I agree with you.

I put a custom Diablo sport chip tuned for E85 on tune #2 in my 99 Ranger with a 2.5L four and 5speed. I break even and some times come out ahead running E85 here in South DAkota. Where I live in Sioux Falls E85 is $2.23 today and E10 is $2.79 and 87 octane pure gas is $2.89 or $.66 more money. I am breaking even at $.50 spread.

 

If you can get $4.00 per bushel on corn. I'll be right over with 20K bushels.

 

Well now-seems that I've been aligned with bashers-lets get this right! #1) I'm Christian and we seem to be attacked daily in the media ect... #2) I'm of Polish and Hungarian descent(need I say more? Jokes?). The point I'm trying to make is that as Americans of all descent, we HAVE to find alternitive sources of energy. If ethanol and biodiesel isn't the answer, then let's get going on something new. I have many Mexican, Muslim, Jewish, African American ect... friends who also share my point of view. Everybody is out for a profit-oil companies, ADM ect... If they weren't, they wouldn't be in business. Most people I deal with on a daily basis are pissed that thier lives are dictated by oil. Should the kids get to go to football practice, or should we save those precious miles for vacation. Most middle class people I know live on tight budgets and have had to spend less on everything else in order to drive. I'm not talking about giant SUV, or Hummer, or Monster Truck (Oh God! I've offended another sector of society-please forgive me!!) people, but sedans and mini-vans. And if there is an alternitive out there to help relieve some of this, then I am all for it. Yes we get most of our oil from Canada, Mexico, Alaska, Greenland, Iceland, domestic and only about 25% comes from Arab countries, Nigeria ect... But when something happens over there, Fuel prices shoot up overnight-you can't deny this!! Brazil now exports most of thier oil and some of thier ethanol(they have a surplus after 90% of thier cars run on it) but we can't import any ethanol from there because it is made from sugar, and the sugar growers union(don't mean to offend all unions either) in the US has convinced the government to put a tarrif on anything imported made from sugar, namely-ethanol!! Our own people are just as guilty and that concerns me also. So in closing, I'm not a basher-I'm concered that if the world supply of oil is cut off for any reason, you will see a side of people you won't like, alternitive fuels may relieve some of that pressure!! I've discussed this debate with 2 of my Amish friends and they have a solution-horses and buggies!! They don't worry about oil, or ethanol-it seems those people really get it!!!!

 

Ethanol and Biodiesel are not the answer.
If you want an alternative that will work it exists now and isn't all that new.
1. Nuclear power for electricy. Stop burning oil in power plants.
2. Muffle the tree huggers with a spotted owl ball gag of shame and drill. Drill in ANWR, off the coast of CA, FL, in the Gulf of Mexico etc etc etc. There is 3 to 5 times more oil in CO, UT and WY than the know reserves in Saudi Arabia. Enough to run this country for 200 years.
3. Build more refineries.

Life is choices. If they're not choosing where to drive, there'd be something else causing a shortage of funds. OR you make a lifestyle choice to live within your means and not live in debt. A $300 per month car payment could buy a lot of gas each month.

If we got ALL of our oil from sources within our borders, the crap hitting the fan in the mid east would STILL drive up prices here. It's called a global market and we are in it. If you owned an oil company and had a million barrels of oil, would you sell it here for $20/barrel or on the world market for $70/barrel.

Brazil also experienced a massive crop failure a few years ago. They ended up having to import gasoline. And you know what? After a crop failure it takes a full year before you can try again. Kind of a long time to be down. I agre the US sugar tarrif needs to be lifted.

If you wish to take up the Amish lifestyle, go right ahead. No one here's stopping you. Again, choices. The fact that you have them to make is what makes this country great.

 

Didn't it peak at that a while back? That was a best case scenario for now, but from the sounds of it from some sources, you would think that is a low...

 

Supercab, you're dead on. People don't understand the oil industry and economics. There is indeed more oil in this country than we could use for the next century or so. We don't produce our own oil for 3 reasons.

1) We're in a global economy. We are fortunate to have many sources of income for importing and exporting. Some countries like Saudi Arabia and others ONLY have oil. You take that demand away from them and they have nothing to sell or trade. It makes countries like that very volitile.

2) Our bunny huggers and other liberals have made it where new refineries can't be built. Where it is almost impossible to allow companies to drill for oil. It's become a political issue and war.

