I know this has probably been done to death but has it definitely been proved that it's the excess Ethanol in our fuel nowadays that causes tank blisters on Tigers? Does it happen to all colours of Tiger as the reason I ask is that my mate was looking at buying a Tiger and in his search he saw Tigers with blistered tanks and he said the ones he looked at that the blisters had the black tiger stripes (orange,silver,roulette green ones) and the blisters were under the stripes,he wondered if it was something to do with the heat attraction of the black stripes in the heat of sun? Mine is an 02 black bike with silver stripes and touch wood is blister free at the moment (probably talked that up now),has anyone got a black bike with a blistered tank?
I have 2 01 Roulette green tigers one with blisters one without. The one with blisters had a lot more tanks of fuel run through it.
no blisters on my orange 05 tank
Sorry to rain on your parade but mines black with silver stripes and yes, it has blistered
Orange 05 no blisters. Bloody big scratches though :BangHead
Do you know I've never looked as my tank has been under a bagster tank cover from the day I bought it and when I take the tank off never look to see :icon_scratch:
Quote from: John Stenhouse on July 03, 2014, 12:37:20 AM
Sorry to rain on your parade but mines black with silver stripes and yes, it has blistered
I've got two blisters on one stripe of my 02 Black.
black 06 with multiple blisters on various stripes
So my theory of the black bikes is well and truly blown out of the water,why does it happen only under the stripes then? If it is the ethanol vapour leeching through the plastic tank why only the stripes as the paint on the tank can't be porous or the tank would leak,or am I wrong and it happens all over the tank on some bikes?
It's all over the tank on mine
Here's one that's completely off the wall; what if some tanks still contained minute amounts of moisture (not necessarily water, think solvent) in the plastic when they were initially painted by Triumph and that moisture eventually causes the bubbles.......
Quote from: fraserdog on July 04, 2014, 08:43:05 AM
So my theory of the black bikes is well and truly blown out of the water,why does it happen only under the stripes then? If it is the ethanol vapour leeching through the plastic tank why only the stripes as the paint on the tank can't be porous or the tank would leak,or am I wrong and it happens all over the tank on some bikes?
I don't think ethanol has anything to do with it
the tanks shrink and grow during temp changes (think sitting in sun) and the decals come unstuck .
I had a TTR 250 yamaha a long time ago ,
plastic tank and bubbled decals
it never had ethanol in it .
I have recently found blisters on my 06, in blue. Yes it is only on the stripes, it's all to do with them being stick on bits. If you use a pin to prick the blisters then nothing comes out. I think it is more to do with the hot weather than anything sinister!
Mine's an 04 in Silver. Started blistering in the last 6 months.
My theory?
The stripes are vinyl. It doesn't "breath" like the paint does. The tank & the paint are porous & the vinyl is not.
Thus you get blisters.
We either need to deal with lumpy tanks or hand paint our stripes!
I'll just deal.
Quote from: dftuttle on July 05, 2014, 05:07:49 AM
Mine's an 04 in Silver. Started blistering in the last 6 months.
My theory?
The stripes are vinyl. It doesn't "breath" like the paint does. The tank & the paint are porous & the vinyl is not.
Thus you get blisters.
We either need to deal with lumpy tanks or hand paint our stripes!
I'll just deal.
+1, blisters occurred when my tank was about 4 years old. I would place pin holes in them to reduce them. If I kept the tank full, they were less prevalent.
I wonder if it affects any other triumphs with plastic tanks? My mate has a 2004 Sprint st with over 60k on the clock and nothing on the paintwork on that.It seems only the tanks suffer not the fairings or side panels which all have decals in one form or another which makes me think it is something to do with the petrol.
Oh it's def fuel but what is going on here in the UK is they are starting to put more crap in the petrol(ethanol) they've been doing to the Americans for years.
If you scour the forums there's been allsorts of hassle Ducati have even had to change tanks because they been deforming.
Stick a Bagster on it :icon_biggrin: out of sight out of mind!!!
I put the premium fuel in mine,v power,bp ultimate etc with the vain hope that these have less ethanol content than regular and might hold off the impending blisters for a while.
Quote from: Bixxer Bob on July 04, 2014, 12:57:28 PM
Here's one that's completely off the wall; what if some tanks still contained minute amounts of moisture (not necessarily water, think solvent) in the plastic when they were initially painted by Triumph and that moisture eventually causes the bubbles.......
My Steamer has them,and my friend has noticed them on his 2007 Guzzi after a cold,damp spell in his garage. A local resprayer says it is trapped moisture from factory painting.
from another board I got wind of a product that seem to claim to stop issues with alcohol on tanks
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Petseal-Ultra-Tank-sealant-Prepared/dp/B006VB6E02
In the topic some said they liked the POR15 tank sealers better but they were not discussing issues with ethanol. Does POR15 say they are compliant with ethanol? With plastic tanks?
Could see why a sealant might work if it will stick the plastic tank. The alcohols would not make contact with the plastic so expansion should stop... maybe reverse??? but that might cause sealant to bow, peal, crack??
Well my tank is covered in blisters, impressively covered.
02 Green with black stripes. Some on the stripes have been the full width of them :)
Quote from: coachgeo on July 10, 2014, 05:22:39 PM
from another board I got wind of a product that seem to claim to stop issues with alcohol on tanks
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Petseal-Ultra-Tank-sealant-Prepared/dp/B006VB6E02
In the topic some said they liked the POR15 tank sealers better but they were not discussing issues with ethanol. Does POR15 say they are compliant with ethanol? Could see why a sealant might work if it will stick the plastic tank. The alcohols would not make contact with the plastic so expansion should stop... maybe reverse??? but that might cause sealant to bow, peal, crack??
I used Petseal on an old gpz900 tank years ago that had internal rust issues,it cured the problem but while it was curing the tank got so hot you couldn't bear your hand on it,i'm not sure what that sort of heat would do to a plastic tank although perhaps the formula might have changed since then.
Some poor guy has posted up on Facebook with a 99 Tiger that has some serious paint problems and he appears to be in Leeds...so he`s using the same juice as most on here, tanks totally fecked and needs stripping and re painting...he`s after advise ...............