General Fuel additives.

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General Fuel additives.

AndersLS

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Hello Forum. Is there any need to add lead additive to the fuel?

These are afterall old engines and may not have hardened valve seats.....

What do you all do about this?

Thanks.
 
I always say that it's inconclusive Anders. The engine definitely suffers over the long term without lead in the fuel, but I didn't experience any benefits of using additives of various kinds (maybe mixing them was my mistake?) over 16,000 miles. In fact, there were hard deposits inside the head which can't have been helping the efficiency of the engine. Apparently some very late 650 engines can run unleaded but ultimately I intend to have hardened seats fitted.
 
I researched this quite a lot when I got my 500 some four years ago. The consensus was that for the light use and low miles that most of our cars will do there really isn’t any need to include the lead replacement additive. With that said, adding it doesn’t do any harm, and it’s cheap, so why not?

Based on that, I use the Castrol fuel additive as regular as clockwork.
 
My feeling is that as steel valve seats are already fitted, although how hard they are I am unsure, fuel additives should not be necessary for the low mileage that I do in the car, especially at the steady speed I drive it at, however I still use an additive to be certain. Another reason I use an additive is that I believe, rightly or wrongly, that the additive will alleviate the problems of the hygroscopic nature of modern petrol causing corrosion in the petrol tank. Any thoughts on this?
 
Hi,

When my wife first got our 500F four years ago we used fuel additive but as we also have other classic cars we run them all on super unleaded with no problems. I have friends who do the same.

Regards,
 
Any thoughts on this?

It's way above my station to have "thoughts" on chemistry but your post made me curious (hygroscopicity !? rust in MY tank !?) so I found this:
http://www.fuel-testers.com/expiration_of_ethanol_gas.html
Not sure it's trustworthy, I use only "98" Super in my classics in the hope of getting less ethanol.

However my conviction borne of 300.000 km with a '79 Moto Guzzi, and a quarter of that with the 500, is that unless your valve clearances tend to dissapear, lead substitutes are a waste of time for alloy heads with proper seats.
 
I guess my philosophy is that it's $5 for enough for 50L of fuel
So kind of worth just doing

Plus I think it adds to the eccentric process off pulling up at the petrol station in your tiny car, with the fuel tank in the front boot, then appearing to fill the tank from a small 50ml bottle.
 
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