fuel system problem

[Defender110]

What a dick!

[mat_fenwick]

I put a gallon can of what I thought was petrol in the Granny a few weeks ago - turned out to be heating oil

No great loss then...

[electrokid]

No great loss at all - with a million gazigavolts of HT it still ran just fine just a bit smokey that's all - well very smokey - actually I couldn't see the houses opposite for a couple of minutes I think it may have .. er cleaned out some carbon from somewhere

[Tim Leech]

What a dick

Now now be nice Matt, we all make mistakes, i couldn't understand why it was running perfectly the day I sold it then crap the next, now I know I'm happy.

[mat_fenwick]

What a dick

Now now be nice

I'd choose to take it as a compliment TBH if it was said to me...

very smokey - actually I couldn't see the houses opposite for a couple of minutes

Do you remember Redex (maybe still sold?) that you put in your fuel but could also pour into your bores to 'loosen varnish deposits'? Well, I did just that once, about 10 years ago. The smoke it created was immense! And just when I thought it had all cleared, I put my foot down to overtake a cyclist, and the poor sod was immediately enveloped by a swirling cloud emanating from my exhaust.

[electrokid]

Oh yes I remember Redex (I remember dad buying 4 gallons of petrol and muttering something about not getting much change from a 1 pound note ! ) To clean the carb you took the air filter off, revved the nuts off it and just poured it in - then you looked around and wondered where the planet went The heating oil had much the same effect.

I drove it with a very light throttle down to the garage to dilute it with some genuine unleaded hoping that people would think it was just an old car with engine problems - took a few fillups to clear it though. I was almost laughing too much to drive - performance was completely unaffected but the rear view was a bit foggy

I only put it in because the tank was very nearly empty - it was running fine on at least 50% heating oil - amazing !

The diesel BX runs ok on 50% heating oil as well - but that's more understandable but I guess not to be recommended.

[rayfenwick]

My brother recently bought himself a 2.5 v6 Alfa Romeo 166. He's a bit skint (no surprises there...especially as his other car is a petrol v8 Discovery) and quite often runs his cars on empty.

Getting used to the fuel gauge on the Alfa caused him to once run out of fuel a few hundred metres from home, on the way back from using his petrol strimmer, and had a jerrycan of 2-stroke in the boot. He didn't fancy pushing it, so he put some of that in. It didn't seem much affected, but smoked a little. He got it home, diluted the fuel with some petrol, and all was well, although I'm sure if cars have feelings, the Alfa would have been quite miffed!

[mat_fenwick]

My brother....his other car is a petrol v8 Discovery

Are you sure we're not related?! I had to think back to if I'd recently bought an 166 for a moment!

Being an Alfa, I'm sure the car will get its own back many, many times...

[electrokid]

Does the Alfa have multi-spark ignition ?