Sugar in the tank

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klickitatsacket

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I just pulled down a customers saw that was sent in. The saw is a MS660 with only 3 or 4 tanks of fuel through it. When I pulled the cylinder this is what I found. http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y186/klickitat/stuff_2777.jpg
Notice the crank case as well as the piston. The cylinder was also coated with this hard surface glaze. I called the owner and informed him of what I found. I guess he is running 4 other new saws off of the same tank of fuel. I asked him who he might of pizzed off and he thinks his neighbor is mad for him ripping logs at 10:00 at night. (not really polite mind you)If his other saws are not ruined yet and all he has to do is have them cleaned out; he might get off lucky only spending a few hundred dollars. I am thinking if it were my saws and neighbor... the neighbor might walk fanning with a saw protruding from the hind end.
 
klickitatsacket said:
I just pulled down a customers saw that was sent in. The saw is a MS660 with only 3 or 4 tanks of fuel through it. When I pulled the cylinder this is what I found. http://i5.photobucket.com/albums/y186/klickitat/stuff_2777.jpg
Notice the crank case as well as the piston. The cylinder was also coated with this hard surface glaze. I called the owner and informed him of what I found. I guess he is running 4 other new saws off of the same tank of fuel. I asked him who he might of pizzed off and he thinks his neighbor is mad for him ripping logs at 10:00 at night. (not really polite mind you)If his other saws are not ruined yet and all he has to do is have them cleaned out; he might get off lucky only spending a few hundred dollars. I am thinking if it were my saws and neighbor... the neighbor might walk fanning with a saw protruding from the hind end.

Dayummmmmmmmm, not good there. I once got hold of a 026 that I thought was locked up. I was lucky cause my rep from Stihl happened to be in the shop that day. We could hardly pull the jug off the piston, it took both of us to pry it off. The thing looked something like in your pic there but 10 times worse. Come to find out the guy that own it called and said he had picked up the wrong can. He had grabbed a can of used paint thinner with lots of old paint mix in it. He said the saw ran untill he cut it off and then it locked up. What had happened was the stuff ran as long as it was hot but once it cooled down it glued the cylinder/piston together. Never seen anything like it.
 
Newfie said:
Maybe just another ploy by Stihl. I bet they charge extra for the caramel flavor.:biggrinbounce2:

Yup you probly right. The guy came by the next day and I showed him what his paint thinner mix did to his saw. He laffed and said keep it, sell me a new one. I soaked that saw for days in GumOut and finally got it cleaned up. Sold it for 200.00. Still running today. Great ploy if ya ask me,hehe...
 
i would kill

I'll start out by saying that its not very polite to run a saw at 10 O'Clock at night but for someone to add sugar,sand, or anything to maliciously destroy my tools,toys, or possessions. i would have to take matters into my own hands. I am not the type to play games and try to get him back. I would show up at the door and take care of my business with him on his front porch.
 
Come on Tom, you mean you put paint thinner in your customer saws, so you can sell them?:deadhorse:
 
West Texas said:
Come on Tom, you mean you put paint thinner in your customer saws, so you can sell them?:deadhorse:

Every chance I get Tom. Hell I gotta make a buck ya know,lolololol
 
sugar in gas

See site below. Some years ago I had heard that the worst thing sugar will do is clog the filter. Same with sand or any other solid - assuming there is some sort of filtration device in the fuel line. All my saws have a filter. So I did a search and came up with this. Has anyone actually tried disolving sugar in gas?

http://www.snopes.com/autos/grace/sugar.asp
 
I have helped clean out a pair of cyl heads off of a small block chevy that smelled like burned sugar. We suspected that they had come off of a sugared engine. The sugar when it gets hot will carmelize on the backside of the intake valves and form a huge piece of charcoal looking stuff on them. He got the heads from a core buyer I would imagine the shortblock may have been real tough.

Don
 
I cant believe a neighbor would do that:angry: if it were me the neighbor would be wearing 660 around his head:buttkick: thats just wrong....they dont realize how costly these saws are.
 
Now lets all not jump to conclusions blaming the neighbor. None of us know what kind of fuel he was running as well as the mix. Was it AV gas and amsoil or redine racing fuel or possibly regular 87 with husky mix. I am sure with proper analysis the truth will come out.

