Aspen Fuel?

[mowoodchopper]

I just saw Craftsman 40:1 premixed at K Mart for 5 bucks a quart. Too rich for my blood...Bob

Thats about what it cost here! You would have to be out of your damn mind to run that! Whats so dang hard about mixing your own fuel anyway? Last year I burned 55 gallon of mix gas through my saws at 20 bucks a gallon that would only be 1100 bucks! LMAO What a joke.

 

[kirkeg]

It's 92 octane ethanol-free gasoline with synthetic 2-stroke oil and fuel stabilizer. The big appeal is that it's the only convenient/local way to get ethanol-free gas here. Today I cleaned off the clearance shelf at Wally-World. Payed $2.50/can for 15 cans...

Buying 100LL avgas is getting to be more dificult, at least in my area. They've moved the 'perimeter' outside the station that sells avgas at the airport. Gotta get 'on the grounds' before getting to the station now. Homeland Security stuff...



I think your best bet would be to buy avgas (if available for you) or race gas (make sure it's not oxygenated street-legal fuel, or you're just buying expensive ethanol-gas), and then bring the ocane level down with camp fuel. Since camp fuel is already around $10/gallon, you'd most likely be out more money if you octane-boosted camp fuel instead of 'octane-lowering' avgas or race gas.

You'd have to look at the specs/cost of your localy available octane booster products (to figure how much it'd cost to raise a gallon of 55 octane fuel to your target level) to see for certain how much it'd cost to go that route. Plus there's the undersireable aspect of adding alcohol (contained in the octane-booster) to fuel that you're trying to keep alcohol-free (as stated above).

If you find out what octane level you'll be starting with (such as 100 for avgas, or 105, 112, etc for race gas) then we can figure out how much camp fuel you'll need.

With 100LL avgas you only need 16oz of camp fuel per gallon of gas to end up with 144oz of 94 octane fuel. Divide 144 by the ratio of premix you want to come up with the needed 2-stroke oil. For 50/1 you'd need 2.9oz of oil. Double the numbers to end up with a bit over 2-1/4 gallons of total mix.

With 112 octane race gas you'd need to add approximately 1/3 gallon (43oz) of camp fuel to one gallon of race gas to get 171oz of 93 octane fuel. You'd then need to mix in 3.4oz of oil for 50/1 mix. Double the numbers for almost 2-3/4 gallons of total mix.


Find out what's the cheapest, lowest-octane non-oxygenated (no ethanol) gas you can get in your area (probably avgas, but you might be forced to run race gas). Let me know what you find, and I can figure out how much camp fuel you'll need to mix in to hit a target octane level. If you can get non-oxygenated "ag gas" then you're a lucky soul, and you need not buy any camp fuel...

Thanks Eccentric for all the great info. I'll see if i can get some av gas locally around here somewhere! Sounds like the best bet locally.

I go north sometimes near Canada. The border is not far away so it may be worth buying a gallon or two to try out or just stock up on some.

 

[nvrs]

Figured out why they have the 40 fuel on clearance... They look like their stocking a new line... Truefuel 40. Got a few cans for the clearance price of $3.50(which doesn't seem like clearance price eccentric, since you got em for $2.50). Put some in my new ebay saw and it fired right up... Smoked a bit but I figured it was because of the 40:1 mix.

 

[Eccentric]

Figured out why they have the 40 fuel on clearance... They look like their stocking a new line... Truefuel 40. Got a few cans for the clearance price of $3.50(which doesn't seem like clearance price eccentric, since you got em for $2.50). Put some in my new ebay saw and it fired right up... Smoked a bit but I figured it was because of the 40:1 mix.

Based on the tags, I believe they marked it down to $3.50, then again to $2.50. Thanks again for the tip by the way. All but one of the cans I bought look like the 'new' style you pictured (and are mostly dated june 2010). The one older can (dated february 2010) is the 'older style' like what's in the earlier pics in this thread. The two cans RandyMac gave me are of the 'older style' too...

 

[mime mechanic]

They need to hire a web site designer. That's beyond lame!

