lot of acres to the tank of fuel . I bought gas powered because they were cheap and i did not have a lot of money to get what i really wanted . Back then sure i wanted atleast a 806 diesel but they were 5-6000 bucks i could buy a have decent looking 706 gasser out of the dead row for 750-950 bucks and usually once home two to three hundred bucks it was up and running. Yep i wanted a Massey 550 combine , they were 7-10000 i settled for a Massey 300 for 650 added a cab for a 150 added lights and a alt. for 100 and a two row corn head for 7.50 yep bought a two row corn head for seven dollars and fifty cents . Go ahead and laugh that little 300 Massey 225 slant six gasser made me over 26000 dollars doing custom combining for small guys and when i sold it the buyer set the price as he said he would give me 2850 bucks and he had CASH , but i made him wait till i was done doing wheat for a guy . I do know my gassers and what does work when you WORK them . For the most part most of you just play and never made your living farming with them or repairing them where i have . Go ahead and laugh at me but i am here to tell ya i know far more about them then maybe three other guys on here . Remember YOUR THE ONE's Asking for the HELP .

Stabil has naptha in in it,look at the MSDS sheets.Coleman fuel is straight naptha.

The lead additive was just diesel fuel.If you ever looked at the label you would have seen the words petroleum distillates.

You're starting from a flawed premise, that there's something seriously wrong with today's gas. Those tractors were not designed to run on high-octane gas; if you want to use it, fine, but they don't need it. It's true that almost all gas sold today has ethanol in it, but there's nothing you can add to fuel to take it out, so stop worrying about it. If you have a supplier who claims they are selling ethanol-free gas, I sure wouldn't take them at their word. You can test for ethanol in your fuel with a mayonnaise jar and a grease pencil, google it.

In my opinion, most fuel-related problems stem less from the gasoline itself and more from the infrequent use of the equipment itself. In most of the country, winter-grade fuel is more volatile than summer fuel, so it you have a tractor that doesn't get much use, filling it up in late summer is a good idea. Refineries switch to winter fuel around October 1st.

I admit I put a little Marvel Mystery Oil in my tractor's fuel. I've had problems with valves sticking when it sits for a while; that seems to have cleared up after I started using the snake oil.

As for "Stabil for Ethanol", does anyone really believe it is significantly different from plain oil Stabil?

(quoted from post at 22:08:41 09/27/13) Makes you wonder what the oil companys are doing with all the money they are making at $4.36 a gallon. They could probably pay off the national dept in six months.

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Go check on how much of that is various taxes. The company doesn't get any where near that.

As with many things, the government is the entity making all the profit.

About 2 years ago the numbers were, per gallon of fuel, 8 cents profit to Exxon vs 46 cents to federal and state taxes.

I have no problem with the oil company, they at least make the investment and do the work. The government is like the mafia, taking their cut in exchange for protection.

(quoted from post at 19:08:41 09/27/13) Makes you wonder what the oil companys are doing with all the money they are making at $4.36 a gallon. They could probably pay off the national dept in six months.

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Yup, they make 9 or 10 cents a gallon actual profit. NY State and the Feds get 70 cents pure profit a gallon here between them, 75 cents on diesel. With the money they're making, with absolutely no investment on their part, you'd think they they wouldn't need to run up the debt so high in the first place!

I always bought "101+ Octane Boost" from the local retail stores and used it in my Farmall H and 574 tractors. It works good. Keeps spark plugs from getting that coating on them and misfiring. I also use stabil in my lawnmowers after I'm finished for the season.

Bingo.

The oil business is a very mature business. Oil companies make very slim profit margins for findinig, extractinig, refining, distributing, selling, etc. petroleum products that all of us need.

Government does none of those things yet rakes in many times the oil companies profit margins to squander for, e.g., paying tens of millions of people to not work.

Dean

I've started using what they call recreation gas here,its 90 octane and 100% gas . I've spent so much time cleaning fuel systems this year that I can do it in my sleep. The corn squeezens are killing me and eating all my rubber line and cork gaskets.

Stabil is essential if gas is going to set over 30 days. As sombody said, gasoline use to be crap in the olden days but, it did not have milage reducing destructive crap in it like today's fuel.

I use regular stabil in all my tractor gas plus a little MMO always. Seems like it keekps the sticky valves freer that with out. I had the gas tank off for 3 months getting the old liner out of it that was deterirated by alcohol in the fuel,,The sticky valves are back so more MMO and some seafoam in the tank.

I just don't understand it.11 gas fueled engines on the place and EVERY SINGLE ONE,2 stroke or 4 stroke starts/runs just fine with this ethonal laced gasoline.What the heck am I doing wrong?

(quoted from post at 05:21:37 09/28/13) The lead additive was just diesel fuel.If you ever looked at the label you would have seen the words petroleum distillates.

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It always just looked like a quart of heavy motor oil to me, lol.

I don't know but I owned a Ace Hardware store for several years authorized Husqvarna, Briggs Stratton, etc. mechanic certification. I have seen lots of small engines, especially vertical shaft engines, destroyed by ethanol. I do know that different parts of the country and different seasons have different government requirements on ethanol. I just returned from a trip. I have a car that automatically tracks fuel mileage. I typically get about 28 MPG unless I buy gas at Wally World and then it drops a couple of MPG. I went to NM and AZ, the first time I filled up in New Mexico, mileage jumped to 32MPG. I got at least 31.9 all through New Mexico and Arizona. On one tank of gas, I got 34.6 MPG. The first time I filled up back in Texas, mileage dropped to 28.4. If I raised corn, I would be thrilled about Ethanol otherwise, my honest opinion is it is another Gov’mt fiasco .

this topic comes up about ever other week, so it was on my mind while I was at the local small engine repair shop. While waiting on the owner I got to talking with the mechanic. Long story short, he uses stabil in his gas. That's good enough for me.

)

Look you two. You guys keep talking like that and they will start accusing you of hanging out with the wrong type...me. You guys make me proud. Thanks.

Mark

I think you would be wasting money on premium. I was in a small engine shop last week and the counter guy was talking " small engines need premium'. A guy wanted to warranty a weedwacker he forgot to put two stroke oil in and the counter guy cllaed it an "oops ' no warranty. Sounds fair. I am cringing right now because I have a fuel injected bike with stored gas in it [for some time] with no Stabil. I like Stabil for winter storage and engines used seldomly.It can't hurt. It only takes a little.I have cleaned white crud out of carbs new gas or old ,I forgot. If it aint pinging the octane level is fine.Just my dummy opinion.

Everybody...I really appreciate and respect everyone's opinion on this topic. This is why I read this forum everyday. Everyone has so much experience and experiences to share. I am definitely listening/reading what you guys share. THANK YOU!!

I run regular gas in my tractors. They get run regularly in the summer and from mid fall to mid spring most of them don't get run at all. I used to add Stabil and it was OK. A freind of mine talked me into using a Primrose product. Can't remember the name of it but, it will keep gas good up to two years. My tractors start a lot easier after setting a long spell with this product also. I have told others about it and everyone who has switched will not go back to Stabil. This product also cleans fuel systems.