There is two problems with ethanol: 1. The water seperates from the fuel when it sits an extended period of time. 2. It is very hard on cork. So if you take percautions to run ethanol there should be no problems. If you use fuel stabilizer and make sure to run the car so the stabalizer circulates through the whole fuel system there should be little to no problems. Up in the midwest we have been running this stuff for 10+ years with almost no problems at all. The only problems I have had with ethanol is that it will clean a dirty fuel system that has not had ethanol in it and will plug the fuel filter from all the crap it loosens up.
are there any stations selling biobutanol in the US, heres an interesting read http://biofuelsdigest.com/bdigest/2...-to-launch-first-cellulosic-biobutanol-plant/
Fuel filters are cheap. I always run one before and after the pump in an old car for the first year or so. I carry a spare and rotate them as the first one gets dirty. it is funny I see all the ads for fuel stabilizer and whatnot and although I do recommend it to people who ask about it I never use it myself. I leave my chain saw sit for a year at a time and don't run my mower all winter. Maybe I am just lucky. We have discussed getting a car ready to setting up your car for alcohol at length several times. It is just a good idea. We have hot rods they are a work and drive situation at best. It is no big deal to change a filter or even change out the fuel lines for a better grade, it is just part of the game. As a group we have a tendency to not be too flexible,ther are times that you have to flex a little. Hot rodding has always been about being able to roll with the punches, they have passed laws against us changed things to make it better for the rest of the world and etc since the very beginning. We just have to be able to figure out what needs to be changed and change it when the time comes.
if your vehicle is going to sit for awhile then run it out of fuel, yesterday i started a chevy campervan that had been sitting in a barn for 15 years, i poured a couple of gallons of gas in the tank and stuck a battery in it, poured a little gas in the carb 5 or 6 times and it sat there running like a jeweler's watch, i was given the campevan because no one thought it would ever run again, today i go back for the shortbox pickup, free.
Runs fine, doesn't store well, eats fiberglass gas tank in your old boat, and might weaken your cheapo rubber gas lines. And it's more expensive to make than gas is to refine (if we had refineries it wouldn't be) but the corn is good business for the US and...the next sound you will hear is my head exploding from too much information.
Auto manufacturers resisted the move to 15% because of impact on fuel systems and other issues, and didn't want to be on the hook for warranty costs. But govt. decided to go ahead anyway. Biggest problems with ethanol is it's not cost effective and is less efficient than fossil fuels. Basically just another govt. subsidy. Even the tree huggers agree.
in the 70's i was working at a gas station and the boss came in bitch'n about the summer time gas had alky in, now this was the houston texas area.
Govt ups mpg requirement objectives, then drops mpg by forcing a higher % of ethecrap. Yep that sounds like the country I love.
The gas companies are the same ones who supply the propane. Propane is a byproduct of the refining of gas. Use to just be burnt off as waste. My guess is they price it accordingly to make sure it isn't sold too cheaply as compared to the gas which is their main product. Around here, it is cheaper if you buy the non-road version for BBQ tanks and forklifts, etc. But, if you get the road stuff with all of the road taxes thrown on top of it just like with gasoline, it generally is more expensive and has been around here for the last few years. When gas was at its highest a few years back, it was a little cheaper, but the gas went down further/faster than the propane and now is a little bit more expensive typically. Get caught running an off-road set-up on the street and they might relay that to the tax board for consideration. Not sure if the cops are that sharp about it, but I don't want to take the chance so I use the taxed stuff for my truck. It requires a different filling fitter by law, so not easy to just change on the fly and obvious to an easy inspection for those who know what to look for. On ethanol, can't see much problem with it myself. How hard is it to just get the proper hoses and other parts that don't corrode? Seriously, can't be that hard. Now, the stupidity of making gas out of corn and putting more cost and energy into that than what you get out of it is a whole 'nother thing entirely. But there are a lot of farmers sucking up our tax dollars and getting fat doing it, so not likely to change that anytime soon. Better than paying them not to grow anything at all though I suppose which is an even more genius idea.
Ethanol sucks---big time. It does nothing to clean the air and is highly hygroscopic and corrosive. I have a fleet of training cars that only get used periodically. For 20+yrs non-stop fuel system problems.
Buy fuel injector hose (looks like regular black rubber hose but with a teflon liner) and that's the end of alcohol eating the rubber!
The "only get used periodically" part might be the main problem. Might have to just start them up for a bit more often to keep the fuel fresh and not sitting. One of the worse things for any car is just sitting and not being used. Plus if the cars are 20 years old too, that is another problem. Not much automotive worth a damn was made in the late 80's - early 90's.
So in that video the fuel tank is varnished from old fuel, pre-alcohol, and the ethanol disolves that varnish. Yet in a carb the Ethanol CAUSES the varnish. Sounds like he gets to have his cake and eat it too.
