Chainsaw Fuel and Storage Opinions 2023 (sticky?)

[Sidecarflip]

I see no need to. Runs fine, gets 40 mpg (if I drive conservatively) and it goes like a ***** ape if I want to.

I suggest you try Bore Tech Eliminator. All my long range hunting riles get the BTE treatment and my Gradient Lens bore scope tells me it works just fine (as in no copper fouling) or propellant build up. I use it on my handguns as well. One thing however, when cleaning any rifle you have to use a device that keeps (any solvent) out of the action, especially with Jewell triggers.

Been hunting and shooting long range rifles for years, mostly custom built ones.

BTE is not cheap however.

 

[huskihl]

Can’t say that I use it extensively, but I keep a can of seafoam around. I was a concrete mason for almost 30 years and have several Honda 5.5 and 8 HP engines on mixers, power trowels, generators, air compressors… We didn’t have ethanol free fuel here, so for the first 15 years they were run on 10% 87 pump gas. After about 5 years, every one of them idled rough and would only throttle up with the choke partially closed. Figured I’d give it a try. With about 1 inch of fuel left in the tank, I dumped in 1/4 of a bottle of sea-foam and started the motor to make sure it got into the carburetor. That was in December. Fired it up in April and it ran normal. Did the same thing with my power trowel. Let it sit for a month and it ran normal. This was probably a 8:1 mixture, not the 128:1 or 128:2 they advertise for cleaning or maintenance.

Never did look inside the carbs until I bought a non-running portable air compressor with the same Honda 5.5 on it as the others. The steel surfaces were slightly rusted, aluminum surfaces were caked in something light tan, and the nozzles and jets had green corrosion plugging them off. I cleaned it out by hand well enough to get it started and let it sit for awhile with Seafoam in it. Runs fine now.

So I don’t know about removing carbon but it works to remove crud and green corrosion left over from letting ethanol fuel sit in them

 

[bwalker]

I see no need to. Runs fine, gets 40 mpg (if I drive conservatively) and it goes like a ***** ape if I want to.

I suggest you try Bore Tech Eliminator. All my long range hunting riles get the BTE treatment and my Gradient Lens bore scope tells me it works just fine (as in no copper fouling) or propellant build up. I use it on my handguns as well. One thing however, when cleaning any rifle you have to use a device that keeps (any solvent) out of the action, especially with Jewell triggers.

Been hunting and shooting long range rifles for years, mostly custom built ones.

BTE is not cheap however.

The only rifles I clean on a regular basis is my prarie dog rifles as they see several hundreds rounds per outing. Hunting rifles might see five shots a year so and all of them have Rock Creek, krieger or Bartlein barrels which foul very little. No need to clean them often,especially when using Dyna-Tek.
My main hunting rifle is a custom model 70 in 300 ultra. It's had a jewell set to 1lb on it for 20 years or so. I flush it out with Zippo lighter fluid to clean and lube once per year at the advice of Arnold Jewell himself. Never had an issue with it in all these years, which has included yearly Montana wilderness hunts, hunting out of boats in the Breaks and other rough uses.
Remington Walker triggers really benifit from the Zippo trick as well. Most the problems associated with them are from people cleaning without the use of a bore guide or over oiling as people tend to do. Mine have all been worked over and I've never jad an issue with any of them.size once varmint rifle which has a walker set to 8oz, but I knew going to that light of pull is a potential problem and treat it accordingly.

 

[bwalker]

Can’t say that I use it extensively, but I keep a can of seafoam around. I was a concrete mason for almost 30 years and have several Honda 5.5 and 8 HP engines on mixers, power trowels, generators, air compressors… We didn’t have ethanol free fuel here, so for the first 15 years they were run on 10% 87 pump gas. After about 5 years, every one of them idled rough and would only throttle up with the choke partially closed. Figured I’d give it a try. With about 1 inch of fuel left in the tank, I dumped in 1/4 of a bottle of sea-foam and started the motor to make sure it got into the carburetor. That was in December. Fired it up in April and it ran normal. Did the same thing with my power trowel. Let it sit for a month and it ran normal. This was probably a 8:1 mixture, not the 128:1 or 128:2 they advertise for cleaning or maintenance.

