1989 Engine Concerns
 

Hey all,

I have an 1989 bronco with a 302 in it. Houston just passed regulation mandating an ethanol oxygenate in the gas, vice MTBE. My question is, will this ethanol in my tank harm my truck? If so, I may go ahead and sell it as I don't want to deal with engine trouble, and can't get gas any other way.

Not to mention I don't want to pay for the privilege of dealing with the mess, as gas in non-ethanol mandated areas is at least $.25/gal cheaper!

Is this something I should be concerned with?

Nope.

Nothing to worry about.

You have 10% Ethanol at most, and I have not seen every pump/station labeled as such, which may or may not mean a thing...but breathe easy in any case.

It should not harm your truck but it seems to make the gas mileage worse.

Ethanol
 

Acccording to a local distributor: Ethanol is corrosive to pipe lines thus needs to be trucked. All vehicles should run fine on ethanol. However, as we convert to ethanol and it loosens the crud in all the tanks, filter changing may be more frequent until everything gets cleaned up from the refinery to our engines. I never buy gas when a transport is dumping gas thus giving the trash and water time to settle below the pump intake. MTBE studies indicate it gets in our water and is bad. Ethanol requires the gas to be refined a different way, resulting in increased refining expense for the ethanol conversion.

b4 the ethonal corrosion that they are talking about is when trying to pipe it at 100%, 100% ethonal will eat rubber seals and hoses. In Iowa we have had E10 for the past 10+yrs, and I have been running it in everything I own for the entire time I have lived in Iowa. oldest was a 88ranger body set on a 74 bronco frame and running gear with the 302 in it. Never had a problem with that one, next oldest I had was a 81 GMC 1ton ran E10 in that vehicle for over 200,000 miles with no fuel related problems (only problem that truck had was clutches, I had lots of power and towed very heavy all the time) and I ran it in things all the way up to the current 2003 expy my wife drives. Don't be scared of the stuff it's not going to ruin your vehicle although as stated it will clean the crude out of your tank so after a couple of tanks change your fuel filter.
As for the claims of much reduced fuel economy, I don't see it with E10, My family still lives in WA state, and I have driven out to visit on several occasions in the past 14 yrs, once I leave the midwest I couldn't get ethonal blended fuel, so just ran whatever I could buy, and my mileage never went up as I got the ethonal out, and didn't drop when I got back to the midwest, there is just not enough difference at 10% to affect mileage.
But on your older vehilce I would suggest you do NOT run E85 that is a different issue all together now.

Alfred is right, just change the fuel filter after a few thousand miles as the ethanol will clean your fuel system. Everybody is so scared of ethanol, Henry Ford designed the Model T to run on it or gas. Don't worry.

Monster..I left agriculture 45 years ago but the roots are deep. I'm looking forward to having a farm product in my fuel. I saw an article where about 20% of our corn will be used for ethanol and the distillation process yields some feed stock for feed also. A win..win situation if economically feasible.

I have been using an E10 for almost a year now and no problems.I think I am getting better mileage,especially when towing.Here in Manitoba our E10 is same price as regular gas.This is actually a bargin as the E10 is rated as 90 octane and regular is rated as 87 octane.Probably explains the better mileage when towing.

I've been running 10% for 20 years, no problems yet... Like stated though, be prepared to change your fuel filter to get rid of the crud left by non-ethanol blends...

Use the blend, next fall/winter change your fuel filter.

Ten percent ethanol replaced MTBE in CA and there is no difference in how the cars run. When MTBE was first introduced, there were some problems with fuel lines and mechanical fuel pumps in very old cars. My mother's 1972 Buick sprung leaks in the fuel lines.

Jim

Who told you that? :-huh I work for the country's largest refiner, and that's news to me.
The only thing that could possibly be related is certain oil companies (like ARCO) using subgrade base gas (cheaper) and adding ethanol to bring the octane up to specs. But that isn't done at the refining level. It gets added at the terminals.
Ethanol is corrosive to pipelines, but the reason it doesn't get transported that way is that it doesn't interface well with other products, like gas, diesel or JP-8. It just cuts right through it, and it absorbs water like crazy. In my neck of the woods, it moves via railcar, barge, or ship. Sometimes by truck in some situations. I wish it moved via pipeline, it would make my life much easier.

1pump and others. I searched and saw a long technical article on the internet discussing the refining changes needed for ethanol but I must have mininterpreted it. Bring on the ethanol!