Ethanol gas

[siuski]

My wife and I just bought a 06 21v. I was reading the owners manual and it says to use 89 min octane. Thats fine, but it doesn't mention anything about ethanol. It does say not to use methanol. But is ethanol OK to use in the boat, as it's getting pretty hard to find a station that carries gas w/o it. Will ethanol void the warrenty?? Any help will be appreciated so I can start scoping stations before the season.

[lowdrag]

Congrats on the new boat. I'm assuming you bought it from Dan. What color did you decide on and when is your spray date? If you're wondering, I'm the one that bought the white one he had on the floor. I recognized your screen name from one of the other sites.

As far as the question about ethanol, here's an answer straight from Indmar.

QUESTION: Can I use reformulated or oxygenated fuels?

ANSWER: Reformulated (oxygenated) gasoline is required in certain areas of the USA. The two types of "oxygenates" used in these fuels are alcohol (ethanol) or ether (MTBE or ETBE). These reformulated gasolines are acceptable for use in your Indmar engine. If the gasoline in your area contains either methanol (methyl alcohol) or ethanol, you should be aware of certain adverse effects that can occur. See your operator’s manual for details.

Also from the manual:

Ethyl alcohol, ethanol or grain alcohol is acceptable as long as it is a blend and the blended fuel contains no more that 10% ethanol.

It also says not to use methanol in the manual as it is a corrosive to the internals of the engine.


I'm not sure about the adverse effects other than with ethanol fuel, you don't want to leave it sitting in the boat for long periods of time as I believe it has a tendancy to draw moisture out of the air and causes water problems in the fuel. I believe it is recommended that you completely drain the fuel tank at the end of the season if you're running fuel with ethanol instead of just treating it with Sta-bil as you would fuel without ethanol. I plan on just running fuel with ethanol during the season as that's what most stations carry, and then finding somebody who has non ethanol fuel at the end of the season to make winterizing easier.

lowdrag-

Good call on the winterizing, thanks for the responce.

Yea, we are the one's that ordered the 21v from Dan. I believe that the spray date is April 24th or 28th I can't remember for sure. That's a little late for the start of our season but I sold my 93 SN to a buddy of mine that is still in school down here and he'll be around this summer, so I still have a ride until the 21v comes in. Heck, against my advice he took the boat out this weekend just to make sure everything is running right. I'm afraid it's going to freeze one more time. But it won't be long before we get into the water. I considered breaking out the dry suit this weekend, but other things came up.

We went with all black (including the custom color) and a red stripe like the one on wb.com. We'll probably end up getting the boat the second or third weekend in May. We'll probably be at the wakefest at Kaskaskia on the June 3-4. You coming down for that?

[siuski]

lowdrag-

Good call on the winterizing, thanks for the responce.

Yea, we are the one's that ordered the 21v from Dan. I believe that the spray date is April 24th or 28th I can't remember for sure. That's a little late for the start of our season but I sold my 93 SN to a buddy of mine that is still in school down here and he'll be around this summer, so I still have a ride until the 21v comes in. Heck, against my advice he took the boat out this weekend just to make sure everything is running right. I'm afraid it's going to freeze one more time. But it won't be long before we get into the water. I considered breaking out the dry suit this weekend, but other things came up.

We went with all black (including the custom color) and a red stripe like the one on wb.com. We'll probably end up getting the boat the second or third weekend in May. We'll probably be at the wakefest at Kaskaskia on the June 3-4. You coming down for that?

[lowdrag]

That date isn't that bad. It's actually better than what Dan thought he could get me when we were going to order a new one. He thought the best he would be able to do was mid May. I don't think it's going to get cold enough at this point to do any real damage overnight. Just have your buddy pull the freeze plugs on the motor and drain it.

I'm going to try to make it down there for the wakefest. It all depends on what my schedule ends up looking like.

[lowdrag]

That date isn't that bad. It's actually better than what Dan thought he could get me when we were going to order a new one. He thought the best he would be able to do was mid May. I don't think it's going to get cold enough at this point to do any real damage overnight. Just have your buddy pull the freeze plugs on the motor and drain it.

I'm going to try to make it down there for the wakefest. It all depends on what my schedule ends up looking like.

siuski, I ran ethanol fuel all season in my 05' 21v with only one issue. On two trips out after running hard while wakeboarding on 95 degree days we would shut down for 30 minutes for lunch and our boat would not restart. The cause was vapor lock due to ethanol will evaporate easily causing this condition. We now run the blower fan and let the boat idle for 3-5 minutes before we shut down. There has only been one other customer in our area to report this and I do not know how wide spread this is. If you experience this just open your engine compartment for 20 minutes and try restarting after engine cools down. Hope this info helps if you ever experience this.

[1988comp]

Alcohol is alcohol, so you should avoid it if possible, if you have to use it, it is better to run the engine completely out of fuel, especially for winter.

Alcohol ruins the rubber and plastic parts in the fuel system. A car that is FFV rated has all brass parts that are used for seating in some way.

You should avoid E-85 all together, and summer gas is ok, but use gas from the marina if possible if non-ethanol fuel is not available