E-85 gas?
 

Has anybody used E-85 in there pre 90 truck, I put in 75% gas and 25% E 85 being my gas tank is only 15 gallons will this hurt my 86 toy,i undertsand that E 85 is corrosive but i dullitet it pretty good .gas is $4.25 and E85 is $3.65 all comments welcome :think:

I thought E-85 could only be used in vehicles that are "Flex Fuel." I could be wrong though.

I'm pretty sure you'll see a decrease in mileage. In the winter, they put extra ethanol in our gas (not sure if they do this everywhere) and it decreases my mpg's by 1-2.

So your saving about $2.25 per tankful. Is it worth the chance of damaging some fuel lines or seals to save that little bit.

don't do it, you aren't saving money anyway. fuel economy drops with E85, so you break even if you run it full boat. then you're just helping drive up the cost of corn and other foods.

Al

Im afraid that anyone that knows what they're talking about, will tell you the same thing. DONT DO IT!

We've all have seen in the movies, when some redneck puts some moonshine (ethenol is just denatured moonshine) in his car and it gives him that extra boost to get away from the cops. This is a myth. In fact just the opposite happens. This is why you loose mpg. Methenol on the other hand...
Todays Flexfuel vehicles have complex fuel, ignition and computer systems designed to get the most out of ethenol blended gas and even they loose mpg an power.
And yes is is very corrosive.

think about all the rubber lines and parts that will get damaged from ethanol - fuel pump, hoses, injectors or carb . . . not worth it. If you want to be cheap, buy a Metro

http://mudvillemagazine.com/loafers/.../melindcar.gif
http://www.juddweb.com/jhb/artwork/digital/4x4metro.jpg

lmao, Yesssss

I ran up to 40% E85 in a 87 RTE for about a year with no problems. Above 40% the O2 and computer could not put enough fuel in the engine and I started running lean with a check engine light. That was the limit test. Most of the time I ran around 30%. In cold weather you will have hard start and lean conditions until the engine warms. All of the OEM soft gaskets are other than natural rubber and are not affected by the E85. Any soft metal parts are a concern. The fuel line is steel. So, in the end, I had no problems and sold the truck with no known problems. There is no cost advantage to buying the less expensive ethanol but it will clean the engine internally really well.

My $0.02

Methanol on the other hand what ????

Ethanol isn't that corrosive. It can be run (as E85) in most EFI vehicles without a problem.
I've run it in several (as has a poster above) for several years with no problems at all.
You should replace the fuel filter after the first tank, as it will loosen and remove existing deposits in the fuel tank.



:)
Fred

Your right. Please continue to use it even though there is no advantage.

In some areas there IS a price advantage enough to make it worth while.

:)
Fred

:nono: Do not use any ethanol based fuels, it's causing an increase in grain prices, and they make beer from grain. Any slight savings on a tank of gas will not pay for the increased cost of your beer. :hillbill:

O.K...do the math for us, and be honest.

Nah, y'all are big boys now, y'all do your own math ;)

Here in Tucson, now, it's not cheaper, though it was a year and half to two years ago when I started running it in two of my vehicles that I had at the time.

The only way that anyone can tell if it's worth it is to see what it cost where they're at and if it's $0.60 or so a gallon less than gasoline, try a couple of tanks (at least to get a good average mpg figure) and see how the math comes out.
For me, with (at that time) a '98 TJ and a 97 Dodge Caravan, the break even point was $0.60 per gallon less than the cost of gasoline.
For a while E85 was well under a dollar a gallon less than gasoline here.

Now, I am NOT saying that E85 is the way to go to solve out problems.
E85 is because of our resident moron in office and the current administration who together make a government of, by and for the big companies and having nothing to do with the everyday people.
The E85 mandate was just one of many, many insanely stupid things that baby Bush and company have done while in office.



:)
Fred

Your right. We need to punish the big companys until they ALL go to Mexico.

Im confused. It sounds like you must have been in favor of E85 when you were saving $.60 a gallon. Did you think it was stupid then?

