What to do with crap fuel?

[Beefer]

Need to get the fuel out of my tank. I've been having runability issues with the new boat, and ran it today on fresh fuel in a topside tank without a single hiccup (until I used it all up ). So now I have roughly 40 gallons of 'bad' gas I need to remove and do away with. I have two 5gal jerry cans, and one 1 gal can. That leaves me with about 29 gals I need still get out of there. I won't buy 6 more cans to do this. One thought was to run an ad on CL for free gas, with a disclaimer it is not fresh gas, but I'm sure plenty of enterprising CL readers would still want it.

What would you use the gas in? I don't own a lawn mower, or anything gas powered other than our cars and boats. I was thinking maybe put 5gals in one of the cars at the next fill up, but worry it may cause issues. The gas is water-free (tested), and was E10 (let's not go down that road, non-E is going in). I've added Stabil to the fuel when I was still trying to troubleshoot.

The local marina will dispose of it for me, but they charge like $3 per gallon for disposal , so I'm not excited about going that route and spending a total of $5/gal for gas I didn't use. Any ideas?

 

[iop]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

I have recently pulled my boat out of storage. ( had to store it due to life )
I put stabil in about 20 gallons of fuel about 2 years ago.
before buying a new trailer i wanted to make sure the engine started...
I brought 13 gallons of fresh gas... put it in the tank and started her with muffs and ran her for a while. No issues.
the reason I say this is:
What caused the gas to go bad... or do you suspect you just got bad gas from the dock/station?? And if it is bad... why sell a headache?? be nice

 

[woosterken]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

check with a quick change oil shop. (quick lube )

woosterken

 

[Willyclay]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

I just got rid of 20+ gallons of bad gas at our county landfill/recycling center. They instructed me to dump it in with the used oil. I only had two six-gallon portable tanks so it was necessary to make two hauls. We used a manual liquid transfer pump connected to the fuel tank line and it took three hours start to finish. The gas was so bad it didn't even smell like gasoline. Good luck with yours!

 

[Rezqewr]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

If you don't have a way to store the fuel, you could probably mix it in your car/truck at 25% "bad," with 75% "good" without any adverse effects.
How old is the fuel?

 

[Bayliner175xt]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

You could have one big bon fire ??

 

[kodibass]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

I had about 12 gal's of bad gas that had a little water in it but mostly it was just old (5 years) I went to our local sawmill got a large trash can of sawdust, layed a tarp on the ground spread out the saw dust and poured the gas on it a gal at a time, the next day burned a pile of brush & added the sawdust a shovel load at a time, it would barely burn>.

 

[dsiekman]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

While everyone likes a good bon fire, it isn't the safest or most responsible thing to do. Sorry, sounded like a tree hugger just then. Try calling your county landfill. Ours has a day, usually about one Saturday every couple months, where they take household toxic waste at no cost. This works well for stale gas, mostly empty cans of antifouling paint, oil, etc.

 

[Stachi]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

we invite people to put used oil and fuel into our waste oil tank at my shop...we sell it to oil recyclers...

 

[DuckHunterJon]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

Depends on how old it is. If it is just suspect, and you want to change it out for peace of mind - mix it with the car/truck gas at a moderate amount (25% or less bad gass). If it is reall old, stinks, or is gelled, take it to a place that accepts used motor oil. Just do them a favor and make sure they don't give/sell to someone local with a waste oil furnace. As long as they are just sending it off to a recycler, it would be fine.

 

[nuboat2me]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

I pump what I have left into 5 Gal containers and use it for the Lawn mower,, snow blower and mix it 40:1 for the leaf blower and string trimmer. It lasts me all summer.

I do the same for my Motorhome. thats another story for another forum tho...

I try not to put too much fuel in at the end of the season. Just enuff to keep fuel in the tank and add stabil. I run it on the muffs util I smell that the stabil is working thru the system.

I add Stabil to what I think is in there and haven't really had any fuel issues.

Just recycle it to your lawn equipment.... Or the bon fire idea sounds fun..

My $.02...

YMMV

Happy Boating!!!

J

 

[robert graham]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

Old gas is great for yellow jacket nests, fire ants, Kudzu, weeds, clean motor parts with(mixed 1/2 with Kerosene), start brush fires with, pour on terrorists, lots of good uses!...

 

[Cuyose]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

I wouldn't use the old gas in any mixture in your vehicle. In theory if its just a yr old and you run a filter etc to get the crud out before you mix it with good gas, you could be fine. I tried a while back and it immediately clogged my fuel filter. Not worth it.

It's going to be a pain in the arse to get rid of it, but your best bet is like someone stated above, do a search on craigslist for jerry cans or borrow them from friends and haul it off to the recycling center.

Maybe even check with people that own land around you, maybe they can use it to burn brush piles or something.

 

[Purecarnagge]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

basically there is 3 options.

1. pay for dispoals
2. Creatively burn the hell out of it.
3. Find another motor to mix it 75% good 25% bad with.

I would use option 2. But that's just me.

 

[wbc1957]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

Old gas is great for yellow jacket nests, fire ants, Kudzu, weeds, clean motor parts with(mixed 1/2 with Kerosene), start brush fires with, pour on terrorists, lots of good uses!...

Fire ants???!!! This could cause an explosion!

 

[mtp9302]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

I'll put another vote on the waste oil furnaces as long as it isn't gelled; I have a friend who owns his own auto garage, and that's how he heats it in the winter. He can burn pretty much anything that doesn't have chunks/gel in it, including old gas. Any such mechanics or other shops that use one should be happy to take it from you. If you don't know of anyone, the Craigslist ad you were describing would help.

I agree with Cuyose about not using it in the cars. I don't know how these things go in FL, but up here in NY it doesn't take long for fuel lines to rust. A fuel filter change can easily turn into running new lines when they start to leak from turning the filter nut, which could turn out to be more expensive than the disposal cost you listed. As was said, just not worth it.

 

[ajgraz]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

I agree with your idea to put it on Craigslist, "free, bring your own containers." Someone will come get it, guaranteed.

 

[Woodnaut]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

If you don't have a way to store the fuel, you could probably mix it in your car/truck at 25% "bad," with 75% "good" without any adverse effects.
How old is the fuel?

I've done this before twice with good results, but I did run the fuel through a 10 micron fuel/water separating filter. This is usually an acceptable technique unless the gas is very old or contaminated.

 

[asm_]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

That's not going to fly if the the fuel is already mixed with 2-stroke oil.

B

 

[poni302]

Re: What to do with crap fuel?

Thats alot of gas to just toss .I definatly wouldnt mix it w/ other gas to make it good but you could try this. mix stabil into it to stabilize what you have and then mix in the proper amount of dri gas to take any water out and also mix in octane booster to bring it up to snuff