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Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/23/2008 8:55:28 PM   
SABREPD


 

Posts: 12
Joined: 5/15/2006
From: Colchester, UNITED KINGDOM
Status: offline 		Hi all,
Is there an allround glow fuel? The reason being, is, i`m new to the I.C. world and I hear of so many makes with different ingredients in them. Also can you use the same fuel for 2-strokes and 4-strokes?

Many thanks Nige.

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BLUESKIES
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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/24/2008 10:37:38 PM   
Marcol



Posts: 237
Joined: 3/23/2006
From: King's Lynn, UNITED KINGDOM
Status: offline 		Nige ,
The answers you'll get from the guys in the States won't be a great deal of help to you, as whatever they recommend you probably won't be able to get in the UK anyway, although I have seen Coolpower here.

Most fuels in the States contain some castor oil. The main reason for this is that the synthetic oils in the States aren't as good as we have here in Europe. So some castor oil is added as a safety margin.

However as you are here in the UK you'll be able to buy this fuel. Weston UK Prosynth 2000. This is an all synthetic oil fuel and is THE best fuel available. Suitable for 2 or 4 strokes and recommended by Weston, Laser and RCV.

It's available direct or from Inwoods etc. It's not the cheapest ,but the best never is. I have been using this fuel for many years now and would not use anything else.


See http://www.westonuk.co.uk/index_030.htm

Hope this helps

Colin


(in reply to SABREPD)
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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/25/2008 11:17:19 AM   
balsaeater


 

Posts: 173
Joined: 5/20/2005
From: p, ANDORRA
Status: online 		As above pointed out There is a large difference betweeen fuels in the European situation and USA and even between GB and mainland Europe

Most LHS supply the fuels ready made and in small engines 4cc 8cc 10cc etc the fuel costs are too low for most of use to look at making our own home brew versions

HAZMAT (hazard materials ) shipping penalty costs make the buying of fuel online often a very expensive purchase typicaly doubles the cost per gallon on small amounts and is really only some thing you do if you have no choice and live on some obscure island off Scotland's shoreline or you buy a 55 barrel of materials at a time

In mainland Europe the trend is to supply only synthetic lubrication no Castor oil except for FAI competition

As Castor is a lot cheaper the trend in UK still seems to be to keep Castor fuel oil mixes or mixes with some synthetic and some Castor
best I can tell from my occasional expeditions to the UK to keep the Castor sniffing bunch happy with old time memory revivals brought on with burning Castor oil

The use of high nitro is not so expensive for the USA where it costs vary from 15$ a USA gallon in bulk 55 USA gallon barrel to typically
$80 USA gallon in the LHS or similar

However nitromethane in most of Europe is a lot more expensive often double the USA costs and sometimes even 5 to 10 times the USA costs so buying engines which run best with high nitro demands as typically found in the USA tends to be avoided buy the older hands who will tend to prefer to get the European version made version of the same engine which operates with lowwer nitro or get the European makes of Engine that perform well with no nitro or low nitro make like MVVS Super tiger Moki etc

Yes why does Methanol a simple fuel made from natural gas production costs $0.80 per USA gallon ~£0.50pper UK gallon when bought in bulk 10000 ton barge cost like~ £15 a UK gallon in the LHS
And then you check HAZMAT costs small quantity delivery solutions unlike petrol car forecourt big supply chain and the only solution is to buy a bigger engine which runs on petrol and spend 5 times as much on the model plane costs which goes with bigger planes

Or drop costs with buying a 48gallon UK drum of methanol at mayby £5 a UK gallon only to find that you been stiffed with the cheaper high water content type which makes the engines run rough and flame out most flights


Balsaeater

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/26/2008 4:04:31 PM   
blw



Posts: 4458
Joined: 3/15/2004
From: Auburn, AL, USA
Status: offline 		Castor is added because it offers a higher protection over synthetics, either here in the U.S. or Europe. Some European oils have better cling over some of the more popular glow fuel oils over here, but castor is still the best for hot and lean runs. I have yet to see any synthetic that survives the heat levels of castor, or more importantly, still provides the same protection when overheated. The varnish people mention about castor is the protection when you need it most. A blend of both castor and synthetic is the best bet.

I've always thought it a shame that nitro is heavily taxed in some places. There are a couple of countries in Europe where nitro is priced comparable to the U.S., but I forget which now. There were some interesting prices posted about a year ago.

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/26/2008 6:18:47 PM   
Marcol



Posts: 237
Joined: 3/23/2006
From: King's Lynn, UNITED KINGDOM
Status: offline 		You do not need to use castor oil if using a fuel containing Fuchs Aerosave synthetic oil. This oil provides better protection than castor and has far better anti-corrosion properties. Best of all it doesn't leave your engine looking a complete mess and seized solid after a lay up. It states specifically that a mineral based oil must not be used with Aerosave synthetic.

But as I said in my post you guys in the States don't have access to a fuel with this as the lubricant, so therefor you will have to continue to use a blend of synthetic and castor.

If you can get hold of some Prosynth 2000 fuel or a fuel with Aerosave as the lubricant. I can bet that castor oil will be a distant memory , as it was for me about 10 years ago.

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/26/2008 7:27:23 PM   
Red B.


 

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From: Jonkoping, SWEDEN
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quote:

ORIGINAL: Marcol
You do not need to use castor oil if using a fuel containing Fuchs Aerosave synthetic oil.

