PETRONSKI!!!!
Posted on 10/08/2004 1:44:51 PM PDT by BenLurkin
LANCASTER - Can you trust your car to the gasoline with the star?
An unknown contaminant in the gasoline at the Texaco Starmart on Challenger Way and Avenue K caused at least 45 cars to break down in the past week, puzzling drivers and mechanics.
Mike Aubrey, owner of Mike's Performance Automotive in Lancaster, first heard about the problem Sept. 29. A week later, he was dealing with the third car to break down after getting gasoline from the Starmart.
"What we're having to do is take the manifold out and replace all the injectors," Aubrey said, taking a fuel injector off the shelf to explain. "There's something in there that just acts like glue. When it evaporates, it just glues the fuel injectors shut."
Repairing and replacing the damaged parts usually takes three hours, Aubrey said, but disposing of the gasoline takes another four hours. Fuel must be flushed completely from the gas tank, engine and fuel injectors.
"Shell has offered me no help in getting rid of the fuel," the mechanic said. Gasoline is a hazardous material, which can only be transported and disposed of by a few contractors. Costs can range from $200 to $700 for disposal.
When Adrienne King's 2004 Nissan Altima suddenly broke down Sunday on the Antelope Valley Freeway, she barely had enough power to get to the side of the road. King was surprised, to say the least: The car was only 6 months old.
King had filled her tank only three hours earlier at the Texaco station. King's car was towed to Antelope Valley Nissan, where the service advisor told her there were 10 other cars with similar problems.
King called the Texaco station, where the manager put her name on a growing list and gave her a customer service number to call. The repairs will likely cost King around $2,100, including $700 for disposal of the bad gasoline.
The next day, Monday, the Texaco station shut down its pumps. On Thursday, the station was nearly deserted, with only a few patrons coming into the StarMart. Pumps were sheathed in red covers that read: "Sorry: Pump out of order," and orange pencil cones blocked self-service lanes.
Cameron Smyth, a spokesman for Shell, which operates Texaco retail stations, said the company was looking into the problem.
"We received some complaints from customers," he said. The pumps were shut down "after we realized it wasn't just an isolated incident."
Test samples were taken from the station's gas tanks, but so far Shell does not know what the problem was. Smyth said an "odd substance" was found in the bottom of the tanks, describing it as "thick" and "reddish in color." He also pointed out that the premium-grade gasoline met Shell's specifications.
"Obviously we want to do this as quickly as possible, but we're not going to cut any corners," Smyth said. Independent contractors will conduct the chemical analysis.
As of Wednesday, Shell had received 45 complaints about bad gas. Smyth estimated that the "majority of complaints have already been received."
"It has affected different cars differently," Smyth said. "Some customers saw impact within a couple miles, some it took a few days."
He advised customers to get their cars checked if they suspected a problem.
"If they're experiencing any difficulty with their vehicle, they should obviously take it to a professional," the Shell spokesman said. "If they do feel it's a result of fuel, they can contact the station where got the gas."
King, whose car stalled on the freeway, expects to be reimbursed for the repair cost. Smyth would not give a specific breakdown on what costs Shell might cover.
"At this point, we're keeping a record of complaints received, and a lot done on case-by-case basis," Smyth said. He added that the problem so far is exclusive to the Lancaster station.
"The first step is we need to find out what that substance was," Smyth said. "Once we do that we can extrapolate from there whether it was an isolated incident."
He added, "We have not received any complaints from any other stations."
Aubrey from Mike's Automotive was unhappy with Shell's response so far.
"It's really hard on the consumer and on shops because Shell was never nice enough to put out a notice on what was wrong," he said. "If I'd known what was wrong with this Suburban (the first car with the gas problem), I could have had it out of here in a day, instead of six."
The way the gasoline turned to glue and clogged fuel injectors left Aubrey confused.
"I've never seen gas do what this stuff did," he said in exasperation.
The mechanic is hardly alone.
