Two seasons I spent a lot of time trying to find why Harry's sled suffered a failure (xflipper) while his buddy's sled survived from fuelling at the same pump. The piston showed that it had melted the exhaust side. The thank was emptied dry and no water was found, but no water content test was done.
Since then I took an interest in gas for two strokes and found odd stories that I found difficult to believe. A Ski-Doo ETEC failing while a Polaris Cleanfire was showing a significant decrease in power from the same gas station? There were many such stories last season that didn't make much sense. Could this really be happening while our cars or trucks rarely show such problems?
It wasn't until almost a year later with subsequent failures that that Peter from That Girl Racing made it clear that there was nothing magical about these failures. The exhaust end of the piston crown melting showed clear signs of detonation. I didn't buy this at first, but failure after failure the evidence grew and well.....this is where we are at.
This is what bad gas can look like, but it can also look like good gas and smell like a problems as you will read later from the MachZ owner.
Recently, the following sleds that filled at the same gas station with Premium 93 suffered a failure or ran poorly. I took this information tonight so that you get the information as up to date as possible.
The failures start with the first sled that filled-up the most at this gas station, a Formula Z. It does not represent which sled is more prone to failure. This is just an approximate time line, and I got the most information possible. However it does show that few Two Strokes are protected against Bad Gas.
1st 1993 583 Formula Z SL
- Gas tank was near empty before fill-up
- Engine Failed
2nd 2013 Rush 800 RMK
- Gas tank level unknown
- Engine Failed
3rd 1998 Fomula 670
- Gas tank level unknown
- Engine Failed
4th 2006 MachZ 1000 SDI
- Gas tank 3/4 full
- Owner smelt stale gas
- Only filled 1/4 tank to full
- Survived all day
- Engine Failed the next day
5th 2010 Yamaha Nitro 4 stroke
- Started pinging
- Exhaust donut securing mechanism shrunk and got loose and began to make a rattling noise.
- Dealer emptied tank and ran new fuel.
- Problem solved with new gas with no failure
6th 2010 TNT 600
- Same owner as the MachZ
- Ran 80 km before owner made the connection with MachZ and other failures
- Tank was emptied
- Problem solved with new gas with no failure.
- 1 out of 2 survived, not bad?????
Since then I took an interest in gas for two strokes and found odd stories that I found difficult to believe. A Ski-Doo ETEC failing while a Polaris Cleanfire was showing a significant decrease in power from the same gas station? There were many such stories last season that didn't make much sense. Could this really be happening while our cars or trucks rarely show such problems?
It wasn't until almost a year later with subsequent failures that that Peter from That Girl Racing made it clear that there was nothing magical about these failures. The exhaust end of the piston crown melting showed clear signs of detonation. I didn't buy this at first, but failure after failure the evidence grew and well.....this is where we are at.
This is what bad gas can look like, but it can also look like good gas and smell like a problems as you will read later from the MachZ owner.
Recently, the following sleds that filled at the same gas station with Premium 93 suffered a failure or ran poorly. I took this information tonight so that you get the information as up to date as possible.
The failures start with the first sled that filled-up the most at this gas station, a Formula Z. It does not represent which sled is more prone to failure. This is just an approximate time line, and I got the most information possible. However it does show that few Two Strokes are protected against Bad Gas.
1st 1993 583 Formula Z SL
- Gas tank was near empty before fill-up
- Engine Failed
2nd 2013 Rush 800 RMK
- Gas tank level unknown
- Engine Failed
3rd 1998 Fomula 670
- Gas tank level unknown
- Engine Failed
4th 2006 MachZ 1000 SDI
- Gas tank 3/4 full
- Owner smelt stale gas
- Only filled 1/4 tank to full
- Survived all day
- Engine Failed the next day
5th 2010 Yamaha Nitro 4 stroke
- Started pinging
- Exhaust donut securing mechanism shrunk and got loose and began to make a rattling noise.
- Dealer emptied tank and ran new fuel.
- Problem solved with new gas with no failure
6th 2010 TNT 600
- Same owner as the MachZ
- Ran 80 km before owner made the connection with MachZ and other failures
- Tank was emptied
- Problem solved with new gas with no failure.
- 1 out of 2 survived, not bad?????