could be gummed up carb... that ethanol is not kind to small engines. I just stick with 93 no ethanol. small price for peace of mind
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could be gummed up carb... that ethanol is not kind to small engines. I just stick with 93 no ethanol. small price for peace of mind
Everyone always says that, and it's all I've ever used in my snow blower and lawn mower (John Deere D110). Never had any issues. I put Stabil in at the end of the season, run for a few minutes, and have been fine. Snowblower wasn't happy to start this year (fired it up on Wednesday for the first time), but it did and was starting on first pull yesterday.
After almost no snow all winter, after yesterday's storm, Des Moines now has potential snow in the forecast for the following days:
2/14
2/15
2/17
2/22
2/24
Then it's projected to warm up at the end of the month for the great melt.
2/14
2/15
2/17
2/22
2/24
Then it's projected to warm up at the end of the month for the great melt.
Finally got to really try out this machine. Man it throws snow. Facebook marketplace for the win!
I used to use it on everything. I have 3 lawnmowers and each one would have issues. I switched from ethanol to regular and the problems disappeared. The oldest John Deere actually had the fuel line starting to breakdown and gum stuff up. The ethanol was hard on it.
My snowblower did the same thing as prides did several years ago. Ran about 6000 rpm’s it seemed like. I stopped it and siphoned out the old gas and put fresh non ethanol in, waited a couple hours to let the gas lines blend and haven’t had that problem since.
It's just a best practice thing. I've used plenty of ethanol in small engines without issues, but the few carb issues I've had were always associated with ethanol. Sta-bil helps as well as draining the gas at the end of the season.
I generally find its just not worth the risk for the minimal price difference and have made the shift to premium. It only costs me 4 or 5 bucks more a year to buy premium vs 87 ethanol.
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I've had the same mower and snow blower for several years. I always drain the tank and then run them completely dry at the end of the season and they always start right up the following year.
It's an eastern Iowa town near Clarence where my mom grew up. At one time the school district was Clarence-Lowden.
It is always a good idea to use non-ethanol gas for small engines like mowers and snowblowers. When I would get gas to run the pump on my dad's water trailer for spraying, I was always instructed to get non-ethanol gas.
Umm yeah, that's not a good idea.
Either let it run itself out after the winter or drain the carb and put Stabil in the remaining gas. I always start it up at least 2 or 3 times in the fall before we even get snow.
I couldn't even get mine to start up, I had used it once before this winter, when out on Tuesday to fill it up and crank it over, and would not start. Tried against yesterday, drained the gas out of the filter, plenty of oil and still will not start. Called a dealer here in Ames and they are supposed to send someone out to pick it up this afternoon. So I ended up scooping the drive and the back porch. Broke my best snow shovel and had to dig out an old one.
Not looking forward to more snow and scooping this weekend, but I guess it has to be done.
I think I'm about two winters away from having the neighbor kids do it. Had a back surgery 28 years ago and it's catching up with me.
I seriously don't understand how/why they are so bad at it. You cross over University into Clive and it's polar opposite.
I mix stabil with all of my small engine gas year round. That was a recommendation I got from a small engines repair man years ago.
54"?Finally got to really try out this machine. Man it throws snow. Facebook marketplace for the win!
Last year I had to call the city to take care of huge pile of infront of our house. During one of the big ones, they only made 1 pass and since my house is on a slight curve in the street, they had the blade directing snow to our side. The pile was like 4 feet high by 6 foot wide. Covered from my driveway to the middle of the road. I could not shovel or plow through it with my snow blower. To their credit, they sent the plow back out hours later and cleared the rest of the street.
The other day was the first time I have had problems with it in the 5/6 years we have used it. Getting old sucks, and so does scooping snow. I never had a snow blower when the kids were home, but once they moved to college I would just scoop it out by myself. About 5 years ago after a large snow, and spending half a day scooping I called my wife and told her, you can decide, "do you want to pay for my future heart attack, or am I getting a snow blower, because 57 years old is prime snow removal heart attack range. So I got the snow blower.
