At 03:53 AM 2/5/2005, you wrote:
>The Coleman fuel burns just fine in an
>emergency situation and someone once told me that the octane level of the
>white gas was around 104, but I'm no chemical engineer to dispute or
>confirm that.  The last time I had to use it, the engine did knock a little
>under load, but that may have been due to using the Wal Mart brand gas and
>not the Coleman.

In high school I ran out of gas in my '80 Mazda in front of a supermarket.
Went in and bought 2 quarts of charcoal starter. My friends were convinced
the engine would "blow up", but it actually ran just fine (with a little
knocking and the exhaust smelling like a barbecue). The ended up walking
the 3/4 mile to the gas station. You can feed pretty much any petroleum
distillate of about the same density into a gasoline engine and it'll work
to some degree. Heck, in Africa the average octane rating of gasoline is
really low. 70 octane isn't uncommon and it goes down as low as 50, and
they drive all sorts of vehicles. Coleman fuel is essentially pure
petroleum naphtha-- much higher octane than regular gas, and much cleaner.
Perfectly good in your tank. Dunno 'bout the WalMart stuff though. Probably
just charcoal starter!

John Bange
'90 Vanagon "Geldsauger"