Bad batch of fuel, making the hobby shop accountable...

[crankestein]

I had a minor crash due to dead sticks on a very windy day w a top wing airplane. At the club we spent significant amount of time tuning the engine, on the ground it seemed fine but once airborne it would turn off. At the beginning I thought maybe it needed some castor oil, as I have seen before. Put two ounces and to the air again, dead sticks and a few seconds later the landing was no longer part of the fuselage. Airplane was to low to recover on a windy day and either land it or against one of the field chain dividers, and landing was the answer regardless of the drop in altitude.

Put the broken airplane aside and flew one of my backups, a modded wing trainer, and again getting hesitation, engine overheating, and unable to maintain idle. Too much coincidence, one thing in common, the same fuel. So to the hobby shop I went, once there they confirmed the fuel was bad and removed the remaining ones out of the shelf.

Shouldnt they be accountable to pay the airplane damages?

Shouldnt they test the fuel before putting it on the shelf for sale?

[radfordc]

No and no.

[rifleman_btx]

Unfortunately it's not the hobby shops responsibility.

[Dewey H Lee]

No once the fuel has been opened then it will start to draw mosture from the air. So opening a can of new fuel is a bad idea until ready for use. If anyone its on the manufacturer. Good luck.

[crankestein]

Ok, understood.

[benjack71]

No, no and why did you add castor oil?

[crankestein]

SIG states it has Klotz castor oil, so went ahead and tried it on the .52, no luck tuning, .40FP (which is a super easy engine) and overheating as well after plenty of tuning.
Others say thats what you get from buying used engines, its worn out and tired, others swap the glow plug, too much prop and so on. Tried it on another FP40, same deal, hesitation at idling etc. Only change on all three engines, fuel. Added some castor and seemed to help, but the larger engine still struggling during transition, but definitely better and not getting as hot.

Went back to Cool Power and added 3 ounces of castor, let all engines burn all that garbage fuel, after a tank or so, all problems gone, good power, transition fine, steady idle.

I use it also on all my nitro rc cars, and can tell they run better. To be able to see smoke high in the sky is good indication of a well lubed engine, good power from 3/4 to wot, no dead spots.

[wrongroad]

G'day gang
Methanol is a hydroscopic medium and that means it will absorb water.
It is one reason why one should never return the contents of the aircraft's fuel tank to your main tank. The resulting water will gather in larger and larger volumes until it is not longer viable as a fuel.
When I was racing dirt track speedway, we would get through about fifteen gallons of fuel per night so water contamination in our 44 gallon drum was not an issue. Three meetings and we had used a drum of fuel. However, we always tried to 'run out' of fuel on the last night of the season. The fuel supplier refused to refill drums because he did not want to be blamed for poor fuel quality.
Any left over fuel was dumped and never under any circumstance, returned to the main drum.
I can imagine that it would only take a very small amount of water to make a small .6 of a cubic inch engine not perform at its best.
It is also worth the effort to filter your fuel several times. Once from the main tank to your mixing tank, again from the mixing tank into the models fuel tank. There are plenty of water trap style filters outs there and if you are really caught, pour the 'raw' fuel through a chamois cloth before mixing the oil into the fuel.
I used to filter the fuel in my racing go kart six times and still found rubbish and fluff made their way into the carby filter screen. Makes you wonder how much junk gets into your car fuel system!
Also, be aware that some oils will settle out over a period of time so it is not worth keeping mixed fuel for any length of time. I never mixed more fuel then what I needed at a kart meeting and the remaining mixed fuel was drained from the tank and used in my dads brush cutter.
Fresh fuel is the only way to do it.
Regards and respect
Daryl

[carracer5]

What brand of fuel was this?

[crankestein]

I will never ever use SIG fuel, the red color one, that thing is garbage.

Cool Power all day...

[Dewey H Lee]

I use VP Powermaster. Never had a fuel related problem with any of my planes.