3) Because it is cheaper to import oil than it is to drill our own. We drill and refine a certain amount. Much of the alaskan oil never even comes here to the lower 48. It goes to Japan and other places. The rates among oil producing countries is internally regulated. There have been price wars where some tried to put others out of business. With oil workers and such in the USA making $30, $40, $50+ an hour, the American public couldn't afford a 100% USA oil supply. Just like you don't want to admit that even though you bitch about illegal immigrants, you like the price of your produce and would whine if it trippled because it hired workers as $10-$15 an hour.

The funny thing is that I agreed with some of what White Shadow had to say. He mentioned how everyone is out to make a profit. Especially the oil companies. I will repeat this again. If this is true, which I agree it is, and they have so much political power, which I also agree they do, then why aren't they FIGHTING congress and everyone else against using ethanol in the gasoline. If using ethanol actually reduced the consumption of oil, then why aren't they fighting it. Someone find me an article where the oil companies and car companies are fighting and lobbying against ethanol and I'll drop that portion of my argument. I haven't seen it. Doesn't that tell you something"???

76supercab2 said it, I said it, researchers have said it, Universities have said it, ecologists and economists have said it, but no one wants to do anything about it. If you want to become free from oil and the effects of it on our ecology and economy, then you have to abandon our use of it. You have to develop a totally different means of energy. For large applications like the "Power Grid" you need to go with Nuclear, Hydro-Turbine, and Wind. For local use, you need to go with Solar, Hydrogen, and plug in electric. In the transition period, use more 95-98% efficient coal injection for power plants, get the damn east coast off of "Heating Oil" by giving them tax credits to convert to electricity. Use petroleum fuels only in areas that can't be converted immediately such as powering large ships, aircraft, and factories. Schedule them for progressive upgrades. If the power grid can be increased with wind, hydro, and nuclear, then electricity will be totally green. Then we can start using electricity in the automobiles, homes, businesses, etc... and eliminate all those fossile fuels.

The key to all of this is not Ethanol. That's not even a temporary solution. Use are land to grow food. Don't pay farmers to NOT GROW food. Export to countries that have a need. The farmers can be taken care of. The only viable solution for an alternative fuel for a vehicle is electricity. Electricity's only solution is to become green by using Wind, Hydro-turbine, and nuclear. We can reduce our fossile fuel use over the next 20 years to approximately 10-20%. At the same time, it can be a gradual change for many other countries also, so that those that only have oil can be the ones supplying it for those items that can't be retrofitted or operated safely with another energy source. I.e. I trust the U.S. Navy to have a Nuclear Sub or SHip. I DON'T trust Carnival Cruise line or Commercial shipping to have nuclear powered ships. Because of profit, they wouldn't have the manpower or technology to maintain it in a safe environment. For consumer use, Nuclear is best for providing power to the Power Grid. Later... Mike....

 

Tonights local price is $3.02 - there is a 50 cent basis here or more
Futures was close to $4 but not cash.

 

And regular gasoline prices have dropped a lot in the last couple of weeks. $0.13 less on average from a month ago. $0.40 less on average from 2 1/2 months ago. The summer months is when they say the prices are suppose to go up. All the traveling and such. That was even the prediction 3 months ago. Now, they get one little report saying that they are ONLY expecting 11 tropical storms/hurricanes in the gulf of Mexico this year instead of 13, and the prices start to tumble. Today's prices were $2.77, $2.87, and $2.97. That's the same for regular NON-Ethanol gasoline or E10. later... Mike....

 

That would be the effect of the speculative markets... demand likely hasn't changed that much, but the market goes wild every time some little thing goes wrong with a refinery, or a well gets shut down, or Osama farts... True market economy is not the driving cause of the prices any more.

 

Fellro86 is right, everytime there is instability in the middle east, the market panics and crude shoots up. Even if we have enough domestic, and "friendly" country crude, Christcorp is right on one thing-it's a global economy out there now. Also, China and India are sucking up all the "reserves" or at least thats whats being reported. Evereything we have in our stores now says made in China-and it's made of plastic-which are oil products. Also due to liberal tree huggers like Al Gore and Richard Branson, we'll probably have to pay "carbon credits" which I still don't entirerely get-sounds like a new kind of tax to me. Pump more oil, build new refineries, solve the middle east problems and we'll all have cheap gas. Welcome to Fantasy Island!!!!

