is it bad for the engine?
there was only one shell gas station that said ethanol free in my town but they changed owners and now that one even says "may contain 10% ethanol" at the pump
it might be just me but my car has been feeling slugguish since my last two tank loads.

 

most gas has a percentage of ethanol in it, as the pump sign said, about 10%.
no damage or otherwise harmful effects to your 'stang. its probably in your head that its running sluggish since you noticed the ethanol addition.

 

10% isn't going to affect anything. Too much ethanol can damage rubber lines though.

 

I didnt know ethanol was in all gas... BUT yeah its probably a head thing, but to be honest, if there really are feeling a difference, its because ethanol doesnt burn as well as gasoline. I've read tons of reviews on it, and like the ethanol fuel u can get is called E85 because its 85% ethanol and 15% gas, they add the gas percentage to help with engine starting. And to proove the sluggish part (if its indeed the added ethanol) cars running on E85 get less mileage per gallon as compared to gas MPG. Which is retarted, in the end you pay the same for the same mileage even with E85 being cheaper. BUT however its less harmful to the planet. Sorry for the huge rant, im almost sure all of these statements are true.

 

I have heard that gas with 10% ethanol will give slightly worse gas mileage than 100% gas, but I don't know if that's true or not.

 

States are making it a law now to have up to 10% ethanol in the gas due to the huge oil scare and price hike. There are no stations in eastern VA (that I've been to anyway) that have ethanol free gas anymore. Only East Coast and the mom and pop stores did before but even they have the up to 10% ethanol stickers now.
It may not be in your head either. Gas with ethanol does yield less miles per gallon than straight gasoline. That's why I, and a few other people I know only got gas from those certain stations when it was available. When I had to get gas with ethanol in it before, I easily noticed a drop of around 2 mpg. Up to 10% less mileage is what I've been told. Hmm, funny how that is how much ethanol they mix isn't it? But, I was driving my 4 cylinder notchback around so I couldn't really notice a drop in power since there is nothing lower than squat.

 

Agreed, basically, if they made a switch, you should feel it. I can feel the difference in my car with the A/C on, or windows down. OR even 3 people. So hopefully this isnt hard on our cars. Over here in KY id say our gas already has tons of water in it.. eventually our cars wont run.

 

I just did some looking and saw that some idiots are pushing for the limits to be raised to 15% ethanol. Auto makers are shitting themselves.

 

gotta love obama.. not.

 

+1

 

I thought they would only add ethanol to unleaded, but it seems they add it to premium also.. thats bullshit!!!
the car running sluggish might be just in my head. but getting 17 mpg when i used to get 19 or 20 is definetly not just my imagination!

 

just a thought, but your tune might be able to be modified to offset some. try contacting SCT to see if they will update your tune, or hit up a local performance shop to see if they can adjust it for you. it has been noted before that "boxed" tunes are good, but almost always more can be gained from a custom tune.

 

Pretty soon you wont have to worry about it, we'll all be running the flux capactior and a Mr. Fusion. The cob will be your fuel

 

When I was a freshman I decided to write a research paper about alternative fuels, ethanol being the main one, compared to regular gas. I couldn't even finish it after doing the research. Ethanol sucks *** big time. It yields less energy, so less MPG, and it makes food prices higher, along with tons of other stuff.

 

So what do you mean by 'ofseting' it ?

I was driving to college this morning and when I steped on it on the freeway the car definetly did not respond as before

 

I know VMPtuning does tunes for ethanol. I believe he tested and tuned a GT500 with ethanol. I still think that the sluggish feeling is in your head unless something else is wrong with the car. Gas mileage is going to fluctuate a bit. I doubt you drive the car excatly the same everyday. 1-2 mpg difference isn't much.

 

Ethanol improves octane rating and delivers less energy per unit volume. It also makes the gas more hygroscopic. You can use a little more timing with a little more ethanol but you also need to mess with the fuel delivery in the tune if you mess with the percentages.

I'd run E85 if they sold it out here. I want the 105 octane.

