"dennis meissner" wrote in message
m...
Well hopefully in the northwest we may soon get more than a few successive
days of warm weather so we can enjoy taking our boats out.

Haven't de-winterized the boat as yet but will probably do it this
weekend. But what is now concerning me is my fuel I put in the tank last
fall.

Somewhere awhile back from this group I remember the practice of filling
the tank to minimize condensation as part of winterization. what concerns
me now is the use of ethanol in our gas. In a conversation I had with my
mechanic today he told me that over time the ethanol will seperate from
gas.

Should this be a concern?

thanks
Dennis Meissner
You mechanic is right. Exactly what happens is that the ethanol component
in gas absorbes water. It's very similar to those cans of stuff that you
would add to your car gas if you though it had water in it. But there is a
threshold for the amount of water it can absorb. After that it falls out of
the gas to the bottom of the tank. That's when you have a problem. There
is really no way to predict if this has happened to you or not short of
examining the gas. With a full tank the odds are highly in your favor that
everything is fine. This is the main reason that gas with ethanol in it is
not the best thing to use in a boat since they are usually in high humidity
a lot. But many people have no choice.

If you really want to be cautious and have a full size spin on gas filter,
remove it and dump it to get any water that's in it now out. Fill the
filter with gas and put it back on. Start the boat and run it a little
while. Then remove the filter again and dump it into a clear glass
container. If you've got any significant amount of water in it then you
have too much water at the bottom of your fuel tank.

Many boats have a small amount of water/crud in the bottom of their tank.
That's why the fuel pickup does not extend all the way to the bottom but
stops an inch or so above it. The only really good way to get it out on
most boats is to remove the fuel gauge sender unit so that the tank can be
emptied via a syphon hose directly to the bottom. Sometimes with a
flashlight (turned on away from the tank before using) you can see the
bottom layer of water and get the syphon hose to pick most of that up
without having to drain the entire tank. Of course how easily the tank is
accessed has a lot to do with this. Sometimes it is also possible to do
this with one of those manual pumps and hoses that you use to drain engine
oil out the dipstick tube. Keep in mind messing around with a bunch of gas
is really dangerous so keep the ignition sources out of the area.