[Panzerbuster]

The pilot is always responsible to check his fuel as part of the preflight inspection as well as performing a radio range check. If you are concerned about fuel purity then it would be better to pursue that a fuel purity check kit be developed by fuel suppliers that could be purchased at your local hobby shop. Good for the hobby, good for the hobby business owner and good for fuel performance enthusiasts! The hobby is expensive enough without the hobby business owner being forced to raise his costs to cover liabilities that are beyond his control. So man up when you take that transmitter into your hands and advance that throttle to takeoff power. This is a fun hobby let's not over regulate ourselves out of an entertaining and educational pastime.

[benjack71]

G'day gang
Methanol is a hydroscopic medium and that means it will absorb water.
It is one reason why one should never return the contents of the aircraft's fuel tank to your main tank. The resulting water will gather in larger and larger volumes until it is not longer viable as a fuel.
When I was racing dirt track speedway, we would get through about fifteen gallons of fuel per night so water contamination in our 44 gallon drum was not an issue. Three meetings and we had used a drum of fuel. However, we always tried to 'run out' of fuel on the last night of the season. The fuel supplier refused to refill drums because he did not want to be blamed for poor fuel quality.
Any left over fuel was dumped and never under any circumstance, returned to the main drum.
I can imagine that it would only take a very small amount of water to make a small .6 of a cubic inch engine not perform at its best.
It is also worth the effort to filter your fuel several times. Once from the main tank to your mixing tank, again from the mixing tank into the models fuel tank. There are plenty of water trap style filters outs there and if you are really caught, pour the 'raw' fuel through a chamois cloth before mixing the oil into the fuel.
I used to filter the fuel in my racing go kart six times and still found rubbish and fluff made their way into the carby filter screen. Makes you wonder how much junk gets into your car fuel system!
Also, be aware that some oils will settle out over a period of time so it is not worth keeping mixed fuel for any length of time. I never mixed more fuel then what I needed at a kart meeting and the remaining mixed fuel was drained from the tank and used in my dads brush cutter.
Fresh fuel is the only way to do it.
Regards and respect
Daryl

Its really hard to argue with what you are saying. To be honest though when you empty your tank at the end of the day what are you supposed to do with it? Run your plane on the stand until it dies? Drain it on the ground? Neither one of those options is very good in my opinion. At the end of the day and most of the guys at the club just know when you get down to that last 1/4 or so it can get kind of dicey. But, to credit crankestein using cool power all synthetic does help to mitigate some of the water problems by not allowing the castor to sludge up since there is no castor. I can not for the life of me figure why anyone would ever want to add castor to cool power. That kind of negates the point of using it lol

[crankestein]

I do not go to such extremes, and have no need to do so yet.

All I know, I will stay away from Trinity, Traxxas, SIG fuels, and only CP w some oil on the side. It works for me...

And about bringing the fuel back to the gallon, everyone in the field does it, and none complain about the water thing. Maybe where you live it affects it, in our area, its the norm to bring any extra fuel remaining back to the source, and fuel is good for months.

*****

Because thats the only one available at the hobby shop.

It does not hinder performance, and ALL the engines run much better, easy to tune, no dead sticks, no overheating.

Here we go, and need to stay, I have been on this deal since the gold pan RC10, Tamiya Fox, Hot Shot, back when a Novak speed controller cost $150.00 to replace a ceramic throttle. Have used all kinds of fuel on all kinds of nitro engines, and the one, of all I have tested, which is the easiest to tune and gives no issues be it a rc car engine or airplane is Cool Power. No, they do not have Omega.

(There is always that guy), I am not going to get all triggered about it, from 19cc four stroke, .52 Tiger Shark, .42 TT GP, K&B, .25, .15, .09 all run fine easy to tune with Cool Power 5% and adding three to four ounces of castor oil.

On my 1/8th on-road two speed pushing to 70+mph, 1/8th buggies, 1/12 HPI Nitro Minis, they dont complain at all, give me no headaches. Without the castor oil, they tended to be difficult to tune (most of the time), since adding the extra oil, the only noticeable difference, is the oil residue. It works so far for me, it negates its use, which to me is none. Its benefits with no drawbacks...

[benjack71]

I do not go to such extremes, and have no need to do so yet.

All I know, I will stay away from Trinity, Traxxas, SIG fuels, and only CP w some oil on the side. It works for me...