You Dems just blame Bush for everything blindly. You never look at the bigger pic. Now Im not defending Bush, in fact I think he is an idiot.
Congress isnt very popular right now either.

This has been my experience as well. 15-25 % ethanol has not harmed my vehicles. Going up to about 40% will cause the check engine light to come on if I really get on the gas. But it resets itself if I avoid repeated full throttle starts. Ethanol will clean the fuel system up nicely but also will strip engine oil from the parts it contacts. From what I have read, vehicles running alcohol content in fuel should increase maintenance intervals and use a quality synthetic motor oil.
I talked to a guy in England that runs 60% ethanol in his Land Rover with no issues. He has over 200,000 kms on his truck running Ethanol mix for almost half of its life. This is what got me interested in experimenting with ethanol and why I want a new FFV that has a computer that is programmed to deal with varying alcohol content.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/...-112533-7723r/

It isn't just Bush or the Republicans. Democrats were pushing ethanol from corn as well.
Ethanol is a great idea. We just need to use non-food crops to make it. "Weeds" like the native to the US Jerusalem artichoke are ideally suited to ethanol production.

I've NEVER been "in favor" of E85. It's one of the stupidest ideas ever.
I ran it when it was less expensive to run than gasoline.
Now, here in Tucson, it isn't any more.
I'm not a Dem nor a Rep. I don't vote party lines or parties.

If Bush really wanted to push E85 he would drop the import tariffs on E85 from Brazil. Instead he's paying a few (in the back realm of things) farmers a lot of money.

This current administration has always put the "need of the few" in front of the "needs of the many"..

We don't need to "punish" any "big companies".
I have no idea where you pulled that from, assuming that your responding to something I posted.


:)
Fred

Yes, Dems are pushing it also, but certainly to a lesser extent.
If the Dems are successful in storming the palace I suspect that we'll see some of the subsidies to a handful of farmers, removed.

E85 is a stupid idea.
You still need area to grow whatever you're going to use to make it.
Hell, even Castro got it right when he said that Bush is going to starve the people here to produce ethanol.

Electric power for auto's is the wave of the future and, luckily IMHO, we're seeing a strong move into that direction.


:)
Fred

Electric cars? They are typically plugged in and charged overnight. Only facilities that are on the grid overnight are hydro electric and coal powered plants. The electric car will be a big boost to coal since hydro power is not expanding.
We are not ready for full electric just yet.

We are MORE than ready for electric cars and your statement isn't 100% correct.
Here in Tucson, for example, our electric company generates over 5% of their electricity from methane gas that's produce (free BTW) from the town's major landfill.

Anyway, coal is fine for now.



:)
Fred

The problem with full electirc cars is limited range which right now isn't much more than 40 miles per charge and the cost of the batteries is a bit above what the general consumer can afford to make it a realistic mode of transportation but hopefully soon we'll get something.

These ideas really should have been intentlly explored starting 20 years ago but the '90s America got drunk on high horsepower cars (and there's alot today) and big trucks and just until the last 2 years the average american was being ignorant to the warning signs that $4/gallon and higher gas was coming.

That's rapidly changing with the two largest auto companies in the world (Toyota and GM) and others working hard on it.
How about, what you can buy right now (well it would be an '09 as they're sold out of all the '08's) a car that:

- That has a 256 mpg (GGE) EPA rating
- That is 100% totally electric
- Changes completely in ca 3.5 hours (plug in)
- Has a 220+ mile range (they're working on upping that to 300 mile range for next year or maybe the following year)
- Goes 0-60 in 3.9 seconds

It's available (currently) as only a roadster, but plans to introduce a sedan next year at about half the current price (it ain't cheap now, but it shows you what can be done) and the following year plans are to introduce a model at $30,000 or less.

http://fredtj.com/images/photos/tr/tr1.jpg


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http://fredtj.com/images/photos/tr/tr3.jpg


http://fredtj.com/images/photos/tr/tr4.jpg





Yup, we didn't learn from the early (early 80's) gas crunch.
Anyway, "things are a changing" ;)



