small boat engine

[garbear]

Dad gave me a 5 hp 4 cycle boat motor. I cleaned the carb. cleaned out his tank and fuel line. She fire up with some coaxing. Any fuel treatments to help her run good. She is running like a champ. I have been running premium gas 91 octane anything else to add to make it burn cleaner?
Garbear

[chuckbuster]

Briggs & Stratton markets a fuel stabilizer. Labeled with a dose for use and a dose for storage. Use it. Better product than "Sta-Bil"

[MT Gianni]

I have a close friend and fishing partner that is a Fisheries Biologist. He puts seafoam in the tank every time he is out on the water.

[Postalpaul]

Sea foam ! Don't use to much it'll burn to hot

[dkf]

I use Marine Stabil in all my outboards. If you can get pure gas with no ethanol use it, a 5hp will not go through much fuel.

[JonB_in_Glencoe]

Oh yeah, Seafoam !
a 16 oz can will treat 10 to 20 gallons.

[tomme boy]

Been running outboards for over 35 years. 1) NO ETHANOL! 2) If you can get the non ethanol in 87 octane the better. Do not run the premium unless it is the only non E10 gas available. Otherwise, 1 oz of Seafoam to one gal of gas will help with the E10

[1911cherry]

The hard part is over , getting it running right is the real pita, now just use good clean fuel and keep the oil changed once a year.
What brand is it?

[bobthenailer]

A auto tech for 40 years, Sea Foam is excellent ! just about a do all product for almost any IC engine.

Retired now have 4 cans left on the shelf at home .

[Lloyd Smale]

your motor was designed for 87 octain so dont waste your money on premium. Its harder to ignite and will cause carbon deposits and give less performance and gas milage unless you advance your timing to take advantage of it. Octain slows down the burning of gas so that theres less chance of detonation (spark knock) Its an old wives tail that it make motors run better.

[schutzen]

A second or a third on not using gas with a higher octane than 87. This is a $500 experience speaking. I ruined a tiller motor using 91 octane ethanol free gas. It is the only ethanol free gas available in my county so now I make sure to pick up 10 gallons of ethanol free 87 octane every time I am in the city.

For outboard motor fuel additive, I use Seafoam and have had very good luck. My brother-in-law uses Marine Grade Stabil and also has good luck. We are both running outboards built in the early 1980's.

[osteodoc08]

as mentioned, non ethanol fuel if you can find it (a good idea for ANY small engine) and sea foam. I love that stuff.

[Fishman]

Stabil every time, seafoam every few months. We used to run nothing but 91 octane at my office and never had any powerhead issues. The state mandated that we use 87 and three years later we blew a powerhead on a 4 year old 150 2 stroke EFI. Coincidence? Perhaps. And before someone asks, yes we had a water seperating filter on the engine and were using premium 2 stroke oil.

I used to always use 91 octane in everything gas powered at my home, except vehicles. When gas prices when sky high 3 years ago, I went to 87. Stabilized every time. My Stihl brushcutter is 15 years old and I have never had an issue with it until this year, had a heck of a time for weeks. Finally dumped the one gallon of mixed gas into the lawn tractor and bought 91, stabil, and seafoam. It was running perfect after 5 minutes. Coincidence? Perhaps.

My Dad's old Stihl 041 which has cut literally a forest full of wood (think several hundred pickup loads) since the early 80's was running just fine until I ran some fresh 87 octane mix through it a couple years ago. Does anyone know where I can get an engine rebuild kit, because it needs it now. Coincidence? Perhaps.

All that said, for a 4 stroke low horsepower outboard, I would personally feel just fine running 87, stabilizing with Stabil, and running seafoam in it a couple times a year. The large 4 stroke outboards also seem very resistent to the powerhead failures so common to 2 stroke engines. Ethanol just plain sux and will eat the interior lining of most portable gas lines made prior to 5 years ago. You won't be able to tell, the motor just won't run right or sometimes run at all.

No offence intended to previous posters but I certainly do not buy the argument that 91 octane gas is somehow bad for 2 stroke engines, large or small. I have heard the same impassioned arguments for the gas miser and slick 50 and I have to go with my relatively small amount of personally gathered empiracle evidence.

[schutzen]

No offense taken here, but my experience was my tiller motor over rev'ed for about 10 seconds before it threw a rod. I'm not the best small engine mech', so I took it to the guy I use to find out what went wrong. He told me it was the 3rd on in 2 weeks he had seen with the same trouble. He told me where I had bought the gas and that I was I on the 2nd or 3rd tank. Both were true. They station had just started carrying ethanol free gas and it was 93 octane. I don't know if that was the cause of the failure, but for the extra trouble of getting the gas in the city I can make sure it is not.

[leadman]

My last 2 stroke outboard only saw low octane gasoline. Could be why it only lasted 23 years! Or it could be that as I found out when I disassembled it that it was plain worn out. For many years I fished 3 or more days a month, year around.
I am giving Seafoam a try in my Dodge Dakota to see if it helps clean the injector that sticks when first started. Engine did not misfire this morning so it looks promising. Only 136K on it.
The gas does suck here in Phoenix as we are a non-attainment area for vehicle emissions so all the gas has ethanol with a higher percentage in the winter. At least we got rid of the MTBE.

[waksupi]

http://www.amazon.com/Chevron-65740-Techron-Concentrate-Cleaner/dp/B00092893E


I think this works better than Seafoam.

[compass will]

I agree with the techron. But for dealing with ethanol you can't beat startron star bright. amazing stuff

[Superfly]

I second startron great stuff

[MtGun44]

Techron has been around a LONG time. Porsche started recommending it for cleaning out
the fuel injection systems on their cars in about 1969. I use it every couple of years in all
my cars, starting with the 911. Two versions - one is cheaper, but just diluted. Get either
one, just recognize that the more expensive one treats more gallons.

I am unimpressed with claims that 91 or 93 octane gas helps an engine that is designed for
87 octane. Studied IC engines in engineering class and have been working on cars - from
overhauls to minor work for pay (long ago) and for free since about 1967, with an mech
engineering degree. No real reason higher octane than is required would help, unless
someone has modified something like advanced the timing beyond normal or maybe
putting in high compression pistons, pretty unlikely. More octane than is needed is just
money wasted, but if it makes you feel good. . . . like anything else, it's your motor.

Bill