Coleman lantern fuel in the tank

[ccdhowell]

Seems I remember reading in the old threads that Coleman lantern fuel is a very good fuel system cleaner. I couldn't find any reference to this anywhere else on the internet, but I went ahead and tried it anyway.

To a full tank of 25 gallons, I added one quart of Coleman lantern fuel and drove the vehicle normally.

Results:
1. Doesn't seem to have hurt the vehicle.
2. Didn't change idle or engine sounds.
3. Maybe had slightly more acceleration while running that tank through.
4. Maybe retained the slight acceleration benifit on subsequent tanks of gas.

This is a well maintained Land Rover which is no speed demon to begin with, however, it seems to accelerate more smoothly now. Sort of like the feeling you get when you replace badly worn spark plugs.

Conclusion: I'm gonna use it again in a few months and see what happens.

Just thought I'd throw this out there.

 

[Quest]

Being a lantern purveyer of all sorts (Kerosene, Coleman white gas, gas lanterns, etc.) and also a long time collector/restorer of Coleman lanterns, I must tell you the truth.

The truth is, Coleman fuel is primarily naphtha based and it does not come with any solvency (if any) nor detergency in it.

Dumping 1 gal into 25gal of regular gasoline, you are just gonna drop your octane rating a few points (yes, white gas or naphtha comes around 50~60 octane only and it's not meant to be run on modern vehicles with over 8:1 compression ratio) straight.

In other words: I wouldn't bet on the "potentially perceivable" benefits from adding Coleman fuel into regular car gas, if any.

And also: because most modern EFI systems are self-regulated (minor adjustment due to fuel problems), even after lowering the octane points by a couple because of the introduction of naphtha, you shouldn't notice the difference (if any).

If you do, then yes, you shall look into the matter from proper fuel vapourisation problem (fuel injectors need cleaning? FI cleaner? combustion chamber deposits? spark plugs need replacement, fuel filter needs to be replaced?)

 

[Gary Allan]

We used to use unleaded fuel in our mantle Coleman lamps and our "bug sprayer pump" Coleman stove. It wasn't called unleaded back then...unless you went to an Amoco station