As many of you know, Cindy and I have a small stable of old iron that includes a 1954 CJ3B, a 1969 C101 Jeepster Commando, a 1972 J-2000 Pickup Truck and a 1974 CJ-5 Renegade. Being that we prefer our old iron to be as stock as possible, all of them are still running their original factory motors and being that Unleaded gasoline wasn't even introduced until 1974, you can be sure that none of them were designed to run on Ethanol laced gas.
What a lot of people don't know, especially younger people these days is that gas used to have Tetraethyl lead put into it and on purpose. Back in the early 1920's, GM was looking for a way to build high compression engines and found that adding lead helped to boost octane, reduce engine knock and minimize wear and tear on valve seats. Of course, lead isn't good for your health or the environment and so it was eventually phased out.
Now, while Ethanol was first used to power an engine back in 1826, it was only until 2007 that the Federal Government mandated that the U.S. must use 36 billion gallons of alternative fuel per year by 2022 and for the most part, that fuel will come in the form of Ethanol. Unfortunately, being that Ethanol is a grain alcohol refined primarily from corn, it has a few negative aspects to it especially for vehicles that were never made to use it. Specifically, Ethanol is hygroscopic meaning, it absorbs water and water is the last thing you want in a steel gas tank or a carburetor (can you say rust in the fuel system?) and this is to say nothing about how it can also deteriorate rubber hoses and plastic fuel lines.
Up until a few years ago, finding "Clear Gas" or "Pure Gas" was possible but it wasn't exactly easy. For the most part, the best a guy with an old Jeep could do is run E10 gas, essentially, gas that only contained 10% Ethanol. Fortunately, more and more gas stations are now carrying Clear Gas - gas that has ZERO Ethanol and as luck would have it, our local Maverik is one.
While the range of standard unleaded go-go juice is typically marked in yellow and diesel in green, Clear Gas can be found marked in blue.
Clear Gas can be a bit more expensive than regular unleaded of the same octane but not always.
I should also note that in addition to being better for old iron, another benefit of Clear Gas is that it will give you better fuel economy. According to pure-gas.org...
"Pure gas gives better mileage than E10, and much better than E85, simply because gasoline has higher free energy than ethanol. The free energy of gasoline is 34.2 MJ per liter. The free energy of ethanol is 24.0 MJ per liter. That means E10 (10% ethanol) has a free energy of 33.2 MJ per liter, and E85 (85% ethanol) has a free energy of 25.6 MJ per liter. As a result, your mileage is reduced by 3% with E10 over pure gas, and 25% with E85 over pure gas, all else being equal. Mileage will be reduced even more if your engine doesn't run as well on E10, which is often the case with older vehicles."
Click on the link below to see a list of gas stations in your area that sells Clear Gas.
https://www.pure-gas.org/index.jsp
Hope this helps to keep your old iron chugging along and for years to come.