Rotax Robert
 
SWI Don said:
I have helped clean out a pair of cyl heads off of a small block chevy that smelled like burned sugar. We suspected that they had come off of a sugared engine. The sugar when it gets hot will carmelize on the backside of the intake valves and form a huge piece of charcoal looking stuff on them. He got the heads from a core buyer I would imagine the shortblock may have been real tough.

Don

What year was these from? Back in the late 80's, early 90's I worked for a Chevy dealer. Cleaned out a number in intakes and heads with heavy carbon build up. Caused by drop in fuel quality at the time and hot soak. Due to rising oil costs, refiners were stretching to get more fuel out of each barrel. Result was more of the lesser quality fractions in the fuel. When you shut the engine down a thin film of fuel would coat the intake and upper valve area. Overtime, this would build up into a heavy carbon layer that absorbed fuel and caused poor cold starts.

Never thought about sugar in syrup form. This is probably corn syrup and may get through the filter. I'll do some experiments this weekend when I make pancakes.
 
Here is a little more to the story. First I couldn't hardly get the cylinder off of the piston. when I did, everything was glazed with this stuff. My first thought (because I am not sold on it yet) was a synthetic oil. I called the customer and asked about oil and fuel. the saw was run on 91 octane and 50:1 stihl mix. Next I asked him about pizzing any one off and he could not figure it out. I told him to pull his mufflers on the rest of his saws that used the gas from the same can and look for the same thing. I went back into the shop and smelled the cylinder. Now I could smell burnt sugar. Some of the other guys in the shop said they could smell maple too, but I only smelled burnt sugar. The residue of fuel in the tank was some what thick and did have a strange feel to it. No matter what was put in it the end result is that the entire saw is going to have to be gone through and cleaned. The tank, lines, carburetor, boot, crank case, piston and cylinder. A lot of labor just to make sure and protect this saw. When I called the customer back he explained the story of the neighbor not being happy with him and thinks that it might have been him. That is all I know of for sure. I am convinced it is some sort of sugar. Maybe a syrup or pop orregular sugar, I do not know for sure but the smell of burt sugar is a tough one to miss.
 
buzz sawyer said:
See site below. Some years ago I had heard that the worst thing sugar will do is clog the filter. Same with sand or any other solid - assuming there is some sort of filtration device in the fuel line. All my saws have a filter. So I did a search and came up with this. Has anyone actually tried disolving sugar in gas?

http://www.snopes.com/autos/grace/sugar.asp

Yep, I just did. I was aware of the same debunking you gave so this time I decided to try it. They are right. A bit of gas in a coffee can, a dash of sugar, lots of shaking and I had just what they said, a batch of wet sandy type material.

Whatever caused that problem, it wasn't sugar.

Harry K
 
Gas is sort of fickle when it comes to dissolving things.

Sugar mixes readily with gas, but will only dissolve so much, just noting the sugar that is still at the bottom is a test for how much it will suspend. Retry your test, but put in the sugar first, note how much there is, then add some gas and shake, note how much is left, then add more gas, it will dissolve more sugar.

What I think some are thinking is gas is a good solvent, but it is not as good as water when it comes to sugar, but even Kool-Aid will only hold so much and there is a sugar paste at the bottom.

It takes a coward to pull a dirty trick, and as far as the sugar / gas trick, it's as lame as that gets,,,, what do they want? a tube of grease pumped into there exhaust to think they need an engine rebuild?
 
I just tried syrup. Not sure on this one. I added it to the gas/sugar mix. At first it looked like it only mixed with the sugar. I left it set about an hour. Still looks the same (wet, syrup colored sugar) but the gas feels...well, sorta slippery. I am going to repeat with a fresh bit of gas and syrup only, then feel good gas before I try the syrup/gas to see if the feel is real or imagination. I will let it set for awhile and post back here.

Harry K
 
TreeCo said:
10:00 at night?

He's lucky his neighbor didn't shoot him!

At any rate it sounds like the two neighbors deserve each other.

I got a neighbor I am going to deserve. Chainsaw 10 oclock at night. He works second shift, so chainsaw at noon it is.

Who ever said we are wasting our time here.

I have seen sugar in the injectors of a FI vehicle so forget the filter business.

Sugar does not "dissolve" in gas. It creates a suspension. Think iced tea.

Fred
 
Anyone see the Mythbusters episode where they tried to prove several "add to gas myths". They had an old V8, added sugar, mothballs, and some other things to the gas. The engine ran fine on sugar gas, but it was an old loose 4cycle. I don't think they didn't do a tear down to see what it looked like inside.
Scott
 
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