ethanol

[19_again]

I seem to recall either Jack or Doc saying they didn't use gas with ethanol in it, or was I dreaming? Is there a brand without it?

 

[PAUL161]

It seems to me that it depends where your at. I travel a lot and some states seem to push more of it than others. This might not be true, but I was in Mississippi the other week and every station I was in had 10% Ethanol in their gas. Some other states I haven't noticed it being advertised. I haven't noticed it in South Carolina or Oklahoma either. But, maybe I just didn't look hard enough.

 

[LarryK]

As Paul said, depends on the EPA standards in the state. Here in parts of IL we have emmission tests in certain zip code areas and those have to use ethanol, whereas, areas not emmision tested can bring in fuel. As Philips, Texaco, Shell and BP have refinerys in Alton and are ethanol for St. Louis area, but one localfuel station has his shipped from Kentucky for no ethanol. You pay a little more but no alcohol. (He has a collection of older Chevys and Corvettes.)

 

[DrEntropy]

I try to avoid it, Mike, but it's getting harder to do. I have an Amoco station locally without that stuff in theirs, and a Sunoco as well.

It's a goofy interim attempt at "greening" AFAIC. It kills a lot of fuel line materials, O-rings, and "thins" out the volatility of fuel. We'll have it shoved up our, er, um... ~noses~ regardless.

 

[Shinsen774]

I always drive to the adjacent "rural" county to fill up the MGB to get the no ethanol gas. It's cheaper, too.

 

[19_again]

Well guys and dolls,
after my post I belatedly checked our forum's archives and while there were only 6,573 posts about ethanol there was still a lot of info. After reading those, well some of 'em anyway, I wrote to my state public utilities commission to see if it was a state wide mandate, no answer yet. But you're not gonna get much more rural than NH, (of course up here we don't count Maine :wink:.o driving to another county or further into the woods won't be a major chore, that's why we have these cars in the first place no? I also looked for the Chevron dealers up here after some positive comments on another thread but they are few and far between.
Thanks for the feedback on a beat up subject.
Mike

 

[Nunyas]

I avoided Ethanol all the way up until it was impossible to do where I live. My biggest reason was the reduced volatility of the stuff. Even @ 10% the stuff dropped my fuel economy from 20MPG to 16MPG (city). As far as the rubber stuff goes, I don't think I ~had~ to, but I replaced all the ruber fuel lines with new stuff. The rubber diaphragm in the fuel pump seemed to be ok with it.

 

[twigworker]

Yep, all of the above negatives !!!!

I think that the two biggest things that stick in my craw about ethanol is the completely stupid idea that it saves energy over all AND the often overlooked situation where you are not getting what you pay for.

I can't even begin to recall all of the studies that point out that making a gallon of ethanol costs more in terms of energy consumption than what you end up with. The idea might make some folks feel better about their energy consumption, but they are in a coma as far as reality is concerned. And...forget about what it does for food source supplies and the economy of it all...sigh!

The other thing is that the physics of moving a lump of steel down the road are immutable. It takes X amount of energy to move Y amount of mass. Period! End of discussion! What matters is how you go about delivering that energy to the pavement and the source material from which you extract that energy. The delivery process involves everything from the ignition of the liquid to the transmission of the resultant energy release through what ever system you have chosen on back to the tire patch. Obviously it is impossible to describe and critique all of the possible engine, transmission and chassis designs here so I won't even try. But I will point out the indisputable fact that ethanol (alcohol) has noticeably less energy "stored with it" than does gasoline. You simply cannot extract as much energy from ethanol as you can from gas. It just isn't there. Therefore, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to understand that a gallon of gasoline has more potential to move any given mass than does nine tenths of a gallon of gasoline mixed with one tenth of a gallon of ethanol. My irritation comes when people complain about their lower fuel economy when what is really happening is that they have not reduced their performance expectations or demands from their engine when they use the alcohol stuff. All they are doing is putting their foot down a little harder to get the same performance and that in turn eats up more fuel.

Sorry about the rant, but sometimes I get a little over the top when expressing my feelings about the silliness of non-thinking and sometimes over zealous consumers.

Jack

 

[PAUL161]

My pickup with a 350 engine in it gets less mileage and looses power when I use an Ethanol blended gas, especially when pulling a trailer, which I do a lot. I have gained over 2 mpg by keeping it highly tuned and replacing the stock air cleaner assembly with an open style and replaced the cat converter with a new one, which I had removed when the new exhaust system was installed. Without the cat, the computer was miss reading the exhaust temperature and was calling for more fuel than normal, especially when under a hard pull. I know that 2 mpg doesn't seem like much, but when your running about 2600 miles per trip it adds up.

 

[twigworker]

That's what I mean Paul. If you are losing 2 MPG that is ten percent of a 20MPG vehicle. Ten percent is a measurable lose in my book. That also means that you are paying the same ??? cost per gallon as real gasoline and getting less performance/output/mileage/whatever for your money.

Jack

 

[bcliff]

Here in Colorado, along the front range, we have had ethanol in the gas for a long time. I have always noticed a drop in fuel economy, but never measured it. Cars use more fuel when the weather is cold, so it is difficult to quantify. I have been driving british cars for 30 years, and have never encountered fuel pumps going bad or fuel lines breaking down. maybe I'm just lucky.
Bruce