I fully agree with that. I have made the change from castor to synthetic/castor to synthetic only some years ago and I am not going back to castor oil. It may be that in an extreme lean run situation castor oil may offer somewhat better "protection", but I doubt that such situations are likely to occur unless some serious engine abuse is taking place. Other than that and the fact that I am partially addicted to the smell of burnt castor oil, IMHO Aerosave is the undisputed king over castor oil.


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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/26/2008 8:41:23 PM   
SABREPD


 

Posts: 12
Joined: 5/15/2006
From: Colchester, UNITED KINGDOM
Status: offline 		Hi Marcol,
I`m gonna try some Prosynth 2000 fuel this year. Could you just tell me that, I went onto that link you gave me and i`m not too sure if I understood it right. Do you have to buy 4 of them at a time? because it says x4, its just that I would like to try it first rather than buying 4 Gallons of it.

Thanks Nige.

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/26/2008 9:03:57 PM   
balsaeater


 

Posts: 173
Joined: 5/20/2005
From: p, ANDORRA
Status: online 		I presently get EDL synthetic oil at 32.5 euros a 1/2 gallon UK (65 Euros a UK gallon ~£ 51 uk gal ~ $ 100 for USA gallon )

Fuchs Aerosave synthetic oil. I assume is the AEROSYNTH/ AEROSAVE and Motul Micro" 2-stroke oil is reputed to be as good

I mostly use 10% oil less than ~5% nitro and more than ~ 85% Methanol with larger MVVS 90 to 160 glow engines on small madels so 1/2 gas mostly

Could the AEROSYNTH/ AEROSAVE or Motul Micro" 2-stroke oil go to less like 6% to 8% oil


where is the best place to buy in UK ,Germany France Spain if I ordered from there

I will also check France Germany and Spain but often Germany has cheapest post

balsaeater

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/26/2008 9:51:01 PM   
XJet


 

Posts: 3217
Joined: 3/31/2003
From: Tokoroa, NEW ZEALAND
Status: offline 		As I've mentioned elsewhere, I now use Cooper's Plus C (castor synth blend) at 12% in all my engines (except plain bearing ones) and had *zero* lubrication related problems in some 16 months of continuous use amounting to some 200 liters (44 US gal) of fuel consumed.

So, if you look hard enough, there *are* some decent synthetic oils available in the USA.

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/27/2008 3:38:58 PM   
blw



Posts: 4458
Joined: 3/15/2004
From: Auburn, AL, USA
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Marcol

You do not need to use castor oil if using a fuel containing Fuchs Aerosave synthetic oil. This oil provides better protection than castor and has far better anti-corrosion properties. Best of all it doesn't leave your engine looking a complete mess and seized solid after a lay up. It states specifically that a mineral based oil must not be used with Aerosave synthetic.

But as I said in my post you guys in the States don't have access to a fuel with this as the lubricant, so therefor you will have to continue to use a blend of synthetic and castor.

If you can get hold of some Prosynth 2000 fuel or a fuel with Aerosave as the lubricant. I can bet that castor oil will be a distant memory , as it was for me about 10 years ago.



I would still add castor because I've not seen any proof that it will retain any lubricating property at the temps castor does. I've never seen castor seize up an engine if mixed with synthetic oil. I don't think Europe has some of the cheap cleaners we have here. It is easy and quick to clean off.

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/27/2008 8:58:07 PM   
Red B.


 

Posts: 935
Joined: 8/29/2002
From: Jonkoping, SWEDEN
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quote:

ORIGINAL: blw
I would still add castor because I've not seen any proof that it will retain any lubricating property at the temps castor does. I've never seen castor seize up an engine if mixed with synthetic oil. I don't think Europe has some of the cheap cleaners we have here. It is easy and quick to clean off.

Sure, go ahead and add castor oil to your fuel. I don't, because over the last couple of years I have not had one single engine problem that was related to the lubricating properties of the fully synthetic oil I am using. Why use cleaners when modern high quality synthetic oils such as Fuchs/Graupner Aerosave does away with the cleaning problem altogether?



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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/27/2008 8:59:33 PM   
Marcol



Posts: 237
Joined: 3/23/2006
From: King's Lynn, UNITED KINGDOM
Status: offline

The reason you haven't seen any proof is because you don't have access to Aerosave oil.

Castor was a great lubricant when we didn't have modern synthetics. But just like 20W-50 car engine oil, it's now very much old hat.

Would you run a modern turbocharged car on oil developed in the 1920's ? Of course you wouldn't. You would use a modern synthetic oil I would hope. How many Indy cars, Top fuellers or Formula 1 cars use old fashioned mineral oil ?

Answer................... None.

But it's a free country, so carry on. All I'm trying to say is that a fuel containing castor oil is not needed anymore.

Good luck with the cleaning

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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/27/2008 9:23:55 PM   
XJet


 

Posts: 3217
Joined: 3/31/2003
From: Tokoroa, NEW ZEALAND
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Marcol
But it's a free country, so carry on. All I'm trying to say is that a fuel containing castor oil is not needed anymore.


You are correct -- a *good* synthetic provides as much (if not more) protection as castor.

I've deliberately tried to destroy an engine by running it *very* lean with 12% Coopers synthetic oil (no castor) and after several tanks full I found *no* indication of wear or other damage.

However, a few percent of castor won't hurt and it won't make the engine dirty either.

So there's no *harm* in running a little castor.

It becomes a personal choice -- unless you're using one of the lower-quality synthetics such as Klotz or Morgans.




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RE: Allround Glow Fuel? - 3/27/2008 9:55:08 PM   
Marcol