Greg Cook, an assistant manager at Saybolt Laboratories in Carson, specializes in analyzing petroleum- and hydrocarbon-based chemicals. He said the problem could have been caused by the gasoline deteriorating. As gas decomposes naturally over time, it produces peroxides and what experts call "petroleum gum."
That gum can clog engines in a way similar to that which caused King's car to break down. But that process usually takes time, Cook explained.
Hearing that King had filled her gas tank only three hours before the Nissan stalled, Cook said: "That seems radically fast."
The gum produced also had Cook baffled. "It's usually not reddish; that's pretty intriguing."
California regulates gum in gasoline, mandating that there can be no more than five miligrams of gum per 100 milliliters of gas.
"If you're above five, the gas is not stable," Cook said. "It must be an incredible amount of whatever this crud is. There's so many things that could go wrong, I wouldn't even begin to speculate on what that reddish substance is."
"One of the other consequences of decay would be peroxides, which would have a particular odor," Cook said.
Aubrey reported no such smell in the cars he has fixed so far. The gas was normal consistency, although its color was off. Gasoline is normally clear; gas in the cars Aubrey serviced was yellowish. This information further puzzled Cook.
Cook said the problem might have come from diesel fuel being mixed into Texaco's gasoline tanks, but he said that would not have likely caused so much damage so quickly. Diesel also would not have left the reddish residue.
While Shell and local mechanics struggle to determine what went wrong at the Texaco station, King is still driving a rental car. She will probably not have her Altima back until the middle of next week.
Even if King gets her money back, the whole situation has her seething in frustration.
"It's a new car. I've had it for six months. That's just wrong," she said.
Yikes!
This sounds like sabotage. Texaco wouldn't do it...they're a good gas company.
I suspect something like polystyrene or another plastic that will dissolve in gasoline. Sounds to me like this station needs better locks on its tank caps.
Nasty business, for sure, and Texaco's going to have to make good on all the repairs.
For those of you interested in fuels and lubrication, this forum may give some info.
http://theoildrop.server101.com/ubb/ultimatebb.php
It is part of www.bobistheoilguy.com
read later
Interesting. Thanks for the link.
If there is water in the gas it is possible for bacteria to grow. The biomass will appear thick and if it gets sucked into the injectors it will clog them.
What is wrong? An undistributed middle fallacy in the argument?
Weeks ago this happened and Texaco had to fork over for cleaning the fuel system. Why this, now?
EnviroTerrorists.
They burn down new home developments.
They burn SUV's on dealer lots.
This is a logical step.
One fuel injector will cost 50 to 100 dollars, plus labor. On my car, $58*8 is $464 plus tax (my own labor is free). Yer damn right Texaco would be paying.
Good call on the possibility of PS. Wonder what would cause the reddish color, though...
LOL
WTF?
I dunno. It's Friday. Laughs on me. Getting ready to fly to Vegas for my bachelor party, so I'm feeling a touch random.
A lesson: always save your gas receipts. People who didn't, will have a hard time proving they got gas there.
Live near there? Buddies and I are staying at the Hard Rock.
Nobody will get money out of Texaco because that entity no longer exists. They merged with Chevron and are now ChevronTexaco. In my area, all of the Texaco stations have been rebranded as Chevron. However, the gas stations in the western region of the US were taken over by Shell, since Texaco had a refining and marketing JV (Motiva) with Shell before the Chevron merger. I guess they still brand the stations as Texaco there. Which explains why, even though the name of the station in the article is Texaco, the mechanics and the car owners are blaming Shell in the article.
Enviro Terrorists is right, says my gut.
I used to work at a gas station. The filler covers can be lifted by hand, and the fuller caps below them never have locks.
It would be incredibly easy for ELF terorists to go there late at night (all lights off), and pour either bags of sugar or gallons of lindseed oil into the tanks. Either one would cause the problem, and kill a car in 3 hours.
Polystyrene is too bulky to use. Think of 10,000 foam cups.
Lindseed oil is chap and effective. A half a cup in a tank will kill your engine permanently. A couple ounces will kill it slowly.
Maybe somebody dumped a couple of boxes of orange latex gloves in the station's tanks.
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