Fuel Polishing Idea

[Mister Byrnzoil]

I first ran into the expression 'fuel polishing' in the marine industry.

I am intimately familiar w/ biobor and starbrite products. They have worked for me in the past, but they are slow and expensive. (especially starbrite!)

So the coupe I bought recently had some serious fungus problems, so much so that the I was forced to connect the ip intake to the tank return line in order to suck some fuel from the tank b/c the tank strainer was plugged. (I have no desire to drain and remove the tank)

I after about a week of runnin' the engine from the return line, I did what I always do... I cleaned and reused the fuel filter..

Clean and Re-use Primary Fuel Filter?


But what got my attention was the size of the chunks in the primary filter, they were HUGE like 3/8" wide by almost 1" ... I realized that I could let the return line drain into a funnel packed w/ filter material (which went into a 6 gallon aux tank), while pumping the clean fuel back into the tank via the fuel line or the tank fill.

I'm sorry I didn't take any pics, but it worked GREAT! I got an unbelievable amount of gunk out of the tank in about 3-4 hours of 'backflushing'

I believe that this type of remedial action, followed by antifungal could fix the problem and you'd never hafto drop the tank.

[bgkast]

Good idea. What did you use to pump the fuel?

[Mister Byrnzoil]

I used a 7psi, 12 volt DC fuel pump. I wish I knew how many gallons per hour it pumps, but I have yet to measure that.

I conected it to the battery, it doesn't pull much in the way of amperage, but I put the battery charger on too.

As a makeshift filter, I lined a funnel w/ one of those oil absorbing pads.

I have several of those outboard engine fuel tanks, with a built in fuel pickup, they work great.