Never did look inside the carbs until I bought a non-running portable air compressor with the same Honda 5.5 on it as the others. The steel surfaces were slightly rusted, aluminum surfaces were caked in something light tan, and the nozzles and jets had green corrosion plugging them off. I cleaned it out by hand well enough to get it started and let it sit for awhile with Seafoam in it. Runs fine now.

So I don’t know about removing carbon but it works to remove crud and green corrosion left over from letting ethanol fuel sit in them

A little acetone added to the fuel will clean carbs up somewhat, but you have to be careful to not let.it sit long as it's hard on rubber and plastic.

 

[HansFranz]

After breaking in my barrels, I just use Ed's Red because they don't really foul (more) after break-in. Or I should say they reach a point of equilibrium where they don't get any more fouled than the equilibrium point, at least until they get all firecracked and shot out. And accuracy (or at least Service Rifle-level accuracy) stays consistent. Best way to fark up a SR barrel's accuracy is to go hog wild removing copper and other fouling down to "bare metal." Then accuracy falls off until you reach the equilibrium "sweet spot" again...

I guess if you're just cleaning a deer rifle and plan one fouling shot and one kill shot and then done, cleaning to bare metal is OK...but a typical XTC High Power match is 80 shots from 200yd to 600yd ... and you don't get time to spend 6 hours getting all the copper out between relays. So better to reach an equilibrium point for reliable, predictable accuracy.

 

[bwalker]

After breaking in my barrels, I just use Ed's Red because they don't really foul (more) after break-in. Or I should say they reach a point of equilibrium where they don't get any more fouled than the equilibrium point, at least until they get all firecracked and shot out. And accuracy (or at least Service Rifle-level accuracy) stays consistent. Best way to fark up a SR barrel's accuracy is to go hog wild removing copper and other fouling down to "bare metal." Then accuracy falls off until you reach the equilibrium "sweet spot" again...

I guess if you're just cleaning a deer rifle and plan one fouling shot and one kill shot and then done, cleaning to bare metal is OK...but a typical XTC High Power match is 80 shots from 200yd to 600yd ... and you don't get time to spend 6 hours getting all the copper out between relays. So better to reach an equilibrium point for reliable, predictable accuracy.

I broke in a new barrel of a 204 ruger chambered varmint rifle a few weeks ago by shooting a few hundred rounds at prarie dogs.
Break in is a bunch of BS IMO, although many barrel makers will disagree.
It's a fact that many guys induce barrel wear by cleaning. Incessant cleaning is counter productive IMO.

 

[HansFranz]

It's a fact that many guys induce barrel wear by cleaning. Incessant cleaning is counter productive IMO.

Yeah, I agree. I think more barrels are ruined by improper or too aggressive "cleaning" than from any other cause.

A lot of smallbore 22 rimfire match shooters won't clean their rifle bore ever. The wax on the bullets protects the bore from rust, and once it gets fouled, it won't foul further...

Whether or not you follow some protocol, rifle barrels inevitably / invariably get "broken in" with firing. Typically a new barrel will copper-foul in the beginning, then the copper fouling will decrease and generally stop as it gets burnished and fouled, IME anyway. My service rifles will go a couple thousand rounds without much copper fouling before they start to decline. That's why I use Ed's Red -- it removes the powder fouling and leaves a coat of protective oil, without messing with the existing "equilibrium" layer of copper fouling, which I suspect is almost like the glaze you get on cylinder walls. That's the theory, anyway.

What were we talking about again?

 

[iowa_jim]

To put all these ideas together, I'd say-

Ethanol-containing fuel can damage the chainsaw if stored in the chainsaw for a period of time. The group suggests that a month may be the limit of our comfort level. Ethanol-containing fuel might not be an issue in some locations for reasons unexplored, but there are different additive packages in different areas, and who knows what else.

Straight gas with above 87 octane seems to be the preference. Some seem to prefer the fuel stabilizers, some prefer to rotate their gas to keep it fresh.

Gas in a can seems to be the easy fix for storing fuel in the machine, with storage of up to a year considered to be safe.

From there it has to boil down to the specific use case and of course individual preferences. A low usage scenario, burning a gallon of gas a year, makes a strong argument for canned gas, currently running $25 a gallon in my area. Heavy usage would make using any gas acceptable, assuming that the fuel is being turned over regularly.

