I put gas in my 4-cycle weed eater earlier today and noticed shortly after that it started running funky if I didn't have the throttle open, then it stalled. I think moisture got into the can of gas and separated out the ethanol, I could see the liquid separate a bit in the clear rubber primer bulb after priming it. I drained the fuel tank into an old Coke bottle and pumped the primer until I got as much gas as possible out of it. I sprayed the lines into the tank with carb cleaner, as well as the tank itself, and drained into the bottle.
Would it be a good idea to spray down the inside of the fuel tank with WD-40 and collect that waste as well to make sure I got all of the moisture out, or will the dousing in carb cleaner and some fresh gas be good enough?
I think fresh gas will get you going again, but it might take a few pulls and rough starts to work through the old stuff that's still in the engine.
I'll give that a try. I'm not sure what to do with the bad gas. Thought about dumping it in my Pontiac and throwing water absorbing stuff in, it has a near-full 21 gallon tank, so 3/4 of a gallon probably won't hurt it. Haha. The fuel treatments probably too concentrated for the small can.
use it as parts cleaner
I got the tiny 4-cycle going again. It took probably a half hour of pulling the cord, priming and messing with the choke to get it to do anything. It eventually started coming back with full choke applied, even though the manual says half or no choke above 75 degrees. I let it idle until it stalled and just repeated. The time to stalling got longer, until it'd run fine and stall upon throttling. I'd open the throttle until it would nearly conk out and then release it. Did this for probably another 20-30 minutes and it eventually started responding to throttle again. I ran out the full tank of fresh gas and it's back to normal.
sounds about right. I got so tired of this process with small engines that I just started buying very small amounts of gas. Enough for the job. Then emptying the tank and putting whatever was left over into the car. Fortunately I live about 20 paces from a gas station.
We use the gas more than quick enough. This was my error, I accidentally left my 1 gallon jerry can outside under the awning and it's been rainy. I thought these new cans were supposed to be sealed because of gas can emissions. Guess not. Make sure I bring it in the garage next time. Haha.