bad experience with anti-gel product

bought a product from my local parts store...called "arctic extreme"...supposed to be an anti-gel. 1 ounce treats 5 gallons no matter what the temp is...or so they advertised. put 15 ounces of the product in case excavator...and 65 gallons of #2 fuel, put 6 ounces in my duramax chevy, and 22 gallons of #2 fuel, filled our 100 gallon L shaped fuel tank in service truck after putting 22 ouces of anti gel with #2 fuel....other morning -21 F....excavator started, ran for about 5 mins. gelled up, on my way to get some 911, my pickup started to gel, i got it there, got 911 in that, topped off with #1..that's good to go. checked fuel in the L shaped tank, was like runny syrup...pumped 30 gallons off that, put in jug of 911, topped off with #1...that's good to go...anyway, i won't be buying anymore arctic extreme.

I bought a bunch of PS 911 6-10 qts it was clearenced at wal-mart, so cheap, come to find out we really or rarely need it here. Duh huh. so I have a life time supply. LOL

Glad to know it works......In case I ever need it.

You are better off without using expensive fuel additive and anti-gelling agents. Down to about 0-10 degrees, use 75/25 or 50/50 #2 diesel and #1 diesel or Kerosene. Zero on down, use straight #1 or Kerosene. You can also use JP4 which is a pretty dry fuel that doesn't generally gel much.

Keep your sediment drains unplugged and use them often. If your tanks don't have any, install some. Keep the primary fuel screens super clean and change primary filters often. If you get fuel out of bulk tanks around the jobsite or the farm or ranch. I'd suggest you get them cleaned out in warmer weather, then install a very good quality fuel filter. Change these filters once a month. Doesn't hurt to have your supplier check the fuel in the tanks fairly often for bacteria and alge or water. Also rust and dirt. These rules apply to bulk fuel tanks on lube trucks or tankers too.

If you work continously in very cold weather (North Dakota in the summer), use a fuel line heater, particularly around brass and copper tubing and fittings. These transfer heat fast and are always the points that gell up first and fastest.

There are a lot of things you can do that don't cost much and that work far better than any fuel additive. Using these ideas will save you a lot of expensive downtime.

I know I sure don't miss working in the cold. Fact is, I don't miss working at all these days.....

Good Luck!

Never had any luck with any sort of dump in addative, inline fuel heaters and straight number 1 were the only cure for jelled filters and dead diesels around here. Don't know if its true or not but not all additives mix with one another, some cause problems and adding too much has the opposite effect and makes the fuel thicker, or so I was told by a fuel supplier and a mechanic, not sure if its right or not but we put number 1 in at the first sign of cold weather and that seems to work the best and have new filters put on from the onset of cold weather and make sure the fuel heaters are working good, trucks have all heated tanks along with fuel heaters and lifes good or at least warm and running during the winter operations.

we've used fppf polar power, but we don't get to -21, so, hard to tell if it's that's good...it's worked well enough for us though...

For all of you who have ever run a truck this story is for you:
(sorry for the hijack by the way)
My brother is an Archer oil dealer, and one year at the local dealers meeting he was listening to a speech on anti gel additives and the guys started to talk about their experiences with gelled motors.
well to make a long story short a local truck mechanic stated some of his tricks for ungelling motors in Semis on the highway. He no sooner got the words out of his mouth when a man in the back said "I never buy any of that stuff, I'll never run that crap through my motors, when I gell up I always use a hair dryer to warm things up and get back to going again." Well you can about imagine how this truck mechanic replied already, but.......... he said "where are you gonna plug in your hair dryer on the highway??????" To which everyone laughed their butts off...ointhead:duh:falldownlaugh

Just dont be using kerosine in your newer diesel pickups anything with a common rail injection system they do not like kerosine.

and you wana be using lube in your fuel for any older truck cause the ULSD fuel doesnt have the lube that pre 2008 (dodge) and 2007(chev) and the pre 6.4 ford trucks need but benifets in using a lube additive in the newer trucks has seen extended pump and injector life.

Maybe someone can explain what causes fuel to gel. Is it just the cold? Or biofuel? or moisture?

I don't think i've ever seen it.

cummins05 said:

Just dont be using kerosine in your newer diesel pickups anything with a common rail injection system they do not like kerosine.

and you wana be using lube in your fuel for any older truck cause the ULSD fuel doesnt have the lube that pre 2008 (dodge) and 2007(chev) and the pre 6.4 ford trucks need but benifets in using a lube additive in the newer trucks has seen extended pump and injector life.

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^^ What he said

and kerosine burns 2000 btu's less

Fuel additive are a smart thing to do. borderline a must with the new fuel. I have done a lot of research and that is my conclusion.

