Guys, the major cities in Texas are being forced to 10% ethanol gas. A while back I had tuned my $6E MAF system to run right at 128 BLMs with an occasional switch slightly above/below. This was on standard 93 OCT.

I started to use 10% ethanol a while back and decided to check the BLMs the other day and notice I was running in the mid to high 130s.

Does anyone know if 10% ethanol could be causing a BLM shift of this nature?

 

Almost positive of it. My TBIs have done the same thing and my Vortec is running a Long Term Fuel Trim of +8%

 

on the LM1 forum is an interesting thread about running E85. apparently there is power to be had. but i question what the long term effects may be. damage?

 

I don't know, but if there are any negative effects, we will soon find out. Other than 3 fuel filters stopping up in the last 2 months, no trouble so far.

 

i am talking E85. 85% ethanol.... for sure is tough on gaskets ... seals... not sure what pure mentanol does for power? but the alky drag races sure sound mean.

as a side note not sure if a 2 stroke can run E85 ? i was told not BUT it certainly will combust oil.

 

Seeing how 10% ethanol is going to be the TEXAS State gas, i guess one needs to go back and readjust AFR to bring BLMs back down to 128?

 

Spotted a blurb about ethanol in a car rag today, mentioning E85 being 105 octane (according to them, not me). Their thoughts were towards changes in spark tables as well being expected to match the different burn rate as the likleyhood of supporting higher compression.

 

The BLMs move because ethanol acts as an oxygenate. The fuel is now carrying part of the air mixture as well, so the BLMs move lean. The fix is simply to spray more fuel. I slid my injector constant to get the BLMs into the ballpark then tweaked the VE again as a final fine adjustment. Methanol drags are as fast as they are because they spray a ton of fuel, and have higher compression to make use of the higher octane of the fuel.

Teeleton

 

A lot of reformulated areas only have the 10% Ethanol. There is no choice.
Ethonal has less energy so you need more fuel.....BLM shift right.

Would a stock TPI fuel injection system support the fuel required using E85. Probably not. E85 has a higher effective octane rating but requires more fuel. There are good write ups about E85 all over the web. The official E85 web page is a good place to start. Like what was already said, high octane is only good if you can make use of it. Other than that, you will probably make less HP than using lower octane fuel.

 

Also wikipedia has a good website and extenxive knowledge on E85 and other alcohols for fuel.

I will also piont out that A guy by the name of Dave Ramsey has found a way to cheaply produce Butanol (biomass+bacteria=ferment, then fermented juice + different bacteria=butanal and hydrogen)... Butanol is the next step up the alcohol chain from Ethanol. E-85 has a stoich of like 9:1, and a Rich Best power ratio at like 6:1 (requires 50% more fuel for power enrich than gas, that's aton of fuel on a higher horsepower engine). Which is why that even though there is less btu/gal that you can have the same if not more power from ethanol, if you can make use of the higher octane. Butanol has only slightly less energy (BTU's) than gas, and has a stoich of 11:1. Not real sure on the rich best power as of yet. but the 11:1 is within the capabilities of most vehicles with out modification. Also butanol isn't as corosive to rubber and other parts as ethanol. Butanol can be mixed 100% with gasoline and ethanol, and still has a high octane rating (I'm unsure if it's as high as ethanol but I know its higher than 93 gas). Even though the richer ratio, most of the time, as the test are being ran they're getting better gas mileage due to the better power producing characteristics and low end gains. I think Environmental Energy Main Page is the website. Just food for thought!