Mangoman wrote:

johan7 wrote:

Hello , I operated many D4 , D6 D7 and D8 in the sixties and seventies . I found out that cold starting was often a problem . In many cases the starting engine was hardly powerfull enough to overturn the main . That problem was solved on a day when a collegue poured in ( by accident) gas with a higher octane value . From that moment on I always used super gas in these engines with low temparatures . On the D6C the result was incredibly good . I cannot explain why these engines ran better with a gas of a higher octane value , they are side valve engines and normally they do not need that gas because of a low compression ratio . You can always have a try , no cure no pay ! Succes , the Netherlands , johan7

Thank you Johan for your input. I do run premium 91 octane in all my gas motors around here because they usually see infrequent use and the ethanol in the lower grade fuels absorbs moisture and degrades quicker. I tried the pony yesterday afternoon. It was just at freezing temp 0c and it kicked at two pulls and ran at four. Not bad. Not like the one pull it was before but I can live with it. There other two problems that now exist are that the pony is weak on power and also the over enter pony drive clutch pops out even though I tightened it up as much as could without it being a full on two handed affair to lever the clutch over. Now I'm afraid I might be pulling thr pony drive, which means draining the coolant and lifting the pony off its base. Not the time I wanted to get into that.