And about bringing the fuel back to the gallon, everyone in the field does it, and none complain about the water thing. Maybe where you live it affects it, in our area, its the norm to bring any extra fuel remaining back to the source, and fuel is good for months.

*****

Because thats the only one available at the hobby shop.

It does not hinder performance, and ALL the engines run much better, easy to tune, no dead sticks, no overheating.

Here we go, and need to stay, I have been on this deal since the gold pan RC10, Tamiya Fox, Hot Shot, back when a Novak speed controller cost $150.00 to replace a ceramic throttle. Have used all kinds of fuel on all kinds of nitro engines, and the one, of all I have tested, which is the easiest to tune and gives no issues be it a rc car engine or airplane is Cool Power. No, they do not have Omega.

(There is always that guy), I am not going to get all triggered about it, from 19cc four stroke, .52 Tiger Shark, .42 TT GP, K&B, .25, .15, .09 all run fine easy to tune with Cool Power 5% and adding three to four ounces of castor oil.

On my 1/8th on-road two speed pushing to 70+mph, 1/8th buggies, 1/12 HPI Nitro Minis, they dont complain at all, give me no headaches. Without the castor oil, they tended to be difficult to tune (most of the time), since adding the extra oil, the only noticeable difference, is the oil residue. It works so far for me, it negates its use, which to me is none. Its benefits with no drawbacks...

You dont have to convince me on cool power. Its all I run and I dont dump fuel either. Yeah, when it gets to the last 1/4 or so of the gallon you might notice a little rough idle or something but nothing serious. You have been doing it long enough that I am sure you know you cap that gallon as soon as your done taking out or putting in and you keep it out of the sun. As far as adding castor, you do what you want to do. If it works for you then great. I have broke in several two and four strokes on cool power and never even dreamed of adding castor to it. Like you said. I like to be able to just wipe my planes off with a paper towel at the end of the day instead of windexing them to death. To each their own.

[crankestein]

I had a spare SIG gallon, half of it already used, trying with different engines, settings, and some mixed with castor and some dont... still gave me headaches.

Took the gallon like it is, half used, to the hobby shop and the guy working behind the counter, no questions asked, grabbed the SIG gallon, and said to take another gallon of any other brand. He did an about face and disappeared behind the office storage space door...

[wrongroad]

G'day benjack71,
At motor racing events there is a fuel dump drum that all unwanted fuels are emptied into and then taken away for correct disposal.
And, no, you should never run a two stroke out of fuel as it can do damage to the parts that need lubrication. No fuel, no lube. Plus the lean run for those last few seconds can lead to some severe damage if the engine is at high revs.
I have seen Yamaha KT100S [two stroke kart engines] just seize beyond repair when the driver miscalculated how much fuel he needed and the engine 'coughed' while pulling 18000 [yes that number is correct] RPM.
It has always been a matter of course for me to dump the excess fuel which is why I only ever made up what I needed for the next race. Mind you, my Dad's brushcutter always smelled good for a week after a meeting as the few litres of 'ballast' fuel was used. Very little wastage indeed.:)
With the habit of Methanol absorbing water, I will never return fuel from the tank of a model back to 'storage'.
We found that even a sealed drum could soak in a small amount of water and it was a shock to get one litre of water on the water trap of the refueling rig we had from a brand new unopened drum of methanol. This was while decanting sixty litres. A relatively high percentage rate from a fuel type that is a low source of power to start with.
It was nothing to have to drain four or five litres of water from a 120 litre tank on the car after a nights racing. The outside air being drawn in via the breather and the constant heating and cooling of the fuel coming back through the excess fuel return lines caused a considerable amount of condensation in the tank.
I am somewhat amazed that model airfields are not equipped with a fuel dump.
I am building a 134 inch Lancaster and it will owe me about four and a half thousand when it is ready to fly. I can tell you, no reused fuel will be going into the tanks of this bird.;) I am sure you understand why.

Hey crankestein,
Sounds like you have a good shop there. I wish I had a shop closer then 300 kilometres away.

As always Gentlemen, Regards and respect
Daryl