Fuel without Ethanol
Team Owner
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 62,146
Likes: 1,730
From: Athens AL
C7 of the Year - Unmodified Finalist 2021
C4 of Year Finalist (performance mods) 2019
The car would've been designed to meet, principally, California's emission standard and able to take fuel anywhere of the right octane level. There was ethanol in fuels when I was in HS in the 90s, the sticker usually said it contained ethanol at about that time, but it wasn't at every station, and it wasn't up to 10% back then. It said "fuel may contain ethanol", I seem to remember it starting into gasoline around me in the early 90s. I remember being told to get out and pump gas way back when there was still leaded gas available. The requirements for E10 were more recent, like late 2000s. Older cars don't require modifications to take up to 10%, but beyond that it becomes more of a problem.
Ethanol in the fuel tends to wear out rubber in fuel system parts, I'd never run it in a really old car where they'd still have used mechanical fuel pumps with rubber diaphragms and rubber connectors on all the lines. Also isn't good at all for a car that tends to sit a lot.
Given the number of fuel pump/sender failures I see on the forum now vs even 10 years ago in C4s, I do think that long term use of E10 ethanol is contributing, but
The Multec injectors used in the late 80s/early90s cars are such junk that it probably contributes there too, but they'd likely fail anyway.
Ethanol in the fuel tends to wear out rubber in fuel system parts, I'd never run it in a really old car where they'd still have used mechanical fuel pumps with rubber diaphragms and rubber connectors on all the lines. Also isn't good at all for a car that tends to sit a lot.
Given the number of fuel pump/sender failures I see on the forum now vs even 10 years ago in C4s, I do think that long term use of E10 ethanol is contributing, but
The Multec injectors used in the late 80s/early90s cars are such junk that it probably contributes there too, but they'd likely fail anyway.
Drifting
Joined: Feb 2017
Posts: 1,274
Likes: 399
From: Tacoma WA
2024 C4 of the Year Finalist - Unmodified
Ethanol has been available as either fuel or a fuel additive since at least the early nineteen hundreds. The 10% gasoline that we have become accustomed to actual was driven by the Clean Air Act of 1990. This was a political appeasement to the farmers so they would have an outlet for their grains to turn into ethanol. This was later strengthened by another act of congress in 2005.
Where else would they sell this much ethanol if not driven by an act of the government. Ethanol produces less energy than gasoline per gallon but has a higher octane rating thus lowering the price of high octane gasoline. Have you ever priced “race” gas? Pure gasoline that is usually 103 octane and the last time I had to buy it the price was a little under $9 per gallon just outside the Ron Fellows race school in Pahrump, Nevada.
That is why from 1995 on our Corvettes had fuel systems compatible with ethanol.
Where else would they sell this much ethanol if not driven by an act of the government. Ethanol produces less energy than gasoline per gallon but has a higher octane rating thus lowering the price of high octane gasoline. Have you ever priced “race” gas? Pure gasoline that is usually 103 octane and the last time I had to buy it the price was a little under $9 per gallon just outside the Ron Fellows race school in Pahrump, Nevada.
That is why from 1995 on our Corvettes had fuel systems compatible with ethanol.
