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Boat Engines and Ethanol Blended Fuel
From Jim Shepard,
Your Guide to Powerboating.
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Potentially Big Trouble for Some Powerboaters
A marine mechanic in my area, who has made a name for himself as someone who has the “magic touch” when it comes to repairing and improving performance on gasoline powered boats, informed me that he has boats with sick engines “lined up around the block.” In past years, he has had to rebuild maybe a dozen carburetors or injector systems each season. This year he has already done over fifty (50) and it’s only the middle of July. There also is an overabundance of burned or badly fouled valves showing up this year. He is convenienced that he has found the “root” cause of this entire problem; CORN! The price of gasoline at the marinas in our area is about fifty to sixty cents per gallon more than at the local gas station.
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As a result, many people with trailerable boats are buying their fuel at the gas station. 'What’s the problem, you ask?' Simple! Many of these stations are selling Ethanol blended gasoline (E-10) and therein “lies the rub.” According to the experts, E-10 fuel is raising all kinds of problems with marine engines and some fuel tanks. First of all, as I understand it, Ethanol is a solvent and as such is dissolving the resin in some fiberglass fuel tanks, especially the ones made with polyester resin. In older boats, it will also dissolve any acumination of contaminates in the fuel tank and system and send the whole gooey mess through the system into the engine itself. Most gasoline sold without Ethanol in it has a component called MBTE added to the base gasoline. Now if you mix Ethanol with MBTE, you create a gel-like substance that clogs up everything! Wait, it gets even worse! Ethanol attracts water. Unlike cars, boat fuel tanks vent into the open air. Thus, Ethanol can literally suck moisture in from the air to collect in your fuel tank. For those of us that keep our boats in storage for 5 to 6 months (or more), the shelf life of E-10 is estimated to possibly be as short as 60 to 90 days before it starts to turn into “chewing gum”, so to speak.
For all of you boaters with high performance boats, here is some more disturbing news. When Ethanol mixes with water, it separates form the base gasoline product and can lower a 93 octane fuel to an 89 octane fuel in a jiffy. That fact alone could void the manufacturer’s warranty on a high performance engine.
What to do about it? Here are few suggestions.
• I’d invest in some large filter/water separators and install them in my fuel line.
• Purchase a lot of replacement cartridges and be prepared to change them early and often
• Try to burn all of the remaining fuel with MBTE out of the tank before using the E-10 blend.
• If your boat has fiberglass fuel tanks, seriously consider replacing them with aluminum or plastic ones.
• Finally, some states are considering mandating the sale of, not E-10, but rather E-20. If this happens, I think that you can take every problem that boaters are having now with E-10 and multiply it by 2.
