Drain Gas Tank

[MIKED]

Anyone have any idea how to drain the fuel from a 2019 Ford GT? I'm afraid I may have water in my fuel. After putting fuel in it is runs poorly and hardly idles.

 

[italianjoe]

Anyone have any idea how to drain the fuel from a 2019 Ford GT? I'm afraid I may have water in my fuel. After putting fuel in it is runs poorly and hardly idles.

Hello MIKED.

If you don't mind me asking, do you have a check engine light on? Did you pull out a spark plug and look to see what it looks like ? The biggest problem I see with them is fouled out plugs.....when cold these cars run rich and need to be warmed up before shutting them off. Not saying it's not possible you don't have bad fuel but the easiest thing to do is pull a plug and see what it looks like.......

Joe

 

[STORMCAT]

Hello MIKED.

If you don't mind me asking, do you have a check engine light on? Did you pull out a spark plug and look to see what it looks like ? The biggest problem I see with them is fouled out plugs.....when cold these cars run rich and need to be warmed up before shutting them off. Not saying it's not possible you don't have bad fuel but the easiest thing to do is pull a plug and see what it looks like.......

Joe

I know of others that have fouled plugs.. I never start mine unless I can let it warm up..

 

[MIKED]

thanks for the reply's I wish I had only fouled a plug but I run 101 Octane in my car from a local VP dealer and the can had a little bit of water in the bottom that I was not aware of until after this mess happened I'm guessing there is a cupful of water in the 9 or so gallons in the car. I tried HEET drygas in it and it will run and runs "ok" when cold but once it comes up near temperature it drops cylinders and i get a P02195 left bank lean o2 sensor and a few cylinder misfire codes. I'm afraid to keep running it too much to get the water out for fear of doing some damage so my I'm thinking better to drain the tank or take it to Ford which I hate to do. I have race cars and the can had been sitting empty outside my shop but closed up. Stupid mistake and I was telling myself before putting fuel in the can to check it and then forgot. FYI the car only has 50 miles on it

 

[extrap]

Just spitballing: Disconnect the battery, pull the fuel hose off, add a 6' or 8' hose extension to it and run that to a couple 5 gallon fuel jugs, as far away as possible (outside prob best) to dissipate fumes, apply 12V to the fuel pump and let that push it all out of the tank and into the cans ... ?

Insert a switch in line between your 12V battery and the fuel pump, to reduce / eliminate the chance of an exposed spark near fumes / the car.

I know Rich Brooks pulls the fuel hose off FGTs and runs the secondary fuel pump to confirm it's working, so a call to him might get you some advice.

ps I know very little about the NGT, so there might well be some very good reason(s) not to do this! ("knows" enough to be dangerous!)

 

[Indy GT]

Hope you are able to offload the bad fuel from your car. I would definitely talk to Rich Brooks and solicit his input.

And WHY (???) in the world are you paying the extra dollars to run VP 101 octane fuel??
The car will run just fine on 91 octane fuel (by required EPA calibration). So throwing 101 octane fuel at the engine hoping for some reason does not make any sense.....

 

[MIKED]

I will contact Rich Brooks.

I run the 101 as its what I use in my road race cars sometimes I use 98 but I'm in Norcal where premium is a little over 5 bucks a gallon and the 101 only costs me $6.50. added insurance against detonation take away the idiot (me) with the water in the can. Its not like its my DD where the cost of fuel might matter.

 

[Indy GT]

Miked, understand the relative cost delta between pump 91 octane premium in Norcal and the VP product and the low annual mileage on the GT. But understand the 3.5L engine in our car does have knock sensors which when they register internal detonation will quickly pull spark advance until the detonation signature abates.

Interestingly the VP unleaded HP101 (if that is indeed what you use) has a MON of 96.6 and RON of 106. This makes sense as they get the high RON value by adding alcohol (and other chemicals) to the fuel which the alcohol by itself has a high RON value (about 107). The HP101 spec sheet indicates the fuel is "oxygenated" (alcohol added, hopefully ethanol) by 3.77%. So the alcohol certainly adds to the final RON value. Unfortunately the added alcohol does not add as much energy (BTU/Lbm) as the base stock. Using isooctane as a reference baseline, the alcohol addition has about 38% less energy density (12,780/20,556). And thus the relatively low MON relative to RON. For my race car fuel I too want octane of 98+ but I want the highest MON for my road race application which usually steers me to a non-oxygenated race fuel.

