As the owner of several older motorcycles I find myself constantly fighting the effects of ethanol in today's fuel at the petrol stations. My solution has been to pick up some aviation gasoline from a distributor. It has a long shelf life, doesn't absorb moister, and allows my almost 40-year-old motorcycle to run much better. All my smaller engines start and run without the annual rebuilding of the carburetors.

A few well-respected motorcycle shops and clubs I've talked to don't see it as a good idea because it's not 100% legal, but for me, it surely works perfectly. Yesterday, I pulled my Kawasaki KLX250 out of the garage. It probably hasn't been ridden more than 20 kilometers last year, but it started on the second kick and ran flawlessly. Also, on a old Triumph motorcycle the fuel tank mysteriously developed cracks after only a few years, probably because of the ethanol.

I would appreciate some comments on the matter….

The ethanol fuel available at the petrol stations now-a-day has been foisted on us has some bad side effects, including being absorbed by most plastics. There was some uproar when boat owners to use it had their fiberglass fuel tanks dissolve and it glued their engines together.

In Thailand it becomes more and more difficult to find fuel without ethanol. Our best advice to find and use non-ethanol fuel. Marinas have to have it for boat use.

The problem with aviation gasoline is that it's just under 100 RON, what is nice if you have a high power, high compression ratio sportsbike. For the average “older” motorcycle, which are often equipped with a engine that has a low compression ratio the combustion burn is not efficient as it should be. Inefficient combustion burn creates more carbon which will be deposit in the exhaust system...