I drove for the first time in a year yesterday (my auto has to get an emissions test biennially). It drove as well as it did new. I passed the emissions test with flying colors: 25 ppm hydrocarbons (200 allowed), 0.12% carbon monoxide (1.2 allowed). I was driving on gas I bought in June 2013. It was whatever the Smith’s (a grocery store chain) was selling that day ($3.40/gallon !). I hadn’t added anything. The fuel gauge told me the tank was empty, which, since I had driven 220 miles since June 2013, it probably was.
I’ve gone more than a year without buying gas before (I didn’t buy any in 2008 either), bought only once each in 2011 and 2012.
You’re lucky. Don’t push it, I’d drive it enough to use up most all the tank, then add a double dose of Stabil and the fill it up and drive a few miles before parking it.
I have heard horror stories about gas going bad in 60 days or less. I never use Stabil in my mowers or snowblower. I buy gas, at the start of the season, about 7 months for the mowers and 5 for the snowblower and at the end of the season drain and run dry. I dump the leftover gas in my car and have never had a fuel related problem. My snowblower is 43 years old and the mower is 37. They both start right up at the start of the season and I can’t remember the last time I bought a plug. I do grease them and change the oil yearly, sharpen the blades on the mower, (still original blades) and check the runner plates and scraper blade on the snowblower.
If I were you I’d sell the truck as quickly as possible, before this catches up with you. Where do you live? I’ll take it off your hands. Is Saturday good? Will cash be okay? {
Seriously, I owned a '79 and an '89 Toyota pickup. Those engines will run well on almost anything that’ll burn. They’re highly tolerant of fuel of varying quality.
Quoth GeorgeSanJose, 'How frequently do you drive this truck? Once a week? And what is the typical distance traveled in a trip?'
A couple of times a year. Sometimes I have errands to run around town, sometimes I drive to Apache Mesa (30 miles) to watch a meteor shower or eclipse. I used to drive a few hundred miles to hike in the mountains but I stopped.
Quoth texases, 'You’re lucky. Don’t push it, I’d drive it enough to use up most all the tank, then add a double dose of Stabil and the fill it up and drive a few miles before parking it. ’
I posted this comment in response to dozens of problems blamed on (and warnings made against) bad gas, both by I Fratelli Magliozzi and people in this forum. Mr texases rehearses them. I’m not going to drive around just to use up gas or buy an unnecessary additive. I may drive sometime next month.
Quoth Mr MY 2 CENTS, 'Where do you live? If you’re in a cool climate that can make a big difference.'
Albuquerque.
To Mr the same mountainbike: why would you want to buy my '87 when you got rid of your '89? And what happened to mountainbike?
I didn’t get rid of my ‘89. I gave it to my daughter. And, while I love my daughter more than any truck and would happily make the same decision again, I’ve missed my ol’ pickup ever since. At 338,000 miles she got hit by and errant Hyundai and the truck was totaled.
Mountainbike was my original tag. Many years ago this forum changed its software and the new software for some reason refused to allow me to continue using the tag, I had to create a new one, so to let everyone know it was still me I created “the same mountainbike”.
“I posted this comment in response to dozens of problems blamed on (and warnings made against) bad gas, both by I Fratelli Magliozzi and people in this forum. Mr texases rehearses them. I’m not going to drive around just to use up gas or buy an unnecessary additive. I may drive sometime next month.”
Your random luck means nothing, the “dozens of problems blamed on … bad gas, both by I Fratelli Magliozzi [with decades of professional car repair experience] and people on this forum [with many more decades of car repair experience]” means a lot. Fine if you choose to keep your old (and getting older) gas. Up to you. Your luck may hold…
I used to drive a few hundred miles to hike in the mountains but I stopped.
Well, now's the perfect opportunity to start again.
I'm not going to drive around just to use up gas.
Why the heck not? That car is an asset sitting there, slowly depreciating/getting old...and you're getting nothing of value from it! So...GO HAVE SOME FUN! Live life! Have an adventure or two! (Aternatively, trade the car for something you can actually use--like money--and it will wind up in the hands of someone who actually needs and appreciates it.)
You say you live in ABQ: there are well over 1,000 truly awesome day trips you can do there that having a car would make possible, or at least easier. Go to Santa Fe…Drive up to Chaco Canyon…Taos is always nice…Monument Valley is a haul, but a doable overnight…go swim in a hot spring…go rafting on the San Juan river!
Quoth Mr Texases, 'Your random luck means nothing,'
It isn’t random luck. I’ve bought gas only 20 times in the last 10 years, never had any of the problems attributed to bad gas, always passed emissions tests with numbers far lower than even the most-recently-built vehicle has to meet.
There used to be bad gas. Gas pumps used to have glass bulbs at the top through which gas was pumped so customers could see for themselves that it wasn’t dirty. Gas used to lack detergents. ‘Bad gas’ is an out-dated complaint.
Quoth wesw, ’ perhaps you have bought gas at an ethanol free station’
This is another misinformed bias. ‘Heet’, the stuff one uses to scavenge water from gasoline, is an alcohol. Ethanol has an octane number of 120. Race cars use it. One station in town sells pure ethanol for the motorheads with super-high-compression engines (or fantasies thereof) for a huge premium.
To meanjoe75fan: I’m having the fun I want. I don’t need a travelogue. They also serve who stand and wait. I keep track of how much I pay to insure and register it, so I know what I pay just to have it. It’s worth it to me.
As to the knuckleheads who’d buy it, the clear-coat is long gone; jerks have hit me and I’ve repaired the body myself (unprofessional looking, but structurally sound); when I touch up the paint I don’t bother to rub some of it off I just to make it fit in; after a bear attacked it and bent back the cowl louver I just bent it back myself; I still have the original windshield… they’re all wasters who think I’ll accept $1.97 and a bus pass then, on top of that, they’ll run it into the ground.
"As to the knuckleheads who’d buy it,"
Well, I guess I’m a knucklehead now, am I? All these years I’ve been wondering about my attraction to those old Toyota pickups.
Did you actually think I was serious? Did you think I was making you an offer? Wow. That thought staggers the mind.
Clearly you came looking for trouble. Like wes, I too will nevermore answer your questions. There’re a lot of us here who have been helping people for years. If you should need help, however, you’re screwed. Nobody here will answer your post.
I’ve lost confidence in the truth of anything the troll says. He clearly came here with no knowledge of gasoline and clearly with no interest in learning anything. He’s not making any technical argument whatsoever, only insulting and belittling everyone who says gasoline goes bad as well as other posters here. I believe he’ll say just about anything to cause an argument.
I am not sure under what conditions gas goes bad or not.
I changed the gas out this year in my generator as the gas was 3 years old, the gas looked fine but there was a lot of moisture in the bottom of the jug I poured it into along with with garbage in it, almost 1/2" of water for a quart of gas. I did use a fuel stabilizer.
I am sure the sealed gas system helps, glad it works for you. One year we had a 6" rain, stepped into the aluminum rowboat with a 7 hp motor to bail it out, and it sank. Dried out the engine, and used a turkey baster to pull the water taken on in the 3 gal tank, used up the gas and the motor is running fine 2 years later.
I didn’t think anything of it when RandomTroll started this discussion, because he (I’m assuming) has started a number of threads over the last couple of years and hasn’t been known to look for trouble. RT, folks took your question in good faith. By my reading, you got pretty lucky with the old gas. It’s too bad the discussion devolved into name-calling and snark. Remember: this is supposed to be fun and helpful!
