E85 ethanol fuel

[Chuck Woycke]

Has anybody tried E85 ethanol gas in their hit/miss engine yet? I know with E85 you get 20% less gas mileage & 20% less power than gasoline, so you wouldn't want to use it in a pulling tractor, but what about a hit/miss engine? When they were invented the gas had an octane of 62%. Would the engine run cleaner and smoother or would it run at all? just a thought -chuck

[John G. Simpson]

Chuck.
Haven't tried it in an engine or tractor. doesn't work in my truck either.
probably ok in an engine though, they didn't put lead in for many years.
john

[Rudy]

Chuck, A friend of mine from Minnesota brought a large John Lauson engine to Rollag last year and ran it all weekend on E85. It ran and started good and the exhaust had a nice sweet " home brew" kind of smell.

[Patrick McNallen]

If E85 smells any better than ordinary 10-15% ethanol-adulterated gasoline, it must be because the government doean't require the addition of a chemical "odorant" to such gasoline. The odorant is added to ordinary motor gasoline, and it stinks to high heaven. I think it is called ethyl mercaptan. It produces most of the strong exhaust odor that lawnmower engines and older vehicles produce, and it is the stink that won't come off if you get store-bought gasoline on your hands. Straight ethanol/methanol fueled engines produce a very strong aldehyd exhaust odor. Straight gasoline, if you can get it, produces only a mild exhaust odor in engines that are properly tuned and in good mechanical condition. If you could obtain propane that did not have a chemical odorant added, I suspect that the exhaust from a well-tuned engine running on it would be almost odor-free. (That is not to say that it would be safe to breathe.)

[Patrick McNallen]

If your engine runs well on E85, by all means use it. I would expect to need to adjust the mixture a little richer, and cold weather starting might be more difficult. "Wetting" of ignitors has been mentioned here, and E85 would likely be more prone to cause that problem than regular blends or honest gasoline. Ethanol/methanol has only about 50% of the BTU content of gasoline, so fuel consumption will be higher with ethanol blends to do the same work. I would expect to find that E85 would be much more prone to go stale and absorb water than ordinary 10-15% ethanol blend gasoline. I wouldn't leave E85 in any older fuel tank more than a few days, and I wouldn't want to try to store it for more than a very short time in any container. If you had to store it, keeping it in a dark, cool place in an air-tight container might extend its life. In short, real gasoline is a far superior engine fuel to alcohol or alcohol blends. Straight gasoline or gasoline-naptha blends are the ideal fuel for antique low speed engines.

[Ronald E. McClellan]

I have heard remarks about gasohol before and I question what is really happening. I have heard that gas milage drops 10% to 20%. Now I am
going to put numbers on this! If my truck gets 20 MPG on straight gas and I drive 1000 miles , I will use 50 gals. @$2.35=$117.5 * If I use gasohol 10% and get 10% less gas milage=18 MPG and I drive 1000 miles , I will use 55.5 gals (5.5 gals. is alcohol) @$2.35=$130.42* If I use gasohol 15% and get 20% less gas milage=16 MPG and drive 1000 miles , I will use 62.5 gals (9.37 gals.is alcohol) @ $2.35=$146.87 . If this is true , we are buying just as much gas (no gas savings) and we are forced to buy alcohol that does nothing but put money into the pockets of the manufacter's of alcohol. Has there been any accurate studies done on this??? Ron

[Chris Epping]

Originally Posted by Ronald E. McClellan

I have heard remarks about gasohol before and I question what is really happening. I have heard that gas milage drops 10% to 20%. Now I am
going to put numbers on this! If my truck gets 20 MPG on straight gas and I drive 1000 miles , I will use 50 gals. @$2.35=$117.5 * If I use gasohol 10% and get 10% less gas milage=18 MPG and I drive 1000 miles , I will use 55.5 gals (5.5 gals. is alcohol) @$2.35=$130.42* If I use gasohol 15% and get 20% less gas milage=16 MPG and drive 1000 miles , I will use 62.5 gals (9.37 gals.is alcohol) @ $2.35=$146.87 . If this is true , we are buying just as much gas (no gas savings) and we are forced to buy alcohol that does nothing but put money into the pockets of the manufacter's of alcohol. Has there been any accurate studies done on this??? Ron

A couple friendly corrections on the figures, the gasohol 15% you mentioned (E-85) is actually 15% gas & 85% ethanal I believe you were thinking the other way around. Also depending on the state you're in, E-85 may be up to 40 cents a gallon cheaper, which would about cover the 20% milage difference (if that difference exists). I realize that in some states it is the same price or higher, that is due to high damand for ethanal in California after they've found out how much safer & cleaner it burns than regular gasoline. As more ethanal plants go online, that price should go down, esp as technology increases & they get more efficient.