You can forget getting it "mailed". It's gasoline. It's not crossing the border without a lot of red tape.

 

[NickC]

Thats about what it cost here! You would have to be out of your damn mind to run that! Whats so dang hard about mixing your own fuel anyway? Last year I burned 55 gallon of mix gas through my saws at 20 bucks a gallon that would only be 1100 bucks! LMAO What a joke.

Missing the point completely. If you're constantly running fresh fuel you don't have the issue of ethanol absorbing water from the atmosphere and depositing it in the carb, where it then corrodes the metals. You do have the issue of that and other solvents in pump fuel degrading the hoses and diaphragms though, but in a more gradual way and you'd probably notice it and deal with it before it's a problem. As apposed to someone picking up a saw they haven't used for six months and it refusing to start.

This stuff is aimed more at people who use their machines infrequently, or I suppose are concerned about health issues of being in close proximity to running engines?

It also doesn't have any of the other crap found in pump fuel, benzine, toulene etc... The stuff that stinks and gives you headaches and are linked to cancer / serous health issues. If you have a good sniff of pump gas it makes you light headed and nauseous, that's the solvents I assume. This aspen stuff just smells a bit bad, like petrol used to.

Yes it's 3 x the cost of high octane pump fuel, in the UK where I am ethanol free is unavailable. Comes in nice sturdy reusable containers and a straight gas version so you can do your own mixes. I'm about to try some.

 

[dgr]

Nice necro thread. $825 would pay for a lot of repairs due to ethanol. Kind of a valid point.

Is this stuff available at B&Q and Tesco or primarily through lawn equipment dealers? Seems that would determine who it's being marketed to.

Premixed fuel has one advantage for pros. You'll never have an employee run a lean mix.

 

[NickC]

Necro thread? New one on me, somebody's coined a phrase for everything...... I tend to look at the thread rather than the dates.

The thread wanders around a bit, and If I'm not committing some sort of forum faux pas here's what I found.

Put some in my HT75 pole saw, did not like it one bit..... Ran terrible straight away despite carb tuning, eventually stalled and refused to start and felt low on compression, I tested it to find it was 120psi down from 160 ish. Put standard fuel in and it started, ran normally and the compression recovered.

Tried it in a newly ported 026. Ran and idled ok, started to loose power after maybe six cuts... Killed it and pulled it over and it felt very low on compression..... Standard fuel in and it recovered power, felt ok pulling it over and I've just looked into the bore to see it's fine and back to pulling 235 psi!

Bizzarre..... It it washing the bores? I was interested in it but not that much to risk saws, back to the ethanol fuel.

 

[lone wolf]

Necro thread? New one on me, somebody's coined a phrase for everything...... I tend to look at the thread rather than the dates.

The thread wanders around a bit, and If I'm not committing some sort of forum faux pas here's what I found.

Put some in my HT75 pole saw, did not like it one bit..... Ran terrible straight away despite carb tuning, eventually stalled and refused to start and felt low on compression, I tested it to find it was 120psi down from 160 ish. Put standard fuel in and it started, ran normally and the compression recovered.

Tried it in a newly ported 026. Ran and idled ok, started to loose power after maybe six cuts... Killed it and pulled it over and it felt very low on compression..... Standard fuel in and it recovered power, felt ok pulling it over and I've just looked into the bore to see it's fine and back to pulling 235 psi!

Bizzarre..... It it washing the bores? I was interested in it but not that much to risk saws, back to the ethanol fuel.

That was my first thought too, washing.

 

[NickC]

Yes, very strange. I was using the straight fuel version with Stihl HP red at about 40:1, perhaps it doesn't like mixing with mineral? Maybe their own 2T version would give different result but at the price it is I won't be bothering to find out.

If I had a disposable saw I'd run it for a while and see what happens to the compression longer term. Both saws were clean rebuilds so were not coked / gummed up with a claimed cleaning action of the fuel lowering the comp on tired saws, as we know Stihl do a similar product so it can't be damaging?

 

[OM617YOTA]

My 034AV Super lives on Trufuel. You have to tune for it, but no issues at all.