JD 3038E starts, then after five seconds dies

[DeepEastTexas]

All of you know where the water is coming from that accumulates in your tanks & cans.
The advent of corn alcohol added to our fuel has given us trouble since day one. Left sitting in cans or tanks the water in the alcohol separates & settled to the bottom of the tank.
Manufacturers changed fuel line types to address the first problem we encountered.
Carbs and injection systems rusting has been addressed but not 100% we still see clogs of slimy mess and rusty globs in bowls and metal tanks.
And yes there are growths in some fuels.
My 3038E tank is up for a clean out. How do I know? Filters new & water separator clean but it still runs about 10 minutes then quits. Two approaches: blow air thru line back into the tank( though this is a temporary fix) or remove tank and take supply line fixture then wash tank with high pressure. Be sure to clean the screen & dry out the tank. Replace and go to work!
Even the last fix is temporary unless you have access to non alcohol fuel!

 

[dodge man]

There is no alcohol in diesel fuel. There is biodiesel, which has various things in it to call it bio, soy or corn based are a couple of examples.

 

[ArlyA]

I just thought I'd post this for anyone else that has this problem.
My JD 3032e started dying intermittently, would restart, run well for a while, then die again. I cleaned the fuel separator, installed a new filter, and added some diesel fuel treatment. This helped for a few months then the problem got worse. I knew already that microbes can grow in diesel so I suspected that they were clogging the tank pickup tube. I'd noticed some sort of slimy mass in the fuel separator when I'd cleaned it before so this seemed to make sense. I started to pull the pickup from the bottom of the tank but it looked pretty daunting so I took a look inside the tank - too much fuel to see through. I removed the inlet hose at the fuel separator to drain the tank but got little flow. I blew compressed air back through the tank and then got good enough flow to drain the tank. I took another look into the fill port of the tank and could see a slimy mass in the pickup area and in another low portion of the tank. Although the stuff looked fragile I was able to use a mechanic's pickup tool to remove both masses from the tank (photo below). I've read that this stuff grows at the interface between fuel and water. I'm pretty careful about my fuel quality so I'm not sure how I got water in there other than from the air.
She's running great now.
I read on another site where someone paid a JD dealer $600 to pull the tank and clean it for the same problem. I hope this post saves someone that aggravation.

BTW the stuff is not algae as most commonly call it. It's actually bacteria or fungi. There's some good info from DOW Chemical and Wikipedia at the links below.
http://www.hpcdfuel.com/pdf/DOWfuel_training.pdf
Microbial contamination of diesel fuel - Wikipedia

Some chemicals just like water and attract it. So the longer the fuel sits in your tank or fuel can, the more water is absorbed. Diesel fuel drier and anti growth biocide type additives are needed.

I know of Oil wells that needed biocide additives added to the crude just to get it to the refinery.