I've tested 10% & can't find any difference between that & regular unleaded. Not sure on the E-85, I don't have any engines that will burn it, but I will next time I buy a vehicle!

The biggest benefit you've got to remember is that ethanal is made here! If you want to calm down the problems in the Mid-East & other hot spots around the world we've got to stop sending them billions upon billions of our dollars every year. There are a lot of nuts in the world, the only reason we hear from those nuts are that they have lots of our money to play with. Ethanal is "American Made Gasoline". The folks making it are not the large oil companies some of which are foreign owned, they are everyone from farmers to local businessmen all across the midwest of the USA. Buying it is going to do nothing but good for the economy of the country, keeping more of our dollars right here. I'll pay many times more for a manufactured product that is American made because I know the quality is going to be superior & to keep the dedicated & talented folks around the US in our factories. The building of the Ethanal industry has been a major feat & is a real milestone in our trip to becoming more energy independant. It's the first serious challenge to the monopoly the countries of OPEC have held over us for many years, and you're going to hear a lot of figures & bad publicity from them as this is a threat to that. It can't completely replace the oil industry, and probably won't for a long time, but it does provide an alternative, which is always a good thing. A lot of time, effort, & money has been dedicated to developing this alternative, and hopefully it's going to help this country a lot. So why not buy American when it is nearly the same price? Not to mention the environmental benefits! As the slogan goes, replace Mid-East oil with Mid-West Moonshine!


Chris Epping

[Fred Van Hook]

Might be OK to run E85 if your engine is happy with it. If it starts easy and runs OK use it. E85 has a high octane of about 105 and these engines were made to run a octane of 40. So E85 will be harder to light and burn cooler. I'll stick with lantern fuel. Just remember to be careful and have fun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s7nbNi3ItS0

[sparkplug54]

The E85 folks lied to me then because they said its was 15% Ethonal. I have a 2003 Caravan and I get great mileage and never noticed a loss in power.DAn

[MoRo]

The "older-newer" vehicles, before "Flex Fuel" engines, and after carburated engines often do not run on E85. The engine itself isn't designed for it, and the computer doesn't know what to think when it is trying to get the air/fuel mixture.
Carburated engines, pre-computer, didn't "know" the difference, so they'd burn it, sometimes not real well, but they'd burn it.

One thing about the enthanol, it'll "scrub" the crap out of your fuel system, possibly plugging jets or other small orifices.

Give' er a try, the worst you can do is have to take the mixer apart and clean it, dump out the fuel and go back to regular gasoline.

[Patrick McNallen]

I think that E85 is 85% ethanol, 15% gasoline. It is not intended to be run in automobiles or other equipment that is not designed for it. It will give substantially lower mileage in any vehicle because its BTU content is about 40% lower than straight gasoline. Most, if not all automotive gasoline sold in this country today is 10 to 15 % ethanol. It will run OK in most any vehicle, and gas mileage will probably run about 5 to 8% lower than straight gasoline. I don't see why E85 would cause any serious problems in an antique engine as long as you didn't leave it stored in the engine for more than a few days. I doubt if there is any real advantage to using it in such an application. Try searching the EPA or E85 vendor's websites for more information on E85. There are alot of good arguments against using ethanol for motor fuel. Anyone wishing to learn more about ethanol fuel can find plenty of good information on the internet. I suggest that anyone seek infomation from a number of different information sources, and from interests involved, both pro and con, regarding ethanol, mandates, subsidies, net energy yields, overall environmental concerns, ethanol alternatives, ethanol feedstock alternatives, etc.

[BWegher]

Yes, E85 is 85 percent ethanol. The car companies call it flex-fuel.
http://alternativefuels.about.com/od...a/1altfuel.htm

Henry Ford designed the Model T engine to run on ethanol as primary fuel.
Compression ratio and timing are critical to engines using E85

[Bryan Brooks]

I hold the contract for 2007/2008 with the Texas Department of Public Safety (state troopers) to supply them with Chevrolet Tahoe Police Pursuit Vehicles, about 600 units over 2 years. The State requires the Chevrolet FlexFuel 5.3L in the Tahoe PPV, and now, it's the only engine available from the factory in these units. Tests by us, Texas DPS, and Michigan State Patrol shows about a 20% to 25% reduction in fuel mileage when using E85, but, the test also showed about a 15% increase in excelleration performance. Top speed for gas was 136, with E85 139. Operation expense when compared to gasoline, E85 costs just slightly more to use as the lower cost of the fuel and clean burn effect on maintenance offsets most of the loss in economy.

