The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area Engine Shop Starting fluid or gasoline?

Decided to spend the afternoon taking down the Christmas inflatables in the front yard. The very last one was Santa behind the wheel of the ‘50, and he’d been there since the weekend after Thanksgiving. I choked it hard and pumped the gas pedal several times, then hit the stomp starter several times but the 216 never lit. I figured the gas had drained out of the carb and the fuel line, and the fuel pump just couldn’t deliver enough gas to get it started. I’ll go back out tomorrow with some fresh fuel to pour into the carb, but have been wondering if spraying starting fluid would work as well? It would be a lot more convenient for sure. Is one way any better than the other? Are there any negatives associated with ether starting fluid?

Thanks

To much-starting fluid can be dangerous and also gas, don't ask how I know. So I starting using carb cleaner. I have the same problem in the cold months when I don't drive the truck that much. I have an electric pump as a backup. Btw mine is in a heated garage.

Gas and choke. If it is 6V you may need to charge the battery.

Starting fluid is not good for gas engines. It can wash down the cylinder walls and cause loss of compression. It will also cause a Big Bang if too much builds up before spark ignites it.

My first guess is low voltage at the coil, charge the battery.

If the fuel pump works then it will get fuel, even if dry carb, without unreasonable cranking. Then choke and or one or two pumps of the accelerator ought to do the trick.

OK, I'll admit it....I use a third option. I generally park my truck in the open sided hay shed attached to the shop. It's slightly down hill from the shed and when the trucks been parked for a couple weeks it takes considerable cranking to get fuel back to the carb and the combustion chamber fire started. My country redneck solution, saving any cranking is to push it out of the shed, hop in and bump start it. Funny thing is it usually starts dang near instantly. With the increased rpm of the rolling bump start in second and no starter load pulling current away from the coil it's easier on everything. Well excepting my legs and back.

RonR

Check the voltage at the coil while you're cranking. I'll bet it's going to be low. When we get obsessive-compulsive about getting good voltage to the starter with big cables, etc. we often forget that other circuits can suffer from the same loose, dirty and high resistance connections as the starter. Make sure the connections from the ammeter to the ignition switch and from the switch to the coil are in good shape. Are the points clean and gapped properly?

Once all that is in good shape you probably won't need to add any gas to the carb, but if you do only use an ounce or two. With as low compression as a stovebolt engine has, a quick spritz of starting fluid won't hurt- - - -just don't overdo it. The Cummins Big Cam 400 engine start in northern California that I witnessed is a good example. After squirting 1 1/2 cans of ether into it, the nose-pickers from the truck stop tire shop figured out the batteries were low. A quick boost from an 8-D battery in a coaster wagon got it cranked- - - -and it scattered engine parts all over the lot!
Jerry

As is always appropriate - read Jerry's advice carefully.

IF I am going to prime with gas/fluid, I usually squirt a little down the throat, with the choke wide open.
Then, set the choke almost fully closed, and crank with a little "throttle-down".

If my advice is off, we will see corrections posted quickly.
I've been successfully starting stovebolt 216/235/261 engines this way for 50 years.

Another sneaky trick is to use a pump oiler or a plastic squeeze bottle with a fine tip nozzle on it to fill the float chamber with gasoline. Squirt gas into the vent tube at the top of the carb and you'll be able to use the accelerator pump to prime the engine. This trick also allows the engine to run for several seconds on the fuel in the float bowl.
Jerry

Using starting fluid to start a cold gas engine is the best way. It is vaporized & doesn't puddle up like gas or other liquids. It will not fire till the plug fires. Diesel is a different story. The diesel timing is by the injection of the fuel. If the fuel is already in the cylinder, most of the time it will fire prematurely & can cause serious engine damage. We used to start the big old Cummins engines all the time on either. Some even had either injection systems to use for cold starts. I have started the light duty engines on starting fluid disconnecting the glow plug circuit first. It is risky though. The stating fluid we get now is not as strong as the Either that was used years ago.

George

Do you remember the little rubber capsules of ether that truck drivers used to carry for cold starts? They looked like a huge dose of some sort of medicine! Slice the end off the pill and squeeze the liquid ether into a fitting in the air intake duct with a spring-loaded cap, then pull the compression release knob and spin the engine over. Once the engine was spinning freely, push the knob in.