It never gets that cold where I live! I have no experience with gelling fuel. -22 F is cold.
My hat is off to you guys that have to work in it.

What do you guys think of Marvel Mystery oil in your fuel? I used to buy a gallon every year and splash some in the tank on my 97, and then my 04 Dodge Cummins every once in while.
When I bought my 07 it had all the enviromental friendly B.S. on it and it wasn't recomended to use Marvel. I've since hit a few bumps and all that stuff has fell off, so I have started using it again. I've never had any trouble with fuel gelling, unless I happen to get a load in a warmer climate and drive home, then have the temp drop 40 degrees on me and not have any Marvel on hand. (This happened to me in early December)

The marvel stuff is that like automatic tranny fulid? More of an injector cleaner? I've used tranny fluid added to filters to get a machine back running again, just dump it straight into the filters on a filter plugged machine and fire it back up, tranny fluid won't gell up or cause problems that way and we've done it for years and added it to a tank every now and again to help clean injectors, don't know how much good it does but it gives that warm fuzzy feeling like you attempted to do something positive to help out the engine. A friend of mine who's a mechanic told me it was good for diesels so we do it every once in a while.

watglen said:

Maybe someone can explain what causes fuel to gel. Is it just the cold? Or biofuel? or moisture?

I don't think i've ever seen it.

Click to expand...

Fuel gels due to low temperature. It causes the paraffin in the diesel fuel (wax) to solidify and plug the filter and fuel lines at low temperatures. Thicker (summer) fuel is #2 diesel. As the temps drop in the fall your local diesel fuel station should be getting supplied with progressively thinner diesel fuel mixtures (with #1 diesel) so that your fuel should not gel. Heavy duty diesels recirculate the excess fuel delivered to the injector pump but not burrned, back to the tank so the pump heats the oil somewhat and helps keep the tank from gelling. At least some P/U truck diesels don't recirculate back to the tank (like my former GM 6.2 diesel p/u).

Water causes ice to form in the fuel at the bottom of the tank or filter when it is cold enough and is a separate problem. Never fill up when you see the fuel tanker dropping fuel at the station, stirs up all the water and dirt in the U/G tank which gets pumped into your vehicle. Also keep the fuel tank full as much as possible in cold weather to prevent condensation.

Since Al Gore discovered global warming fuel gelling is not as much of a problem here as it was when I was younger.

Norite, i see you're in Sudbury. I went to school with a bunch of people from Hanmer(?) Was there a few times.

Anyway, how cold does it need to get to start gelling. I'm down here in the banana belt near niagara. It was -26 the other morning, with issues.

Gelled fuel

We get gelled fuel below 15 above f. The best thing to do is use blended fuel, with a bottle of 911 for good measure. When I run the Ice Roads on the North Slope, we run straight #1 and sometimes add PFFP for lubrication more than for gelling. Temps can average -30f and get down to -50f or colder ambient temp. Most everything runs 24/7 and many times your miles or hours from anyone or anything. No phone service, no houses, fuel stations, so wanna be sure they stay running. Even if close to phones or service, it is critical that rigs stay running or its a major deal to start them again.

The main thing to do, is not let it gel in the first place, Start blending fuel in early november and if it gets COLD use #1 only. The only real way to keep #2 from gelling is to keep it warm. Additives are ok, but expensive and not the real fix. #1 is expensive too, but how much does it cost when it dont run and loads are passing you by...

That's a picture of the go home meter. Right now it says go home! and stay there!

I'm surpirsed that you folks have had good luck with 911, I must have got a bad batch or something? I tried using it a couple years back it was worthless, I ended up using kero. I also use MMO year round I feel it is a good lubricater, I use it in my gas engines also especially with this ethanol crap{its going to go up to 15% }

Watglen, Most digital thermometers don't factor in wind chill, if not now what does that put it at for a temp? say at 60mph? I prefer the ones that say cold until they warm up to 32 degree's, that way I don't really know how cold it is out.

watglen said:

Anyway, how cold does it need to get to start gelling. I'm down here in the banana belt near niagara. It was -26 the other morning, with issues.

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I had to look this up but supposedly the cloud point for #2 diesel is up to 20 F/-7 C or even higher. The pour point where the fuel actually gels is 10 - 20 F less than that. Cloud point is where the paraffin in the fuel begins to be visible in the fuel. Pour point is where the fuel actually gels so it won't flow. #1 diesel has a cloud point of -40 F which is why it is blended with #2 so it doesn't gel but btu's and lubrication are reduced.

I've had good luck with Howes. I would stick with the more popular brands of anti gels. One thing that has made gelling worse over the past few years is the mandated mixing of Bio diesel since it gels much faster then #2.