As compared to the 'facts' pushed by ADM and the ethanol companies?

No one was forced by government mandates to use gasoline, unlike ethanol.

 

To the original poster. I too would like to discuss E85 conversion for vettes. Mine has 412 whp or around 475 at the crank, and 91 octane just is not getting it done.

Unfortunately, two rather rude members have taken it upon themselves to disallow any discussion because "ETHANOL SUCKS".

Perhaps start another thread and title it "No Ethanol haters".

For the haters do a search for e85 and hot rodding and learn something. Ethanol from corn has been around a lot longer than gasoline.



Jim

 

i ran e-85 on my stock engined twin turbo z06 for 3 years no problems...in fact im thinking of going back since the car runs much better on e85

 

Has anyone tried blending E85 with non-ethanol premium?

The only premium we have now, is 91 octane, straight gas with no ethanol. If I put in 3 gallons of E85 and then fill up with the 91 octane, If my calculations are correct, I should end up with 93.2 octane and 13.4% ethanol.

Jim

 

Yes you can do that. Make sure the E85 is really 85%.
Might as well take it to 15%.

To make it all work correctly you would also want to change stoich in your tune to the correct value for the E15.

The best would be to incorporate a flex fuel sensor into the operating system and just let the system tweak itself for you.

My C5 would benefit from better than our 92 E10 I'm sure. I have to be careful with timing or I'll get KR. But I don't think it's a candidate for E85. Especially since we have only one E85 station. Maybe next year I'll toss some race fuel in and see if it helps power on the dyno. I'm a dyno operator.....

The comment was made that E85 is crap fuel. I'd like to submit that the present pump fuel is crap!
We tuned a Hellcat recently. Got maybe 10hp better than stock. Changed it over to race fuel and we gained 60 hp because we could put some timing in the engine w/o knock.

I run E85 in my turbo 5.3 Nova. Wonderful stuff for that use. I've never seen a hint of detonation and I'm at about 800 rwhp. Low 9's near 150mph.

Ron

 

Your position seems to be more politically/environmentally based than anything.

I used and tuned E85 when it released to the market in 2006'ish...I've run the fuel in a myriad of different cars...cars manufactured in the early 90's even. I never experienced any issues, failures, seal degradation, failures, or anything. The cars that benefited most were forced induction cars. Ethanol drops EGT's, runs way cleaner, can handle more timing which improves boost response, etc.

Regardless of how much energy is produces/consumes, who is responsible (see GM for a large role), what negatives one can say about alcohol's corrosive nature (methanol FAR more corrosive), it works...and works well for the street.

If you can run a flex fuel sensor and dual maps...it's all win.

 

Yes, it's fairly common to run blends. On my old N54 powered car, there were several different maps for various fuels. I ran E30 blends initially and E60 blends after upgrading the fuel system. The E60 blend allowed me to use the "race fuel" map which was a lot of fun since I could get the fuel from my local Kroger and it was cheap compared to buying race fuel from the track.

With that said, blending fuels isn't much fun as you feel like you're always guessing. I would rather run straight E85 if I had the fuel system to support it.

 

There will always be some haters no mater what is being discussed. Those saying it cost more to produce than the selling price, stop, listen to yourself. To make a statement like that is just plain ignorant. No company, no where will make a product and lose money on that product. If I were building anything other than stock, it WOULD be on E85. My race engines so so much cleaner running E85, I could and did run the whole season on an oil change with Mobile 1.

 

I didn't say that it cost more to produce than it sells, I said it consumes more energy than it produces. Which is true. On the cost front, ethanol production is subsidized. But so is oil production with special tax breaks, so the true cost is hard to compare.

In any case we are comparing two different situations. You have a highly modded car that you race on a track. I am assuming the OP does not, since he didn't give any details. Mine is stock, and I don't race, so I can get no benefit from running E85.

Ethanol does have draw backs, especially in engines that sit for extended periods unused - like my Corvette in the winter. It absorbs water, gums up injectors, and is more corrosive than gasoline. Ask a boat owner if he uses ethanol.

For the guy who has a stock car and wants to keep it running reliably, best case is the ethanol does no significant damage in the long term. It has no up side.

For you guys who run modded race cars, the E85 does have an upside in that it allows you to run higher compression and higher boost, while the possible long term damage is insignificant to you. These are completely different situations.

My gripe with ethanol is that it would not exist in the free market except for the subsidies and mandates it receives. If it could compete with gasoline side by side, on its own merit, then fine. But it can't. In Indiana, I CAN'T buy ethanol free gas.

I'm not the type who buys a car, mods it, uses it up, and then buys another 2 years later. I want to keep mine for a long time. Ethanol makes that harder.

 

How does ethanol make it harder to own a car more than two years? That is quite the statement to make and I am curious how you plan to back it up.

 

I think you should go to the general forum and start your own "ETHANOL SUCKS" thread and stop hijacking other users' threads to spew your hate. Let the folks who want to discuss it, do so.

Jim

 

Sigh. I didn't say a car running ethanol will not last more than 2 years. I said that ethanol has drawbacks that could result in more engine damage/wear over the long term than running pure gas.

I have observed that a number of people on the forum change cars frequently. Is it every 2 years? That I don't know. Is it due to using ethanol? Probably not. My point is a lot of people building race cars and use E85 for race fuel likely don't care about the long term. In my case, I like to keep mine for a long time.

You want to run ethanol? Then do so. I don't care. But I resent that thanks to the ethanol lobby I can't run pure gas. For all the griping about oil companies, they have never tried to outlaw ethanol.

 

It would help if the OP stated WHY he wants to run E85.

Is he building a race car? Then it has benefits.

For a stock car? It doesn't.

 

Does it matter? Nope. Rude is rude.

Jim

 

Bovine excrement. My truck, stock from the factory, gains 25hp & 33ftlb just switching to E85.

 

Help me understand. What are the drawbacks you're mentioning? Specifically, which parts would be affected from running gasoline that contains ethanol?

 

when you ran e85 did you change injectors,pump,etc?

i have full exhaust from headers with no cats all the way back, vararam intake and tune.

for the people that don't have any comments about what is required to do this process get lost and start your own thread for the others thanks

 

Yes, it was all done with the turbo install. The fuel system added a secondary pump hooked up to a Hobbs switch to kick in when I needed more fuel under boost.

I personally think with your mods the effort to switch to e85 won't be worth it vs the power gained

 

3 years with e85 here and no problems. Also my car sat for 7 months with e85 no problems. They do make fuel stabilizer for e85 which I used. I agree with others that your political beliefs have influenced your blind hate.

I also have a 97 corvette that has been getting blended 91 with ethanol since that was introduced to the market and surprise my motor and fuel systems still work like normal. After all we basically have mass produced truck engines in our cars. Not some exotic hand built engines.

 

No one sells e85 in the county I live in, I don't even think a surrounding county has it.. My buddy occasionally runs it in his turbo Supra so he can run higher boost, but doesn't leave the car sitting with it in it. It has a flex fuel sensor so he switches between e85 and non-ethanol 93 octane which is available here.