 

ya beat me to it, but of course I wouldn't have articulated it as well

K.G.B I think it's probably in your head or something else is wrong with the car. Us Cali guys have had the 10% ethanol in our gas for a while and you can actually use it to your advantage like r3dn3ck indicated.

 

I am suggesting that you have a shop use your tuner to run a custom tune. also, just for grins, check the basics like air filter, dirty MAF.

10% ethanol mix has been around for a good while now, and I don't think anyone has had a problem with it.

 

Every single tank of gas that has ever gone into any of my cars has had the 10% ethanol in it. No problems to speak of. That's just how the gas has been around here as long as I can remember. Of course I live in an area where it can get really ******* cold, so that is probably why. And I 2nd what r3d said.. I'd run E85 if more than one station in my town carried it.

 

Just wanted to add that when I had my mach it put out 304/330 to the wheels with basic bolt on mods and custom tune, which was right on par if not a little better than any other mach around the country with the same mods.....so again, I don't think the ethanol is your issue.

 

If you take advantage of Ethanol's 105 octane, than those disadvantages are meaningless. An Ethanol powered engine running 12:1 compression will always make more power and get better mileage than a 10:1 gasoline engine, especially since a gasoline engine's efficiency is directly related to its compression ratio.

As for the food supply BS, remember corn is a subsidized crop, so prices will not go up unless the government raises the price itself. However, to create it from corn is dumb just because of the low yield. That's why the fuel can work in Brazil, since sugar cane has 5x the yield of corn.

As for the person that mentioned the rubber lines, it's not that. It's the steel lines, alcohol allows water to be mixed with gasoline, which means your hard steel lines will rust w/ E85. That's why those cars run stainless lines and special injectors.

 

I just wondered if would affect the car on any way. since the cars were made to run on gas not an ethanol blend.

 

I have to agree with this. You do definitely see a loss in mileage and power. And as for the food prices, corn itself is not affected all that much, but more so other products derived from corn. And from an environmental point of view, its terrible...250gal of water to brew 1gal of ethanol, and it produces more contaminates than gasoline does. Not worth using ethanol as a main fuel

 

heck yesterday I just got some gas down the street at this small conv. store gas pump place, and I did notice they have a sign hanging that says " NO Ethanol Gas " and thought hmmm

 

the cars were not designed to run a non-blended gasoline. They were designed to run modern oxygenated gasoline which is a blend, period. It's normally either 10% ethanol or 15-20% methy tertiary butyl ether (MTBE). MTBE was banned as it causes cancer so ethanol is what we have left. Ethanol is a bitchin fuel but has limitations.

Sugar cane, sugar beets and similar foods that are basically made of sugar are great ways to make ethanol. Corn is a retarded redneck-hillbilly way to make ethanol. 90% of the weight of the plant is fibre not starch/sugar.

Now you want a true American crop with unnaturally high yeilds and amazing purity of the alcohol (not to mention it grows best in shitty soil, takes modest water supplies, grows fast, easy to harvest, etc...) potatoes.

Ethanol has a tendency to have a rating 120 octane. That would mean being able to run INSANE compression ratios and LOTS of timing. This means oodles of power from every molecule you burn IF you build and tune the engine to be optimized for alcohol, otherwise it'll just drink the booze inefficiently. Gasoline engines that "can" run alcohol aren't designed with those tunes and build optimizations in mind. So, flex fuel is a retarded half attempt at a reasonable concept. A pure alcohol car would be making ridiculous power on CR's that would give us fits (12:1-13:1 NA, 10:1 FI) pulling timing curves that mechanics will have to get used to not being recipes for engine death.

 

Any vehicle produced after 1990 ( I think) is okay for running ethanol blend. If you do have a problem, it is due to the cleaning effects of ethanol.

R3D....I will agree with you about a E-85 motor. I would love to build a motor for E-85 (105 octane). Can you imagine the sound of a 13:1 motor running on the street!!

With the tf heads having a more efficent combustion chamber then factory heads and a decent cam and tune selection, I think it is possible to come real close to the gas mpg.