I suspect that what you were seeing as residue was the carmelized maltose that comprises 7% of honey. Honey diluted in gasoline and vaporized by the injectors as a part of the mix should, I would think, expell any tiny amount of maltose with the exhaust stream.
It’s also true that combustion chambers reach temperatures far in excess of an open fire. Open fires are typically in the range of 750 degrees and above. Combustion cxhambers can reach in excess of 2000 degrees.
While this is interesting, I think the main concern with the honey is congealing and clogging the filter or the injector orafices. But I don’t think this is a likely problem. I believe that any honey could reasonably have been added to the gas would be a small amount and would be sufficiently diluted to have no effect. I believe there’s something else going on here. The scenerio as a whole just does not strike me as a simple “something in my gas” problem.
Cane sugar is sucrose, which is C12 H22 O11. You described fructose, which is not cane sugar.
Complete combustion of sugar leaves carbon dioxide and water. Incomplete combustion leaves unbonded carbon behind which is the hard sticky stuff in your campfire. Throwing sugar packets onto coals is not going to completely combust sugar, and in addition will introduce other chemicals to the equation (from the coal, anything else in the fire, the ground, the paper the packet is made from, the ink on the paper, etc) which you will not see in a pure complete combustion.
Equation:
C12H22O11 + 12 O2 ---------> 12 CO2 + 11 H2O
… But if you’re interested, the equation for combustion of fructose is:
Other than the tank strainer and fuel filter, any substance is going to have to pass through a screen inside the fuel pump and more importantly an even finer screen inside of the fuel injectors.
It might help to know the exact details of what the shop did or did not do but if the injectors were not sonically cleaned or replaced then maybe the poor running and smell is due to misfires caused by clogged injector screens.
One would think that a clean tank, fresh fuel, and some additive along with high pressure would clean them out but you never know.
here is the list of all parts that were replaced in order of the invoice F-rail, F-injector, gas cap, F-pipe, F-hose, F-pipe, F-pipe, F-sensor, F-pipe, F=pipe, W-module K, F- tank kit, F- cansiter, sensor kit, heater hose. when i took my car to dealers i had the tech drive with me and as i was driving he heard the noise that my car makes which happens at 0 until almost 40 mph the gas pedal vibrates and the left side of the dashboard it gets worse as you try and turn the corner to the left the car still has a lot of lag as you try and get the car to run the smell was not as strong as it was this morning as it was this afternoon but i could still smell it the tech on the other hand could not the engine smell was there and it was coming from the left front side(if your looking at the engine) so as we were riding he tries (the tech) to tell me that he might be a panel that didnt get bolted down all the way he refused to believe that the vibration was being felt in the gas pedel
That list of parts sounds legitimate for a vehicle that has been heavily contaminated except the heater hose.
Was the original hose leaking and was there any loss of coolant and overheating involved in all of this?
At this point without car in hand and scant info I can’t even being to tell you what’s going on with it.
That vibration could be due to an engine miss which could be caused by any one of a number of things. Knowing if any codes are present and what those codes are may shed a little light on it but even that may not be definitive; at least from where I sit.
I’m a little late getting to the party here, but am I really the only one that has seen documented evidence of sugar (not honey, don’t know if it matters) causing major internal engine damage?
ok4450 there was no loss in any fluids in the car before it shut off and they didnt say that anything was leaking from anywhere as far as codes there is no check engine light on and they said they hooked it up and ran a test and nothing showed up as being abnormal… acemaster you do know of sugar causing major internal damage??if so where can i get this information at researching it gives me no information and as far as im concerned honey is sugar or at least has sugar in it so the effects should be the same right???
I doubt you’ll find any consistent documentation that sugar causes engine damage as it’s rare. But I have seen it. My story:
Police were called for a prowler, found ex-girlfriend funneling 2 bags of sugar into a Ford Ranger gas tank. Car owner then drove car until it quit 10 miles later, had the tank drained and cleaned, replaced pump unit and fuel filter. Another 10 miles or so engine developed strange noise and barely ran, brought it to me. Inspection revealed bent pushrod caused by a valve seized in the cylinder head. I surmized that the sugar that got in the engine “caramelized” on the valve stem and caused it to seize in the guide. My thoughts were backed up by the Allstate insurance investigator who inspected the damage and wrote a check for the total repair.
acemaster…in helping me understand this because im not a car person at all if there is damage done to an engine it will not start? there reason im asking is for future care with the car. i dont want a lifetime full of trouble with this car due to the honey. i have read and believe i understand all points of view so far but im having a hard time believing if it made it to the rail which is located right infront of the manafold that squirts gas to the whatever it didnt make it to the engine. can it take time for the damage done to show since im not sure how long it ran before the rails were clogged up. i know only the tech can tell me this but it seems as if this isnt even a problem as far as they are concerned even after i brought to there attention the burning smell and the vibration in the pedal and the car shifts funny. im sarting to beleive it has to go deeper than just a lose whateve. if you tell me my car is back to factory spec than why im still having problems even after i was told i wouldnt and that all damage had been fixed
mandiac, help me understand, is the car running OK now? Other than the smell. If you are not sure, have the engine borescoped. Google for services in your area. You need someone who has a full articulating head, not one of those cheap borescope cameras at Home Depot. The borescope can inspect the inside of each cylinder and down the intake manifold to look at the intake valve stems.
They would have to remove the exhaust manifold to look at the exhaust valve stems, but those would have the least amount of carbon buildup. With a borescope, there is no more guessing or theorizing, you will have the facts.
Okay, I’ll concede the point, that it’s not carbon but extremely black and burnt carmelized sugar.
But asemaster has described the situation as it’s been told to me. The sugar burns/carmelizes in the combustion chamber and as a liquid gooey mess it sticks to everything it touches. More sugar means more goo. When it cools after the engine shuts off it’s permanently stuck, like a big wad of rock. It clogs up valve seats, the space between the piston and the cylinder, space above the piston, everywhere.
One bottle of honey, if it even makes it to the engine, would either do immediate damage or pass right through if the engine wasn’t allowed to cool. If it’s been any appreciable length of time I think the danger is long over.
keith the car is not running ok its got lag in the shiffting from first into third all the way til you get to 40 mph alos has a vibration in the gas pedel with a grinding type sound when it shifts or i turn a corner slow and i will call up to the dealer to see if they have one of those scopes and why they have not used it to for no other reason than to shut me up…jaywb i dont know how long for sure it was in there i can guess all i want to but its only a guess and that could be wrong i thought a week but i was told it wouldnt be able to run that long with the amount that was in there so now im stuck as to when it happened so im guessing that since the car is still able to turn on and run even though the ride is crappy there was no damage done to the engine so now i have to figure out why the ride is so rough because i dont believe a loose panel would cause the transmission to lag and the engine to vibrate when its driven nor give of the smell
Here is a possibility, the honey is now out of the system and the engine is fine, nothing wrong with it. But if someone would go to the trouble of putting honey in a gas tank in the middle of winter, what else might they have done? Could they have put something in the transmission or cut open your CV joint boots and put sand in there?
Anyway, a borescope of the engine will settle those issues, but you might need a bumper to bumper inspection to look for other vandalism. Maybe install a motion detection security camera and DVR in your car. Check with local security firms to see if you can rent a system like that for a few days, then call your main suspect and piss him or her off again, but not mentioning your car. Just don’t do or say anything that would get you into trouble.
Maybe it’s a batch batch of ethanol, The little yeasties didn’t get a chance to eat all of the sugars and poop out alcohol. I am skeptical about the honey too. Corn syrup is cheaper.
