How long will Regular Gas remain good in a boat fuel tank?

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Q. How long will Regular Gas remain good in a boat fuel tank,and at what point should I add a stablizer

A. If the tank is METAL and the tank is FULL, gas will last in that tank for YEARS....many YEARS. Case in point....The gas in the FULL METAL tank in my Honda emergency genset dates back to Hurricane Hugo in 1989. The tank is steel and kept filled to the top. The genset will crank on the first pull and runs fine. Why?? Because it can't BREATHE.....That's the keyword. If the tank can breathe, such as a tank that is not full as you can get it, the light hydrocarbons that give the fuel its octane rating evaporate out at a faster rate than the heavy elements. Octane drops. Any tank not slap full breathes in when it cools every night and out when the vapors inside heat every day.....unless you can close off the vent and pressurize the tank. The only gas tanks like that in a boat I ever knew of was an old Evinrude with twin hoses that was a pressure tank. I don't think it can breathe if the cap was sealed. What's left after lots of breathing cycles is that god-awful smelling gook that looks like shellac..... Of course, in an effort to make more money on each boat, we're using PLASTIC, made of very large hydrocarbon molecules. Plastic has another problem. The light elements in the gas can "leak" out between the plastic molecules! If you leave gas in a plastic tank, even one that's totally sealed up and pressurized, it'll "leak" the light molecules and the gas will SLOWLY turn to gook. You can test this silly theory, yourself, very easily. Take a plastic 6-gallon gas can. Fill it with gas. Put the tank in a plastic garbage bag such that all the openings of the tank are out of the plastic bag. Seal the plastic bag to the top of the tank BELOW the openings with duct tape, the experimenter's friend. Leave it in the garage a week. At the end of the week, crack open a hole in the bag and smell inside the bag, trying not to let any more air in the bag. It'll stink of gas even though there was never any gas in the bag. Didja ever notice how the inside of your cheap boat ALWAYS smells of gas, even though all the gas is in the cheap plastic tank? The gas is leaking right through the plastic the tank is made of. It's why all aircraft have METAL tanks that I know of. If you take a pilot training course, you are HAMMERED with "ALWAYS STORE THE AIRPLANE WITH FULL GASTANKS". The breathing, in airplanes and boats, too, also causes water vapor to be breathed in, which condenses on the cold tank walls at night, sliding down the walls under the gas waiting to be picked up by the pickup tube and pumped into the carbs or fuel injection. Gas tanks need to be kept FULL for both these reasons.....diesel tanks, too!

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