I'm tempted to run non-ethanol gas through the fall and finish with canned gas.

 

[ericm979]

Ethanol's been in fuel for decades. Manufacturers long ago figured out materials to use for fuel systems components that can handle it. I have 25 year old equipment that's on its original fuel system components.

The problem with ethanol is phase separation. Water in the fuel will dissolve in the ethanol. That's actually good. The problem is when the temperature drops, the water+ethanol mix drops out of solution. Then you have a layer of water and ethanol, and that's bad for fuel system components (and running engines for that matter). Fuel system parts, especially the metal ones, aren't made for water.

The more water is present and the colder it gets, the easier it is to get phase separation. I've never had a problem with it (or ethanol in general) but it's rare for the temps to get into the 20s here. If it gets cold where you are then it could be a problem. If you store gas in a way that it can get water in it, that would make it more likely. Sealed cans are the way to go.

If I had E0 available locally at a reasonable price I'd run it all the time. If you run your saws in winter and it's cold where you are, you might want to run E0 or canned fuel in the winter. I burn too much to make that cost effective and it's not an issue for me anyhow. I use fuel stabilizer and can leave E10 in equipment for six months and it starts fine. YMMV.

 

[Sidecarflip]

Ethanol's been in fuel for decades.

Since Obama.

 

[Mike Ray]

on my two strokes i use ethanol free and a cap of seaform per tank of 40-1 mix, suppose mmo would be as good.

 

[muddy42]

I believe you have the right intentions, but you misunderstood what you read about regular fuel versus fuel with two-stroke oil in it. In my experience, two-stroke oil helps fuel to last longer. Most are trying to use fuel up quicker for the smaller two-stroke motors because as you mentioned, two strokes do seem to be fussier than larger four stroke engines.
The reason for using the fuel up is because of two strokes being fussy, not because it has two-stroke oil added to it

Yes you may well be right. I am pretty cautious with my two strokes, the effort and cost of repair or replacement is just not worth it. I use premixed canned fuel in the infrequently used machines and only mix pump petrol when doing lots of brushcutting, in a modern machine.

 

[guym3]

Interesting discussion, so here's my limited experience.
I live in the UK where ethanol free fuel is freely available, so I use it. Stores for a year in a can with no problem. Left in a saw for a year it's horrible.

If I can't get ethanol free, then I add water and remove the ethanol, see youtube multiple vids. This is easy to do but takes time and by the time you've removed the 5-10% ethanol, then your fuel is more expensive than the premium ethanol free. In addition, it reduces the octane reading but it seems to work ok. My ethanol free is 99 octane but this doesn't seem to matter.

I avoid canned fuels as not only are they ridiculously expensive but you see some sensible people have real issues with them. No personal experience though.

If I'm storing a saw, then I pour out the fuel and add 30 mls of 1:10 oil:fuel mix. I turn off the kill switch and pull it over 10 times to fill the carb and cylinder with oil.

Just my experience but would welcome other's comments

 

[Tomos770]

I avoid canned fuels as not only are they ridiculously expensive but you see some sensible people have real issues with them. No personal experience though.

What? I find it opposite....Aspen 4T mixed with oil stinks waaaay less (clothes and other equipement) when used.

 

[guym3]

Sorry I stand corrected. I have used Aspen, which I find brilliant, but it is very expensive and increasingly hard to source locally. I was more referring to the smaller volume canned stuff of which I have no experience.

 

[Tomos770]

I buy 5L can of it (Aspen 4T) and use it only when I winterize my O*P*E.....that way 5L can lasts 2-3yrs...

 

[marsingbob]

Since Obama.

Obama had nothing to do with ethanol in gas. It was that radical liberal George Bush in 2005 mostly inspired by the radical american corn farmers.

 

[guym3]

Using Aspen that way certainly makes a lot of sense and value if you can't get ethanol free fuel. Might try it in the future.

 

[jellyroll]

I use 87 E0 because there is no 90 or 93 E0. Ethanol fuel at the pumps is 15% and i don't have problems i use standard oil mixed at 40:1

 

[Sidecarflip]

radical american corn farmers.

You may be right on the first part but not the second. I'm a farmer too and I don't know of ANY farmer who isn't a Republican and certainly not radical in any way.