 

By the way, E85 price today at the local family express-$2.27. Also I was reminded by a friend that I was using premium with my Diablo chip to achieve about 20 mpg-he's right. So all the previous threads were based on 87 octane price!!!! I havent run 87 in this truck in a long time. Premium today was $2.97!! I haven't used premium gas in 2 years since I've been using E85-guess I had a brain freeze-my apologies!! Thats about 24% savings in cost vs. about 15-20% efficiency falloff. To satisfy Christcorp, I will unbiasly finish up this tank of E85, and with unbiased witnesses, run a tank of 87 octane and will record and report the results. I will try to find someone with a dyno to get a report of power difference if any-stay tuned!!!

 

Unless your vehicle is knocking, and you can't adjust the timing, and the compression needs it, you don't gain anything from using 91 octane over 87. Normally, a compression of 9.5:1 or higher is where the high octane fuel comes into play. All the higher octane does is slow down the burn rate of the fuel. In high altitudes like here in Wyoming, because of the lower air in the mixture, the low grade of gas is normally 85 octane. If your vehicle isn't knocking, then the only thing that you get from burining a higher octane fuel is a lighter wallet. In all of my vehicles, I get no change in MPG or power from running 85 octane or 91 octane. If I had a high compression engine such as in a corvette, (10:1) then it would recommend and suggest a 91 octane. That's one reason E85 is something like 103 octane. The burn rate of the fuel is slowed down to handle the high compression and it doesn't pre-ignite. The problem is however, if you don't have the compression to utilize the high octane, then you aren't gaining anything, and possibly is part of the reason for a lower efficieincy. Later... Mike....

 

You hit it right there, that with the lower compression for regular gasoline, ethanol efficiency suffers, but with the compression higher to make better use of the burn qualities of the ethanol, it will rival or surpass gasoline, but only when the engine is set up for ethanol primarily. The unfortunate truth is that only one fuel at a time is the way, not trying to use both.
With the chip, and higher octane, you can run more advance would be the benefit, but running stock tune and setup definitely do not see any gains running premium, but the higher tunes take advantage of the slower flame front.

 

Hold it there!! If you have higher compression engine, that will also likely to increase peak temperature, and that, together with the higher compression will help to increase the NOx production! There are several ways to combat NOx (i.e. EGR, slightly rich mixture, etc.) and some of those methods will not help fuel economy at all.

In any case, theories are nice (incl. mine ), and I believe when I see that higher copmpression, more efficient engine optimized for E85 in a production car approved for the US market. And I'm willing to bet 10 against 1 that it won't happen for reasons that seem to be obvious for many of us.

All you corn boys can say anything you want, but show me the beef! OK, you can show the "beef" since corn is good feed , but show us an engine that backs up your claims. Initially, I'm even willing to cut you some slack and drop the NOx requirement, but it should be street legal and meet emission requirements in every other respects, and usable in a daily driver. What I mean about "show" is that show some data collected on a dyno in an accredited lab, in a university, or by some credible manufacturer that proves that the mythical engine optimized for E85 (or ethanol) is more efficient than an equivalent gasoline engine.

If manufacturers think there's a bright future for E85, they most be working very hard on it. Right? Or hardly working, perchance?

 

Yup; except for race cars and other specialties running alcohol type fuels, the normal gasoline vehicle is not made for that type of compression and a 103 octane fuel. Hell, they can't even make a pure 100% ethanol or it would practically never start. Flex fuel vehicles is a total joke There is no economical advantage to it generally speaking. What you save at the pump (Thank your fellow tax payers for subsidizing the $0.51 a gallon for you), you make up for by buying more gas because your MPG has gone down.

I keep bringing up the point and no one wants to answer it. If ethanol is such a great thing, and it saves so much importantion of foreign oil. And it's so great for the environment. Then why aren't the big oil companies and car manufacturers lobbying against it. Could it be that it doesn't really affect the oil industry. That it doesn't really save any oil use. That it's all for smoke and mirrors to make the consumer "Think" that they are doing their part to reduce oil and save the planet. It doesn't matter what the reason is. What is important, is that the oil companies and car manufacturers aren't lobbying against ethanol. That alone should peak your B.S. Meter. Of course, many people don't want to think about that. They want to believe that the oil companies and car manufacturers are just good old patriotic Americans and are willing to take a 25% cut in profit; give it to the ethanol producers. That they care so much about the environment that they will go out of business if that's for the good of the country. Sorry, but there's reasons they aren't fighting the ethanol issue. Later... Mike....