Whats wrong with starting fluid

[Hooked_on_HP]

I was reading a reply on another post and starting fluid got brought up and how bad it is on engines. I didn't want to hijack that thread so I started a new one. It seems some people think useing starting fluid is worse than modifing your ROPS. I will agree you cannot use starting fluid with glow plugs, but if used properly I dont see any harm in it. All of our trucks and equiptment at work come from the factory with a starting fluid system installed. We dont use them verry often but when it is below freezing and somebody forgot to plug in the block heater starting fluid is a blessing.
Bill

 

[JerryG]

The units like are mounted on trucks and tractors use a metered amount of starting fluid. When most people go to use starting fluid, they use way to much and it can be very dangerous to an engine, especially the lands on the pistons.

 

[Farmwithjunk]

I was reading a reply on another post and starting fluid got brought up and how bad it is on engines. I didn't want to hijack that thread so I started a new one. It seems some people think useing starting fluid is worse than modifing your ROPS. I will agree you cannot use starting fluid with glow plugs, but if used properly I dont see any harm in it. All of our trucks and equiptment at work come from the factory with a starting fluid system installed. We dont use them verry often but when it is below freezing and somebody forgot to plug in the block heater starting fluid is a blessing.
Bill

Ether (starting fluid) is like fine Scotch Whiskey. A little sip is good every now and then. Half a bottle in one swig is darn near lethal. Moderation is the key.

For obvious reasons, the best scenario is to have an engine that fires right up without any help. Someimes outside forces, like extremely cold weather, prevent that from happening. Just a touch of ether sprayed into the air intake will give an engine just that little boost it needs to light up. Another "outside force" is having a tired, worn out engine. With the engine already in a weakened state, ether is like TNT in the combustion chambers. Give that same tired engine a BIG slug of ether, and you have an oil pan full of fishing weights, formerly known as pistons.

I refuse to use ether. If an engine needs something 10 times as volitile as it's normal fuel to reach ignition, it needs help, maybe in the form of an overhaul. Not harm in the form of violent explosives in the cylinders.

 

[woodchuckie]

The starting fluid will clean off any oil it contacts on your pistons and valves. It seems that it would take a lot to do any damage. I've also heard that choking the carb will have the same effect in cleaning off the lubricating oil.

 

[mjarrels]

Perkins diesels don't like it...

mark

 

[sandman2234]

Moderation my dear man, moderation...
David from jax

 

[Woodbeef]

A one second shot will help..........much longer could be dangerous.

 

[Volfandt]

Its bad bad bad
It strips away the protective oil coating on the piston and cylinder walls. Over time this will wear the rings and cylinder wall down past optimum clearances, lessoning compression and causing excessive oil usage.

Some of the old GSE gear I used to work on back in the day, with Detroit diesels, had an ether injector system that used those small metal capsules just like you find on CO2 pellet guns. It was only supposed to be used in sub-zero temps but folks got to useing them for all 1st starts of the day. Especially on the hydraulic start AC/DC generators and test stands. Their pressure tanks would bleed down over night and barely eave enough pressure to crank the engines so we'd want to get a start 1st time or we'd have to hand pump up the pressure again and again which was not good....
Anyways, with prolonged use of that ether those engines got to where they wouldn't start without it. Their internals were very noisey also.

I never use it on my personal equipment!

I've had some hard to start gasoline engines over yrs, with my 48 TE20 being the hardest to start once it got cold out.
What I'd do is to inject a small amount of gas into the carb with one of those turkey spice injectors and this would usually get that old engine started with a slow turning 6v starter.

Glow plugs should be all you need to get a properly maintained diesel going.

Volfandt

 

[Charolais]

I have an old friend that owned,operated and worked on dozers. We were talking one day about the use of starting fluid(Ether) and diesel engines. He told me that over the years he had learned a way to use Ether that didn't harm the engine. He said use a clean piece of cloth, spray the Ether on the cloth and hold it over the intake of the air filter while turning the engine. I've tried it and it works but on most engines you will need one person to turn the engine over while the other holds the cloth over the air intake. But it does work.

Yes you all are correct on the Perkins engine. You can use Ether on a Perkins for one winter in daily starting and it'll get to the place you have to use it at 45 deg. to get it started for the rest of the engine life. I know because my Dad did that on a 135 MF.

I also saw a Fiat enigine last summer with 3 of the 4 pistions cracked right across the top. The guy that owned it let the engine run out of fuel. He didn't know how to bleed the system and started spraying Ether in the try and keep the engine running in hopes it would pick up the fuel. Turned out to be very expensive in the end. And know it didn't pick up the fuel. I haven't used a shot of Ether in 20 years now and have no plans to do so. I do plan every day in the winter to have the engine already warm from plugging up the engine heater.(I use a timer) I have to feeding cows daily. I also keep a small generator close by to use if the power is out.

Ether can be used but you'd better know what you're doing when you use it.

 

[RoyJackson]

I have used ether many years ago. It was a metered shot on a Ford backhoe. This was in the late 60's, by the way. Out on the construction site I worked at, it wasn't uncommon to see a small fire burning under some of the equipment. This was to heat the oil enough to get those beasts started in the winter. For you folks from Maryland, this site was Columbia City in Howard County.

I wouldn't use it on my 790. For one, many of the newer Deeres use an intake heater rather then glow plugs. I don't think spraying something as volatile as ether across a heating element would be a good idea. I don't know if it would flash back out of the intake, but I'm not going to find out