Hello,
I have an Ariens Compact 24 (920021) with an LCT engine that I purchased back in winter 2014. I've been pleased with it, though it's probably only gotten 15-20 uses or so since I've owned it (not exactly a bad problem to have). Anyway, my question about the snowblower relates to offseason storage, and more specifically, whether most with this model or one similar drain or leave pretreated gasoline in it during the offseason. Currently, I have 1/4 - 1/2 gallon of regular ethanol gas in the snowblower that I filled roughly two months ago. As I always do, the gas was immediately mixed with Seafoam in the gas can. It appears that the weather may not necessitate using the snowblower for the rest of this winter, so it got me thinking about offseason maintenance (both this year and moving forward).
I've read enough about this dilemma to know that there are advocates for leaving gas in the snowblower through the offseason, and I know there are others that recommend draining it. What I'm interested in is what's going to be the easiest from a maintenance perspective. Everything else being equal, it would be nice to have a similar offseason storage plan to my push mower, as the mower manual recommends draining the gas, but it's not essential to be in sync with the mower.
Am I OK to leave the ~two month old, ethanol gas that's been mixed with Seafoam in this blower, and if not, what is the easiest way to remove it - buy a siphon and siphon it into my car's tank? Moving forward, based on whatever input I receive here, I do have the option of purchasing ethanol free gas from a dealer approximately ten minutes away. After doing some reading on the benefits, using a gallon or so of that to fill both the snowblower and mower might be the best way to go. Obviously, the snowblower doesn't get used often enough that I'm going through gas with any sort of regularity; in fact, there was at least one winter that I didn't even need to use it. I'm not opposed to leaving gas in it assuming it's safe, but I believe I read that some folks recommend storing it with a full tank of gas. Assuming that's correct, fFor the reason I mentioned, it would take me years and years to use that much gas, so I'm not sure that's a great option for my situation. Any advice you can offer would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!
I have an Ariens Compact 24 (920021) with an LCT engine that I purchased back in winter 2014. I've been pleased with it, though it's probably only gotten 15-20 uses or so since I've owned it (not exactly a bad problem to have). Anyway, my question about the snowblower relates to offseason storage, and more specifically, whether most with this model or one similar drain or leave pretreated gasoline in it during the offseason. Currently, I have 1/4 - 1/2 gallon of regular ethanol gas in the snowblower that I filled roughly two months ago. As I always do, the gas was immediately mixed with Seafoam in the gas can. It appears that the weather may not necessitate using the snowblower for the rest of this winter, so it got me thinking about offseason maintenance (both this year and moving forward).
I've read enough about this dilemma to know that there are advocates for leaving gas in the snowblower through the offseason, and I know there are others that recommend draining it. What I'm interested in is what's going to be the easiest from a maintenance perspective. Everything else being equal, it would be nice to have a similar offseason storage plan to my push mower, as the mower manual recommends draining the gas, but it's not essential to be in sync with the mower.
Am I OK to leave the ~two month old, ethanol gas that's been mixed with Seafoam in this blower, and if not, what is the easiest way to remove it - buy a siphon and siphon it into my car's tank? Moving forward, based on whatever input I receive here, I do have the option of purchasing ethanol free gas from a dealer approximately ten minutes away. After doing some reading on the benefits, using a gallon or so of that to fill both the snowblower and mower might be the best way to go. Obviously, the snowblower doesn't get used often enough that I'm going through gas with any sort of regularity; in fact, there was at least one winter that I didn't even need to use it. I'm not opposed to leaving gas in it assuming it's safe, but I believe I read that some folks recommend storing it with a full tank of gas. Assuming that's correct, fFor the reason I mentioned, it would take me years and years to use that much gas, so I'm not sure that's a great option for my situation. Any advice you can offer would be greatly appreciated. Thank you!