Some of you may recall a few months ago I was investigating some carb issues, and determined a rebuild was the only way to solve them. Obvious symptom was frozen jet, wouldn’t move with choke, nor could the mixture be adjusted.
Seems I’d let things sit too long and fuel evaporated leaving behind nasty sludge that gummed everything up. I might have been able to just disassemble and clean the carbs, but the diaphragm did seem brittle and the metering needles were pitted.
Parts have now been ultrasonically cleaned, sludge removed and light coating of WD40 & dry overnight to prevent any new corrosion.
Check out what I was presented with on disassembly though… yuck. Keep in mind that this was a “running” car that could be driven… just didn’t have choke adjustment etc.
The fuel DID have stabilizer in it.
Needless to say I will be looking for ethanol free fuel, and trying to drive more regularly!
Is it not ethanol that promotes corrosion in the system, and degrading of rubber (see cracked diaphragm) .
Ethanol that evaporates sooner leaving the varnish that gums everything up?
This is Exxon fuel, perhaps they have some additive causing the green tint? I’ve had similar issues in lawn equipment sitting through the winter and leaving sludge in fuel bowl. Switching to ethanol free fuel has eliminated that problem so far.
In the throttle body and on the piston there is a glossy green varnish as well.
No idea the material of the hardline, presumably it is the original from 1955 but certainly could have been changed along the way.
That is fine advice, but with our seasons here I never intentionally “store” it… Life just gets in the way.
For instance I was driving it somewhat regularly (poorly tuned carbs & all) in January and February… decided in March to rebuild carbs, some carb parts were back ordered, and i didn’t have everything on hand until April… Now finally in mid July I’ve started work.
Such is the life of working full time, and raising young kids!
Dear departed decided that Poodles would have to do.
Demitase, Bentley, Duke ,Another in there somewhere, name escapes me!!!
Coco, seems to play the part nowadays!
Yahoo, I got the Predator a HF Honda knock off, that powers my old Troy Bilt, chipper/shredder to fire up. Fresh gas, fresh oil, cleaned filter, and spark plug. Noisy as all get out, Even to me. Engaged the idfler to drive the flails. It works!!!
But, loading it with a lot of stuff to chomp up will wait. Temps rising.
Any gasoline that dries up in the system will leave varnish, and gasoline will readily evaporate, some components are more volatile than ethanol.
Having used ethanol 10% since it was available I have not had any issues with the Jaguar, particularly diaphragms. Could be the diaphragm material, as mine are blue and so nitrile rubber. I have had ethanol issues (I think) in yard implements but never anything in the E-Type.
Though the varnish is a component, what I’ve noticed is the “sludge” that I’ve seen with evaporated e10 fuel in both Jag and yard implements. I’ve not noticed said sludge when using non-ethanol fuel.
Either way the prime culprit here is lack of running. Ethanol simply takes a bad situation and worsens it.
I’m not sure what material the previous diaphragm’s are/were. The new ones are still black, but according to Joe Curto are a “Viton” material that is supposed to be more resistant to Ethanol.
Carbs were last rebuilt c2002, so a rebuild every 15 years isn’t too bad, but maybe go 20 the next time…
Our local Exxon has 89 octane non-ethanol that I run in the lawn stuff. I ran it 100% in my daily driver until they jacked the price. It used to be about 10c/gal cheaper than premium e10, now it’s about .60c/gal more. Got me 10+% better fuel economy though and my car (designed for up to e15) ran smoother and seemed much happier.
Same station also sells 100 octane e10, so for the Jag I’m thinking a half/half of the 100oct e10 and 89 octane e0. There are also some local stations with 93 octane e0 I may try.
Also I thought one of the problems with ethanol was the water solubility which promotes the corrosion noted (badly pitted needle, similar effect to “needle & seat” and other areas).
Perhaps you drive your car frequently enough so as to not encounter them?
Interestingly I’ve had no such problems with my 2008 Harley-Davidson which gets ridden even less frequently than the Jag gets driven…
However it was probably designed with modern fuels in mind, and also cycles through a tank of fuel basically any time I ride it, where the Jag probably has at least some fuel in the tank that’s several years old… though the tank was nearly drained inadvertently in 2015 when the seal from the 1960’s era Stewart Warner fuel pump failed and made a nice gasoline swimming pool in my garage…
I think we’ve established that Ca never had very much percentage of ethanol in their gas compared to other places which is why folks there say it’s no factor.
A significant problem is from water damage when it falls out of solution and sits in the bottom of float chambers etc causing corrosion. Another is that it eats certain plastic and rubber items, even the special Tygon fuel tubing used in garden machines.
The only place I use ethanol gas is in my everyday cars. My other cars, boats, motorcycles and machines all use ethanol free. I’ve used the Puregas site for years but I still sometimes do the simple water test to verify that it really is non-ethanol.
