New engine killer

[crewfish13]

I hate to burst your bubbles complaining about ethanol in the gasoline, but up here in the corn belt (otherwise known as Ohio), we've has up to 5% ethanol in our gas for years, and I, my wife, my family, or my firends have never had a single problem with it. This is definitely a problem with your service stations and their not being able to maintain their tanks, not the gasoline itself. Yes, ethanol is hygroscopic, but it's not that hard to prevent significant accumulation of water.

[SteveB]

I thought the tanks that store gas are pressurized???

Only for leak testing. Usually on new stations, an in-tank submersible pump is used to pressurize the lines to the dispensers.

[rcknrll]

Please tell me how not having the tanks completey emptied has anything to do with anything.

How would you "get to know" the place you get gas from?
I've installed pumps, tanks, dispensers, been *inside* the tanks....

Tell me how ethanol reacts with water.

Ethanol doesn't react with water, ethanol absorbs water. And I can safely say that gasoline and water don't mix very well.

As areas that are EPA listed as "Non Attainment" switch to higher ethanol blends and as the use of MTBE is phased out, more ethanol is going to be used. If the tanks aren't "dry" when the station makes the switch, they will initially pump "gas" with a much higher water content with the worst case scenario if this is the potential of damaging a motor.

[SteveB]

Ethanol doesn't react with water, ethanol absorbs water. And I can safely say that gasoline and water don't mix very well.

As areas that are EPA listed as "Non Attainment" switch to higher ethanol blends and as the use of MTBE is phased out, more ethanol is going to be used. If the tanks aren't "dry" when the station makes the switch, they will initially pump "gas" with a much higher water content with the worst case scenario if this is the potential of damaging a motor.

Sure.

The ethanol absorbs the water in the tank, and the horror story is over.

Any decent, legal station dips for water on a DAILY basis, and/or the Veederoot system sounds the alarm when water gets to high in the tank...about an inch and a half in an eight foot tank.