The high compression Diesels with a 22:1 compression ratio can be damaged by starting fluid, whether or not the glow plugs are operating.
Jerry

You know, I’ve learned from Jerry before about the need for the coil to be fully charged, and I actually thought about that after it never coughed or sputtered. I tried cranking the engine many times and it never even tried to light. Should have gone with my instincts. I’m off now to put the battery charger on it for a while, then I’m going to bet it fires right up. I’ll report later today.

Thanks all.

When we were growing up on the Mexican border, you could buy a bottle of Oso Negro (which means black bear but some swore it translated into "blindness in a bottle"). You could get vodka, gin, bourbon or scotch. Gin was vodka plus a splash of Pine-Sol floor cleaner, bourbon was vodka with a little more caramel coloring added and scotch was vodka with less caramel color added. It was dirt cheap and back then the alcohol content was scary high. I'm not sure anyone even knew how high it was or if there was any consistency. But you could pour some down the carburetor of nearly any engine and have it kick right over. I've read they just make vodka and gin now and they've taken steps to gentrify their image.

When I was in the Army, the 2-1/2 Ton and 5 Ton Diesel trucks had a rig for a spray can of ether and a cable to the cab. Not sure I'd recommend that remembering how many engines the shop I ran changed out. Of course, the GI's had little respect for the equipment they used, so that probably had something to do with the engine changeout quantities, too.
I wouldn't recommend ether except under very rare circumstances, given the chance of scattering engine parts.

Jerry, I've seen low batteries cause that issue as well, I'm surprised they didn't hydro-lock the Cummins. Way back when I 19 - 20 years old I worked for a guy plowing in field tile, we had a D9 Cat - no blade, set up with laser controlled plow. 2 cylinder gas pony motor. 1473 cubic inches of 6 cylinder raw Caterpiller power, a can of either in each hand for the twin air intakes.

Tried starting the truck this morning after charging the battery all night. It sputtered the first time but never again. Plan B..... took the advice several of you offered and poured some gasoline down the carb, then hit the stomp starter again and it finally lit. Success!! I think it was a combination of a low battery and no fuel in the carb and fuel line. The rich fuel mix fouled out the #4 plug, but after taking it out, cleaning it, and reinstalling the motor ran like a sewing machine!

Thanks everyone for your suggestions.

Spray brake cleaner down the carb. A few sprits work, even on cold mornings. It far less damaging ad safer then starter stuff.

The brake cleaner I use doesn’t burn. Or when forced to it creates poisonous gas.

Better to stick with gas or actual starter fluid if you must.

One of the founding principles of virtually every religion for millenia has been "Do everything in moderation". Why shouldn't that apply to using starting fluid? The only difference in ether and other fuels is its flash point- - - - -much lower, and therefore easier to ignite under less than ideal conditions. That would include bitter cold, low cranking speed, weak spark, or low compression. Just don't have a stupid attack while using it!
Jerry

Point well taken Jerry. Just in case something like this happens again, a can of starting fluid is a lot easier to carry in the truck than a can of gasoline! I’ll get a can of ether this weekend.

My Harley soft tail EVO engine gats a little balky after a long sleep. A quick spritz into the air cleaner after the engine is spinning well usually wakes it up nicely.
Jerry

This thread on ether vs. gasoline brought me back to my high school auto shop class. (many many years ago) Our shop teacher was a wise old bird (insert your personal vision of HRL here) and he would use acetylene to start fresh rebuilt motors. He would stick the torch in the carburetor and crack the acetylene valve while we were cranking. I remember those motors lighting off right off the bat. I guess he figured that he didn't want a bunch of rookies sloshing gas around the shop. I'm not even sure that aerosol ether was invented back then. I have never tried acetylene since but I'm of the squeeze bottle of gas down the carb vent school of thought.

SimS

I have never had any reason to use ether, I do know they used a lot of it on the equipment when I worked up in alaska, And destroyed two CAT engines. Simply because they didn't know to turn the start switch to the GLOW PLUG position. Once that little secret was revealed life was a lot better. I personally keep a little squirt bottle handy to sqirt in the float bowl, works perfectly. In any rate I avoid ether like the plague.

What is in the squirt bottle, brokenhead?

Gasoline, obviously. Acetyline or Propane is also a lot less messy for finding vacuum leaks than the Mr. Bad Wrench favorite, carburetor cleaner. I also use a little acetyline for bead-seating stubborn tubeless tires, especially the tapered-bead XX.5 inch ones.
Jerry