Agreed! Don't know how they'd produce a variable compression motor.

But an FFV EB would be very nice.

 

either way you go, the money is going overseas.
damned if you do, and damned if you don't ...I wish people would wake up and smell the coffee about these "green" fuels like E85. It isn't green, and it costs just as much as oil. I guess if you slap a green leaf sticker on it though, it must be earth friendly.

 

Going oversees, maybe so on certain products, but not gasoline. When was the last time you saw huge corn crops in Saudi Arabia, Iran or Iraq?

So if you think E85 is a useless crop, how do you think we'll ever reduce or end our dependence on foreign oil? E85 is a stepping stone. E85 only vehicles get much better mpgs and produce more power than a gasoline only motor. Plus, corn is a renewable resource, fossil fuels are not. Think switchgrass, sugar cane, sugar beats and cellulosis (sp?) are few items they can use instead of corn. Problem is there isn't enough E85 around the US yet to build cars that only run on E85, which they must then reduce the cars compression to run gasoline, ruining the benefits you'd get from running an E85 only vehicle. Get these other products up and running, E85 more across the US and you won't need to subsidize.

Huh? I only purchase gasoline from a station that does not use Middle Eastern oil. Even the gasoline they put in the E85 I use is not from the Middle East. I've done research on the two stations I frequent.

Hey, I'm not a green person. Just try to do my part for the country and world as a whole when possible. So I agree the greenies have impacted our ability to drill locally, but I'm not supporting their views.

It may cost just as much as oil, but we don't have to support the middle east to produce it, less pollution, it can be reproduced over and again, it helps local farmers, and many more reasons.

So I'll agree to disagree with you. I've done plenty of research on E85 and agree in it's current state it's not the greatest, but it's a stepping stone and stage one of moving away from oil and supporting the middle east.

 

soapbox/
E85 is the biggest government boondoggle ever. ADM paid millions to politicians on both sides of the aisle so that ethanol would be pushed on the public and required to be mixed into our gasoline. It takes more energy to make a gallon of E85 from corn than you get out of the completed product.

E85 is not green in any way. It's the typical BS "green" crap that's fed to the masses to make money for someone. The people perpetrating this BS don't care about the environment. It's just another way to redistribute wealth.

Whew! Sorry about that! /soapbox

 

So if the facts that Ethanol is a bad alternative for fuel and also as an gasoline additive, what are the alternatives? Is MTBE better to mix instead of Ethanol? I know there is a 2008 Hyundai recall because the fuel pumps are failing because of corrosion from the 10% ethanol per volume on gasoline. Maybe this stuff is really bad for our cars in general.

 

bold stuff

 

Notice I stated E85 (actually E100) only vehicles, not FFV's. With an E85 (E100) only vehicle you can up the compression rate of the motor. Due to the fact FFV's have to run both E85 and gasoline, the manufactures must reduce the compression rate down to a gasoline level. This means the motor is not running at the optimal compression rate to use E85 in it's most efficient state. So yes, in FFV's that run both normal gasoline and E85, you get worse mpgs due to the motors decreased compression. Once you boost that compression rate up for running strictly E85 (E100), you'd find that your mpgs on E85 alone would increase over gasoline and you power output would increase too.

Ethanol is most commonly used to power automobiles, though it may be used to power other vehicles, such as farm tractors and airplanes. Ethanol (E100) consumption in an engine is approximately 34% higher than that of gasoline (the energy per volume unit is 34% lower).[14][15] However, higher compression ratios in an ethanol-only engine allow for increased power output and better fuel economy than would be obtained with the lower compression ratio.[16][17] In general, ethanol-only engines are tuned to give slightly better power and torque output to gasoline-powered engines. In flexible fuel vehicles, the lower compression ratio requires tunings that give the same output when using either gasoline or hydrated ethanol. For maximum use of ethanol's benefits, a much higher compression ratio should be used,[18] which would render that engine unsuitable for gasoline use. When ethanol fuel availability allows high-compression ethanol-only vehicles to be practical, the fuel efficiency of such engines should be equal or greater than current gasoline engines. However, since the energy content (by volume) of ethanol fuel is less than gasoline, a larger volume of ethanol fuel (151%) would still be required to produce the same amount of energy.[19] In spite of that, as the ethanol-only vehicle wastes less energy, yielding the same or higher mileage.

 

An ethanol only vehicle would indeed get much better efficiency and power vs a flex fuel vehicle. We are talking somewhere in the range of 13:1 to 15:1 compression along with revised cam profiles. The towing ability of a 5.4 3v with 14:1 compression would be sick!

 

A little birdie told me that gasoline is corrosive as well...

 

true

the ethanol is even more so. running a higher concentration of ethanol in a non FFV vehicle will cause leaks/failures long term. The FFV vehicles have different seals and lines to resist the higher corrosiveness of ethanol.

 

That depends on what you mean by non FFV. If you are talking about 70s carb'd vehicles, then yes. Newer vehicles can handle the ethanol in the tanks and lines.

 

Upto what concentration? There have been some people who have been putting in E85 and having failures as soon as the 2nd tank. Hyundai fuel pumps are being damaged by even 10% or less.

 

My Brother-in-law just bought himself an '06 F-150 Super Crew 4x4 with a 5.4 liter that runs on flex fuel and he seems to be getting around 14 MPG on the highway and 12 MPG in the city using E85. He is thinking about getting a bed cap for it and see if the milage will increase. My truck's 5.4 liter does not run on E85 because its not equipped with the flex fuel engine. I heard if you attempt to run E85 in a non flex fuel engine, the burnt bi-products of combustion from ethenol are very acidic and will attack the metal in critical engine parts, thus greatly reducing engine life between overhauls. I think the flex fuel engines use special coatings on these critical engine parts to extend their life from the acidic effects of burnt bi-products of ethenol if I'm not mistaken.

 

$5.00 Gal Diesel Is What Makes The Food Prices Go Up. Everything Uses Diesel.
The Use Of Corn To Make Gas Has A Minimal Effect. Farmers Generaly Have A Surplus Of Corn Anyways