[justme 7917]

In Brazil thay have been using it for years.take a look at who been supply the cars.in the middle of this year thay will be 100% free of mid east oil.

[Patrick McNallen]

In sunny, moist, Brazil they have a long growing season and sugar cane grows like a weed. Cheeeeep labor, too! No UP of Michigan or Chicago in February, either.

[Stans]

They've got a nice big shiny new plant in Manitoba making ethanol from waste straw. Kind on nice you don't have to use people food to make it.
Stan

[Patrick McNallen]

I think that ethanol will really come into its own as a fuel when it is made mostly from non-subsidized, non-food sources of sugar/starch and or wastes from food crop production. I am beginning to hear talk of some kind of grass that could be grown on marginal land and used for energy-cost effective ethanol production. I wonder if mesquite couldn't be adapted to use as an ethanol base crop. It is a fast-growing legume, and might eventually improve waste lands enough to make them arable. Kudzu, maybe? I believe that a hungry world can use all of the corn that our farm states can produce for human and animal food.

[Patrick McNallen]

I wonder just how much land Brazil has devoted to growing sugarcane for ethanol? Could it be that the destruction of the Amazon Rain Forest that so distresses American Environmentalists is being driven by Brazil's biofuels program? At any rate, I'm sure that China will find a use for any Middle Eastern oil that Brazil does not buy.

[Andrew Mackey]

I would not use E-85 in an older carbureted auto, or an engine that has rubber or Phenolic internal parts in the fuel system. The E-85 will destroy the rubber componants (this includes diaphram fuel pumps too), and will damage phenolic floats. E-85 will probably work OK in a spark plug fired engine, but lighting it off with an igniter fired engine, is another story As stated in other posts, E-85 is Hydroscopic - that is, it attracts moisture, thus inviting rust on all exposed steel and iron surfaces. Another side effect is that the E-85 will promote electrolysis between brass and aluminum alloys. It will make old carbs self destruct. It must be stored in an air-tight container, and be kept in a cool, preferably dark area.
Andrew

[half-fast]

I,ve heard so many stories through the years about ethanol I no longer have any idea what to believe. In the beginning of “modern ethanol” (197x) people soured on it because of plugging filters (fuel dealers and suppliers said that as soon as your fuel system was cleaned of some soluble deposits the problem would stop) (what they didn’t say was you were also cleaning some of their deposits from lines, trucks and storage tanks) and softening rubber compounds of the day. These should no longer be a problem. But because of these factors some people still bad mouth ethanol.
It should work fine in all old engines as it was one of the first internal combustion fuels.
In 1860, German inventor Nikolaus Otto used ethyl alcohol as a fuel in an early internal combustion engine.
Now for the present day. Vehicle manufacturers can for a small sum (I read some where $200.00) add the necessary equipment to allow a vehicle to operate on E85. This gives the manufacturer a “credit” on their Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFÉ) for producing a “green” vehicle. So they put said equipment on gas guzzlers like pickups (remember the Chevrolet PU ads) and get credit for a vehicle that can burn E85 but it might never burn E85. The problem: --- In 80% of the country (outside the mid-west corn belt) E85 is not available so the gas guzzling PU’s use up a bunch more gas. Bottom line: --- We are using more gas than if they left things alone in the first place. But the manufacturer can brag about making the green vehicle and getting their credit. Closing this credit loophole can save gas for us (US) immediately.

Patrick

You are right, E85 is 85% ethanol and 15% gas but I would think because alcohol evaporates faster and burns cleaner it should not foul an igniter as fast. You are also right about ethanol absorbing water. In fact, if a system has an excess amount of water the affinity of alcohol for water will actually cause the alcohol to be extracted from the gas when it absorbs the water and result in the fuel dropping in octane. You can even perform a test by putting water in a sample of gasoline and allow it to extract the alcohol to determine the actual amount of alcohol content. Put one part water to nine parts gas in a test tube and shake. Allow time to settle. If separation line between gas and water / alcohol mix is now two parts to eight parts you have 10% water, 10% alcohol and 80% gas.

MoRo

On “older-newer” vehicles. Ford Taurus and some others have had flex fuel vehicles back to 1993 in the US and before with exports to Brazil. Ford technology from mid 1980s.

Some links to info on ethanol. My 2 cents aahh Quarters worth.

http://e85.whipnet.net/flex.cars/index.html
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/s...toryId=7120263
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_alcohol_fuel