How do you set up a motor for ethanol? I haven't noticed any probs using it, but I've read it will spoil over time. When I store my car for the winter I fill the tank with 100 LL Avgas I'm rebuilding my carbs & replacing all the lines. Do I need to check if the rebuild kits are ok with Ethanol?
There is not one single E-85 station in Alberta. I wouldn't mind if there was, however.Some of the guys in the VW scene in Britan are building 13:1 street motors to take advantage of the abundant E-85 (105-110 RM/2) over there. The Z-28 is 11.5:1 and I find thats about as high as we can get around here(altitude and available fuel) without pinging.
One of the problems with "Alcohol" in fuel is that there was a period when companies were dumping METHANOL and it got used instead of ethanol. And it did eat up stuff much worse than ethanol, but not enough of the folks that get all fired up paid attention to the difference. Until we can get some bureaucrats that look for solutions to problems instead of ways to build their empires . . . don't get me started.
Problem is ethanol is "sloshed mixed" in the tanker at the terminal. You cannot run mixed ethanol/gasoline through a pipeline. If your station is one of his first stops you could be getting something much different than 10%.
Some of the snowmobile guys have too. One of the Thunderstruck guys was running a 250 hp snowmobile off of propane.
I don't think ethanol is killing old cars however I don't care for the stuff. Every vehicle I've had gets better mileage on straight gasoline. Also considering without massive government subsidies ethanol would not be competitive at all. It's just a stupid tax payer money give-away to the corn lobby. Maybe when the government get's it's priorities straight I'll finally be able to fill my cars with real friggin gas again.
Once AMERICAN'S figure out that buying Ethanol puts our farmers back in business and that with a little tweak in your Hot Rod, this stuff actually makes HP. With top lube (minimal) it also will be stable for long periods of time in your gas can for the lawn mower. The next step is to get the majority of the foreign bought gasoline out of our Ethanol to get the price down. Ethanol in it's virgin state is readily available for less than $1 a gallon. Add foreign bought gasoline and taxes to it.... Right back to $3+ Pretty simple, tune your Hot Rod to run on Corn and eliminate foreign excess.
Hi Australia is probally one of the highest user of propane ..it can be purchased just about any service station...It costs about .50 cents a liter..That about less than $1.80 a gallon in the U.S..I have 2 cars that are set up and run propane only...its also a green fuel....It can also be run with petrol as a duel fuel set up..There is probally 20% of cars are set up to run propane here...both Ford and GM have new cars and commercials available new set up as dedicated as propane only ...it is about a third of the price of petrol here......
Bullshit, I help run a tanker company. If it is mixed at the pipeline or refinery the computers mix it right. Some areas, us included have a secondary site to load the alky. Yes, math can be messed up and the blend can be wrong. But, the repercussions from the state and FEDS are so great that if that happens it has to be pumped out or fixed if the error is caught in time. So many fuckin urban myths about this stuff that it makes me laugh. See my post above where we have been running it up here for 25+ years
That's some pretty dumb ass reasoning. Ethanol cost more to produce than fossil fuels, that's why manufacturing capacity was way underutilized and govt. had to step in and force a higher percentage blend. Basically just another farm subsidy that we're all paying for. Food as fuel is one of the dumbest ideas in a long time, and even tree huggers like Al Gore have come to realize that.
Ignorance must be bliss. Ever hear of CRP? We pay farmers to not grow shit. Also, the corn utilized for Ethanol is not the same stuff we eat. Also, the byproducts of the mash from distillation are sent back to the growers to feed the cattle. If you go read a few of the 50+ threads on this topic you will also see that zman and myself as well as others are talking about the future of alky derived from grass, lab grown algea and logging waste. And your credibility is seriously flawed if you side with Al and the tree huggers in your opinion.
Haven't seen that happen on any scale that's cost effective. But even if that's possible at some point, the issue right now is using food for fuel. I understand it's not the same corn we eat, but still takes a lot of water and resources to grow, energy to process, etc. And the bottom line is that it isn't cost effective and it isn't good policy from an environmental standpoint.
First you lost me with your whole corn thing. Corn is the last thing we should be making ethanol for fuel from. It's a scam to do it from corn. Switch grass, sugar cane, and on and on are much better. Only when related to corn being used to produce it. But then I think you're just regurgitating the talking points on this and haven't done any real research. Basically any bio mass can be used. You haven't looked. You haven't done the research. You need to educate yourself on the subject before running on again. And quit contradicting yourself.
The point I was trying to make is you can use the resources to grown corn (or whatever) for food, or corn for ethanol, and the latter doesn't make sense from a financial or environmental perspective. Since your comments above suggest that you agree, I'm not sure why you think I'm uneducated or misinformed. As for bio-mass alternatives, maybe that will work out at some point, but we aren't there yet.
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