An additive that does seem to work!

Decided to start my ES2 at Xmas, pretty much 2 years to the day since it was last started in 2013.

Fired up 2nd kick on the old petrol - not sure what it tells us, but clearly not all petrol goes stale, or at least too stale ?

Thoughts anyone ( polite that is) ?

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I don't want to start a heated debate on modern petrol, but I think it is now better quality than it has ever been, and the 'petrol gone stale' is mainly an urban myth.

I have started bikes that have been stood for a long time with no problem, or just maybe the pilot jet gummed up a bit. On my 3 classic bikes I have never had any problem that I could attribute to petrol quality.

A friend of mine lives on the wild west coast of Scotland where the estate he works on has a variety of of petrol driven machinery. They have a bulk delivery of petrol into the estate bulk plastic petrol storage tank once a year, which they draw from for those petrol engines. So, that petrol has sat in the bulk tank for up to 12 months by the time the tank needs refilling, and he has no problems with it.

I know that the ethonal content is causing some owners with fibre glass tanks a lot of trouble, but there are solutions for that.

Fifteen or twenty years ago, there was a high sulphur content in petrol, which to my mind gave far more problems to more more bikes than ethonal ever does.

For the sake of my children and future generations I am glad to see the back of leaded petrol, and I have never had a problem with valve seat recession.

Thats all just my tuppny worth

The theory behind the ' petrol going stale' problem is this: whilst a pure liquid such as water boils at a set temperature, 100 C., petrol is a mixture of compounds , some have low boiling points (light ends) and some higher ( heavy ends ). The light ends vaporize more easily and are helpful for starting, but will evaporate on storage more easily and so starting becomes harder. Thee top oil companies will formulate their fuels with more light ends in winter than in summer. You may well not notice any difference.

The second aspect is oxidation on storage,particularly in vehicle. This leads to varnish formation in carbs and consequential problems . Drain the carb if you lay up the bike and no problems, forget and you may have. My daughters MG was left over winter with petrol in its SU's, The chokes stuck fast, needed the jets drifting out and copious application of carb cleaner.

Previously alan_elstob wrote:

Decided to start my ES2 at Xmas, pretty much 2 years to the day since it was last started in 2013.

Fired up 2nd kick on the old petrol - not sure what it tells us, but clearly not all petrol goes stale, or at least too stale ?

Thoughts anyone ( polite that is) ?

.My 650ss would not start with old fuel in it longer than about 4 months. Put new fuel in first kick. I put the old full in my 500 Ariel and it runs and starts fine. Its about state of tune

my commando would not start with 3 month old fuel, i drained it down including the float bowl and put fresh fuel in it and away it went cheers nick

Please see the attachment for my reply.

A veiw point I heard I while discussing ethonal content in petrol with other classic bike owners is, that while fossil fuel prices are so low at the moment due to the competition between the deep well producers and the fracking producers, it makes the the more expensive addition of ethonal less likely. So maybe we should lend our weight to support the fracking industry.

I just hope it doesn't cause earthquakes under my house, or contaminate my drinking water supply ;-/

Anyway, Mark, I'm happy that that you feel well enough to get out on a bike again, and that your Commando started well. Also I'm grateful to you for giving us a good Roadholder magazine.

Keep your knee's in the breeze.