My new math assumed 15% ethanol, 85% gas.

Shows what I know.

I may have missed it, but My wife researched e85 since her car can run it per manufacurers specs. I just don't get it.

1. as it has been said there is no real savings because of lower mpg = more trips to the pump.

2. You require more frequent oil changes = more petroleum consumption and more petroleum waste.

3. the wear on your vehicle increases = shorter life span of engines resulting in more junk cars to recycle.

Where is the enviromental advantage here?

1) Lower MPG and lower cost per mile. Depending on acutal results (which seem to vary between 5-15% loss of mpg) it may be an economic alternative... cheaper per mile.

2) Why more frequent oil changes - my understanding was that E85 burns cleaner (and cooler) than gas?

3) What additional wear?

The environmental advantage is that this fuel is largely (85%) renewable and if we a lot of vehicles started running on it we'd be MUCH less dependent on foreign oil. Discounting the conspiracy theories - certainly you'll agree that worldwide a lot of "human interest" issues are caused by countries controling oil wealth.


My experience: I have a tunable ECU. I went with straight 13 gallons of E85 (4 gal gas). In order to get this to run right, I had to compensate with about 30% more fuel across my fuel map. That doesn't mean I'm using 30% more fuel at cruise, but my idle consumption has increased by 30%.

Increasing fuel by 30% and my ECU can compensate for everything else.

I'm suspicious of vendors saying that toyota injectors are not E85 compatable - I'd like to find why they say that - other vendors are offering "conversions" - basically just a box that increases pulse width by 30% for the Toyota.
I'm thinking it may have to do with injector impedance, rather than actual injector/fuel compat issues... :-)

The turbo loves E85. Knock sensor is almost completely quiet. I can add boost and run more timing.
I just need a big fat corn sticker on the back of the 4runner...

Holy old posts batman!

But seriously, I'd like to hear from folks that have been using this for awhile now w/ real-world experience. Not just a tank or two. E.g. mileage drops etc.

sorry to bring up a old thread but how did this pan out?

If you're asking me - I'm still at that spot where running E85 is a wash in terms of cost per mile driven. E85 is somewhat expensive in Austin, although not to the scale of 93 octane fuel.

I haven't gotten back to playing with it yet - mainly due to the local availability. I will say that it can run in a much wider AFR range than gasoline, so I can go much leaner with it under cruise to see if I can recover some MPG.

Good things:
1) It's much cleaner for your motor. Heads/blocks run on E85 look really good once opened up.
2) 100 octane. This won't matter to most people, but on a turbo truck like mine, it's absolutely great and means more power as I can run more boost and more timing.
3) Increased exhaust gas - again, on a turbo, I boost faster.
4) Cleaner emissions. When I need my annual inspection, I'm probably going to run on this stuff.
5) Lower Exhaust Gas Temps

Disadvantages:
1) Availability. At least in my area.
2) Environmental wise, it's probably not *the* solution to our foreign oil dependence as it requires a lot of energy to make it and decreases our food supply.
3) Decreased fuel economy.
4) I believe it requires retuning - in some cases this could be just an increase in fuel pressure.

>>>*This great older thread shows some progression over time as more becomes known about alternate fuels.

There still is no E85 around here but we do have some experimental fuel stations that can pump any blend, that is interesting. I wish they weren't so far away.

My Camaro disliked even 10%, it was a 1994 model and 10% set off the check engine light, plus it hesitated on the stuff. I could have fiddled with the tuning and fixed that, I just gave it away to the young fellow next door in exchange for some labor. That old car is still pretty, bright red and he is tickled pink.

Our 02 Monte Carlo doesn't seem to care, 10% runs fine, mileage drops 5% instantly. The spec on the engine says to me it would run E85, perhaps with some added timing advance.

Now my Corvette's system is so high tech it will run on about anything that will burn, as I found out when an attendent put in regular one day. Hair on the back of my neck stood up at that one, I managed to restain myself from....well....*LOL**..

It didn't even ping but I could tell 100 H/P was gone. Engines over 11 to one get unhappy on regular grade fuel, so the system just pulled out so much timing advance it would still run fairly well.

On E85 that engine would be advancing the timing to take advantage of the Alcohol I would think.

Any of you who have read my posts probably know I wish it would run on Venison...*LOL**..

You folks running the older engines, say prior to '02 probably will find the engines will run but poorer. Later models and especially current designs in production should be no problem, and I would think that any Turbo application might just like the stuff. Engines on Alcohol like lots of it, and too much doesn't really affect power output.

We ran Alcohol in one of our circle track engines, we took the carb jets out completely and she was still too lean. We gave up on that, besides, tech was eyeballing us because of the smell.

The problems with Alcohol remain the same. What do we use for a source? Crops are seasonal and susceptible to weather conditions, and using a primary food source doesn't strike me as a good idea. Of course the carbon tradeoff maths out but I am not even sure I believe that to be the real problem.

Corn seed last season was terrible, high priced and I had my very first Corn crop failure in my entire life. I saw Corn in the stores for $1.25 an ear, I was used to 10 ears for $1.00 in season??? Everything was going towards fuel, that isn't smart in my opinion.

It is just that more viable crops are not yet available in the quantity needed. Sugar Beets would be a far more productive source in potential volumes per acre, but there just was not enough in production. Plus that crop will survive a mild freeze nicely and grow all winter, witness the 8 pound Beets out in my garden from last year, still perfectly good. Sugar cane of course, some States can grow that but no way can we grow enough.

Then add in government, tax imported sugar to "protect" the USA farmer? Now that is smart, keep the price up and keep us on the oil spigot.

We Americans have a long ways to go before we can unhook from the imported oil I think.

I still say look up! Sunlight! The real problem there is Sunlight is free, there is little profit in supplying free....Enough energy strikes a typical vehicle to power that same vehicle most of the time in daylight, so much so that we use gasoline to power a device to cool them off a good percentage of the time.

One day we will see someone build a hybrid with solar collectors in the paint job.......*EB

my 99 dosn't like the 10 percent, I pay the extra 5 to 10 cents for the real gas.. the power and milage make up for it.
I am sure that with a few changes my dodge truck would run fine on the alky... but btu's it will use more fuel.
it is just the power locked into the fuel.

on the other hand I would love to see, (after the motor is hot). one cycle of gas and one cycle of water, steam engine.
or with the computers now. fire ever other cylinder every other cycle with water, to use up the 80 percent or so heat that go's to waste. if you look it up there is the GUY of motors working on a 6 cycle motor. looks good to me. alot better then the big little motor that is out there.
the circle motor thing.

Depending on what the engine is made of, corrosion might be a problem with water injection.