:)
Fred

i beg to differ. wat about that fully electric car that GM put out a few years back? that got something crazy like 100 or more miles to a charge, leased them out for about a year or so, then just suddenly took em all back and crushed every last one of them? we have the technology, but its all political. the halls of justice are painted green. money talks. if someone were to lose money, such as the government, on the taxes they put on gasoline, theyd be losing a lot of money. so lets say they make, eh... a billion dollars a year in gas taxes alone. i know its not realistic, but lets say it is. now if every other person were driving a fully electric car, that tax money to the gov't would be around $500 million. now lets say taxes stayed the same, and the next fiscal year every other person left that didnt buy an electric car last year bought one, and didnt have to use gas. that $500 million would drop down to $250 million, and so on. everyone that asks 'why dont we have electric cars?' ^^^^^^^^ thats the answer. please excuse it if the numbers are out of wack, im not a great mathematician.

Just think where we could've been if we'd just been on things 10 years ago since we still are at least 5 years away from an affordable (under $25k) real electric car that can haul families and go a few hundred miles on a charge. Even today's hybrids have limitations and are still carrying about a $5k premium over their gas counterparts.

sorry, I must have misunderstood



If its ok for YOU to get a financial benefit, from E85 then arent you putting YOUR needs in front of the many? It also makes you a hypocrite. Why exactly do you think E85 is a bad idea?

This would seem logical. I would like more info about what effect it would have on the market, farmers, ect. This would also be a good time to re-evaluate CRP.

Oh dont you worry about that. The government wil ALWAYS figure out a way to tax us, even if they figure out a way to run a car on water.

too true my friend.

Look people, there are no easy answers.
For the time being, energy is finite so anywhere you get it, will have an effect on something else. If we want cheaper fuels, were going to all have to sacrifice something. But nobody wants to do that. One guy could"nt even pass up the temptation to save $.60 a gallon while at the same time preaching about the ills of ethenol and blaming the "Administration".
So...if everyone started driving electric cars tommorow, the grid would have to be built from the ground up and prices would shoot thru the roof, and then you'd all be whining about the cost of electricity.
And the same goes for corn, soy, sugarbeets and so on and so-forth.
You "idealist" fall in love with a cause without looking at the bigger pic. You say things like,"if everyone did this, it would solve all our problems". I'm here to tell you to pull your head out of your arse and think things thru to the "cause and effect".
Here is a simple excersise; What would happen if everyone in the USA just stoped driving cars tommorow?

everyone would come after you with torches and pitchforks

I think they are already on their way.

anyone notice all the automakers claiming all their cars now make 30mpg on the highway? and this is supposed to be 'good' fuel economy? my first car was an 84 honda civic, it got 35mpg around town on a bad day, probably 45mpg on the highway. how in the world with fuel injected cars, effiecent motors and computer controlled everything can we honestly be way behind what we had 20 years ago? i guess we've been so brainwashed from gas guzzling SUV's bringing 10mpg that we think 30mpg is good! maybe someday we can even convince all the soccor mom of 2 kids she doesn't need a suburban to haul her yoga mat around. when i grew up my family had a station wagon, we needed the extra room because we were always camping. it didn't have 22" blingy rims, 4wd and a 300hp V8. the nav units and built in DVD players hadn't been invented yet either.

we're a product of 'i have it because i can' and its completely brainwashed everyone. society needs to pull their heads out of their asses and tell our government we aren't that stupid.

on second thought, i guess we are. :roll:

Al

Good post

propane..

Cars are weighed down by computers and so much safety stuff that they on average weigh more than a comprable sized car did 20 years ago and for some reason car manufacturers got all caught up in our hunger for big trucks/SUVs and wound up sporty cars and ignored the inevitible increase in fuel prices and if we acted on this agressively in the late '80s and developed more fuel efficient cars as the millenium approached we might be in a much different scenario but it seems we didn't get serious til the last 10 years or even less.

Hey, did you guys know that Ford's quality is now equal to Toyota?

Yup, in some of their vehicles vs some Toyota's.

Lotta good that'll do 'ya when Ford's gone the way of the Dodo Bird ;)




:)
Fred