Re: Gas Tank Crud...Anybody?
 

Get a fuel polisher or tank cleaner on it. They will suck out the old fuel, filter the sh!+ out of it numerous times all the while rattling the varnish free from the walls of the tank, and then re-filtering again and again. Out west the job is about $300. They guarantee their work so it'll be like a new tank when they're. Probably as smart a $300 one can invest. Especially out east where seas and weather changes more abruptly... Good luck.

Re: Gas Tank Crud...Anybody?
 

Terry,

You probably should run the highest octane fuel you can find until you've used up all the ethanol fuel!

I bought 90+ octane non-ethanol gas at every marina during my circumnavigation trip and I made a habit of opening the drain on the bottom of my Racor's sediment bowl every time I refueled to check for water. I found 4-6 oz of water EVERY TIME until after Flamingo, where they had big filters on the pumps! My vent fitting has a trap in it so I don't think I was getting any spray or water in thru the vent fitting, and it sure didn't sit long enough to condense that much water! Didn't find any more water after buying gas in Flamingo, Key Largo, Matheson Hammock and Ft. Lauderdale. Bottom line is that I think you can probably count on getting water in the tank when you buy fuel at most marinas on the west coast of Fl.! :shocked

I bought gas in Clewiston, St. James City, Gasparilla Marina (near your place), Sanibel, and Chockolosee Island and drained water out of filter at each subsequent refueling! That's not a big problem as long as you have a good water separating filter and are running non-ethanol fuel. However if you add ethanol fuel to a tank that may have some water in it, there is risk of phase separation, where the water combines with the ethanol in the fuel, which can reduce octane of the fuel by up to 3 points if there's enough water to suck up all the ethanol! If you put in 87 octane ethanol fuel, it could drop as low as 84 octane with phase separation, and that can kill a motor pretty quick! When I got home and started using ethanol fuel again, I put in 92 octane, so I could afford to lose 3 points of octane and still meet the 87 octane requirement of the motor! Denny

Re: Gas Tank Crud...Anybody?
 

Denny,

The funny thing is when I drain just the gas out of the filter there is no water.

Gilly,
I bought some Startron Enzyme tank cleaner. Hopefully with a few fuel filter changes it will do the job. If not then I will have to do the tank polisher thing.

Actually this was a bump by nail, can anyone help him out :D

Re: Gas Tank Crud...Anybody?
 

You might try a Racor, which has a sediment bowl with a drain on it, with a 30 micron filter, along with a finer 10 micron filter on engine, downstream of the Racor. The Racor bowl can be drained, removed and cleaned without disturbing the filter element. I recently read an article on the subject by Steve D'Antonio in Passagemaker Magazine that recomended the course + fine serial filter set up for diesel trawlers that have very large fuel tanks. Theory is that the first filter will not clog as quickly, since it doesn't have to stop the really small stuff, and the fine filter will work better because it's not getting clogged with the bigger chunks.

Another option would be to just pull the tank and clean it, as it's not that hard to pull the tank on a Seafari. Might be worth doing if you've never inspected it. I was glad I did that when I got my boat, even though it was only 3 years old at the time . . . I found a brass nut on the support board underneath the tank that evidently fell in there at the factory before tank was installed! Galvanic action was eating through the aluminum where the nut was contacting it! :eek: Would have gone all the way through in another couple of years if I had not caught it! I ground out corrosion with Dremel tool, repaired with Marine-Tex and painted entire tank with zinc-chromate epoxy primer. I pulled it 34 years later when I repowered to clean it and replace all the hoses, and the original tank is still in good shape!