Lead additive in Gas?

[Brewski*]

My 89 recommends to put lead additive in the gas. Previous owner says he always adds to gas. I thought that the "New" types of unleaded gas had valve guide lube in it to run in all motors was standard of the industry. If anyone can shed some light on this and whether everyone puts additive in there gas all the time that would be great.
Thanks,
Brew

[BigBald]

RE: Lead additive in Gas?

I had a 1988 and did not put additive into the gas....it ran fine.

[surroundsound64]

Lead additive in Gas?

I had a 1988 and did not put additive into the gas....it ran fine.

I don't put any in my 81. Just premium gas.

On the topic of gas though, when you winterize your boat, some of you may put a gas stabalizer in it... If you don't want to do that, you can just put some 100LL (the LL stands for low lead, so it actually has a little lead in it) gas (avgas) from the airport in it. It doesn't have the addatives that pump gas has that goes bad. And it's not too much more than 93octane.

That's what I always do anyway. Plus you get 100 octane. hehe.

[JAG]

RE: Lead additive in Gas?

I wouldn't trust any of todays gas as far as lubricating valves. I have been told that as much as a 40hp loss in power can occur from valve recession very quickly without the additive. If the previous owner religiously used the additive I would recommend continuing with the practice. I use CD-2 Lead Substitute for off-road use only and available at Walmart. Its highly concentrated, 1 ounce treats 5gals and the whole bottle treats 320gals so it goes a long way and is much cheaper then other additives. I have been using it in my 90 since newand have not experienced any loss of power, top end speed, or RPM.

[davidr]

RE: Lead additive in Gas?

Please don't use avgas. Lead is really nasty stuff (poisonous), and 100LL avgas can have up to 2 milliliters of tetraethyl lead per gallon.

[AWhite70]

RE: Lead additive in Gas?

I've heard this discussion before and here is my '02. Nautiques essentially use automotive designed engines (i.e. cylinder heads). Automobile engines have been designed for unleaded gas since the mid-70's. There aren't any differences between automotive and marine cylinder heads so therefore you don't need to use a lead additive.

[surroundsound64]

Re: RE: Lead additive in Gas?

Please don't use avgas. Lead is really nasty stuff (poisonous), and 100LL avgas can have up to 2 milliliters of tetraethyl lead per gallon.

You do realize airplanes use that right? (Cept jets)... That's billions of gallons of it burned a day.

[AWhite70]

Re: RE: Lead additive in Gas?

You do realize airplanes use that right? (Cept jets)... That's billions of gallons of it burned a day.

Only reciprocating aircraft engines (i.e. piston engines) use avgas. Jets and Turbojets burn jet fuel, which is very similar to diesel fuel and contains no lead.

A relatively small quantity of avgas is used compared to automotive gasoline. That's one reason why it hasn't been regulated out of existance yet. The other is the lead is needed for the octane rating and most of the planes out there are old enough that they require lead or a lead additave.

[surroundsound64]

Re: RE: Lead additive in Gas?

You do realize airplanes use that right? (Cept jets)... That's billions of gallons of it burned a day.

Only reciprocating aircraft engines (i.e. piston engines) use avgas. Jets and Turbojets burn jet fuel, which is very similar to diesel fuel and contains no lead.

A relatively small quantity of avgas is used compared to automotive gasoline. That's one reason why it hasn't been regulated out of existance yet. The other is the lead is needed for the octane rating and most of the planes out there are old enough that they require lead or a lead additave.

Jet fuel is almost straight kerosene. Smaller jets that don't have heated tanks use jetA that has an addative in it to keep it from freezing at high altitudes.

Any airplane that has pistons, unless it has been altered so that it can run on regular automotive gas, use 100LL. Regardless, billions of gallons of 100LL is burned each year. The amount of lead in it is still very small.

I'm not saying run your boat on 100LL all summer, just put it in the tank (5gal or so) before your last run of the year. It'll fire right up in the spring and clean your motor out while you do it! hehe.

[JAG]

RE: Re: RE: Lead additive in Gas?

And 100LL smells a lot better then automotive gas!

[surroundsound64]

And the cost of it hasn't skyrocketed like auto gas has either! At least not yet. hehe.