Certainly your choice what fuel to feed your baby. Your pump premium in Norcal probably has just shy of 10% ethanol added so if you did take some water from the fill, the 10% alcohol might have just absorbed the water. Just watch out for water in the bottom of those VP cans.

 

[italianjoe]

thanks for the reply's I wish I had only fouled a plug but I run 101 Octane in my car from a local VP dealer and the can had a little bit of water in the bottom that I was not aware of until after this mess happened I'm guessing there is a cupful of water in the 9 or so gallons in the car. I tried HEET drygas in it and it will run and runs "ok" when cold but once it comes up near temperature it drops cylinders and i get a P02195 left bank lean o2 sensor and a few cylinder misfire codes. I'm afraid to keep running it too much to get the water out for fear of doing some damage so my I'm thinking better to drain the tank or take it to Ford which I hate to do. I have race cars and the can had been sitting empty outside my shop but closed up. Stupid mistake and I was telling myself before putting fuel in the can to check it and then forgot. FYI the car only has 50 miles on it

Code P2195 is more then likely a contaminated o2 sensor as for the removing fuel ......shop manual says to siphon through the fuel filler and will only remove 46 %.....if it was me I would disconnect the fuel line at the high pressure pump and turn the key on and off and let the in tank fuel pump remove the fuel in the tank. If you need further info please contact me anytime......send me a message and I will give you my number.

Joe

 

[DakotaGT]

In most of my modern, high-performance cars (with cats, 02 sensors, etc) I add a couple of gallons of VP101 to the tank at every fill-up, to a tank of premium non-ethanol. As Bill said, this (VP101) is unleaded and oxygenated with ethanol, but a rather low content of ethanol. I do this because I don't want to leave any horsepower on the table, such as might occur if the so-called 91 premium is a bit short of the advertised octane, and as some protection against detonation if this were to be the case. Knock sensors are great, but guess what triggers them to adjust things- yep, KNOCK, and I don't like that to occur in the first place. Adding any more than a couple of gallons per fill is not only wasting money, but some cars actually LOSE performance with octane that is unnecessarily high. Anyway, my buddy owns the gas station where I fill up, and I talked him into adding a pump with VP101, so it's pretty convenient for me.

Now my Demon comes with a factory performance tune specifically to run on 100-101 octane fuel, so that thirsty hog gets a full tank of VP101 every time. That heavy beast needs every one of those 840 hp

 

[MIKED]

Code P2195 is more then likely a contaminated o2 sensor as for the removing fuel ......shop manual says to siphon through the fuel filler and will only remove 46 %.....if it was me I would disconnect the fuel line at the high pressure pump and turn the key on and off and let the in tank fuel pump remove the fuel in the tank. If you need further info please contact me anytime......send me a message and I will give you my number.

Joe

Thanks Joe I think that's what I am going to do. I do have the shop manual and had read that about the siphoning and only able to get to 46%. I will disconnect the line coming from the pump and cycle the switch to dump the fuel. Turns out I also have a good authorized factory Ford GT store/mechanic (Fairfield Ford) about a half hour from my house so if this doesn't take care of it I will let them handle it for me.

Thanks to everyone for reply's/input these forums are awesome

 

[fjpikul]

Did you think about calling the Concierge? I have had very good luck with them. They usually won't have an instant answer, but they do get back after finding an answer (probably from Italian Joe. )

 

[MIKED]

I did call the concierge and decided to have Fairfield Ford pick up the car and drain the tank and check the o2 sensor to make sure all's good. After sitting a day with the HEET (which is basically methanol but will mix with the moisture to burn it off) in the tank and cold starting the car a few times it appears to be running fine. I just don't want to take any chances with the engine.

 

[Ed Sims]

You will like Joe & the gang at Fairfield Ford. They have taken good care of me & the owner is a friend.

Ed

 

[MIKED]

Good to hear they are picking up the car tomorrow morning. Can't wait to get this behind me one of the stupider things I've done

 

[MIKED]

Just wanted to give a thumbs up to Sean, Joe and John at Fairfield Ford in Norcal. Car is fixed and back home running great the fuel did in fact have a little moisture in it which they flushed out. these guys are very good and would not hesitate to take my GT there again. They treated it like it was their own and let me know every couple of days the progress and took care of a few other things including replacing the plugs under warranty (a known issue). Picked the car up in an enclosed trailer and had me come down to the dealership to look at everything before buttoning it back up and returning it to me perfectly cleaned in their Jemglo enclosed trailer. Could not ask for better service than that.