elxkid Posted May 19, 2006 Share Posted May 19, 2006 No one answered my question in the other thread so I'm starting a new one. The question: Can any gasoline operated vehicle (such as a Legacy) be modded to run on E85? I assume it would require a new fuel system to handle the corrosive quality of the ethanol. Is this a correct assumption? I need to know for a project I'm working on. This forum already saved my life (literally) so maybe it can help my business too ...sporting the hottest Legacy on the westside of my block:icon_bigg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Th3Franz Posted May 19, 2006 Share Posted May 19, 2006 Correct. Ethanol is nasty to fuel systems that aren't designed for it. The car might need to be tuned for the fuel also. You can kiss your warranty good by if you run E85 on a car not designed for it. I think the owners manual says like up to 30% ethanol is acceptable.. IMHO E85 isn't worth it. You burn a lot more of it to get the same performance, so you'll be filling up more often. Around here, I seldom see people at the E85 pumps. -Franz The end of a Legacy http://www.youtube.com/th3franz Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sutter2k Posted May 19, 2006 Share Posted May 19, 2006 You should be able to find a wealth of information here http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=803341&highlight=E85 http://forums.nasioc.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1000007&highlight=E85 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VTGT Posted May 19, 2006 Share Posted May 19, 2006 thats an indepth report on nasioc. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elxkid Posted May 19, 2006 Author Share Posted May 19, 2006 wow. That is great stuff. So who's going to step up and try that out on a legacy? ...sporting the hottest Legacy on the westside of my block:icon_bigg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LIZARD Posted May 19, 2006 Share Posted May 19, 2006 ^^I'm guessing YOU are!! Stage2.5376, TDC ProTune,blah blah blahhhh and....Alky/H20 injection Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elxkid Posted May 19, 2006 Author Share Posted May 19, 2006 E85 is non-existant in socal. ...sporting the hottest Legacy on the westside of my block:icon_bigg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Rebo Posted May 19, 2006 Share Posted May 19, 2006 E85 is non-existant in socal. It's kind of ironic that CA would have so few E85 pumps considering all the government CARB nazis and their nonsensical emissions regulations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
93formula Posted May 20, 2006 Share Posted May 20, 2006 I would say you can, and someday i may look into it myself if e85 becomes more common. 105-110 octane sounds nice. Ill take the hit in gas milage if I can have more power. Even if it is 5% more. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RabidMonk Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 IIRC, an engine tuned specifically for E85 would have more power AND get better mileage than the same car tuned for gasoline. However, since all current E85 vehicles are also tuned to run on conventional gasoline (which is probably a wise thing considering how scarce E85 is), a vehicle running on E85 will typically yield about 2/3 of the power and mileage compared to burning gasoline. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwiener2 Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 That's not true at all^^^^ E85 has less energy than straight gasoline. To get the same power you have to burn more E85. The higher octane doesn't mean more power either. You can up boost and/or compression a buttload and get a bigger punch out of the E85, but regular gas gets the same punch on less compression/boost My Mods List (Updated 8/22/17) 2005 Outback FMT Running on Electrons Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AWD_Rules3830 Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 I think the owners manual says like up to 30% ethanol is acceptable.. i think its actually 10 percent ... maybe less, i know its really small ETHANOL SUCKS BALLS ... that is all ... I love my car ... basically. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AWD_Rules3830 Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 I would say you can, and someday i may look into it myself if e85 becomes more common. 105-110 octane sounds nice. Ill take the hit in gas milage if I can have more power. Even if it is 5% more. we could have 105 to 110 ... like they do in europe ... if people were willing to pay for it .... i thing want 98 is regular in germany idk lol I love my car ... basically. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phoenix96 Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 i thing want 98 is regular in germany idk lol phoenix96 2006 Legacy GT Ltd · 2011 Outback 3.6R Ltd · 1992 SVX 2006 Outback 3.0R VDC · 2009 Forester 2.5X 2002 Outback VDC · 1996 Outback 2.5L · 1986 GL-10 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cynder Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 E85 is very good in context. In a typical flexfuel engine the performance degrade of E85 is minimal and the fuel prices are excellent compared to regular gasoline. The trade-off is that drivers fuel up more often but at much lower prices. Point is, if you're operating on E85, you're cost or environmentally sensative--not your typical performance oriented driver. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AWD_Rules3830 Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 grade of gasoline ... 90 somethign is like regular over there I love my car ... basically. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sutter2k Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 E85 is very good in context. In a typical flexfuel engine the performance degrade of E85 is minimal and the fuel prices are excellent compared to regular gasoline. The trade-off is that drivers fuel up more often but at much lower prices. Point is, if you're operating on E85, you're cost or environmentally sensative--not your typical performance oriented driver. I think cars could get more out of E85 if they were tuned more aggressively for it. Even though flex-fuel cars need to yield tuning on the conservative side in order to handle various fuel/octance variations. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vincedog3 Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 I had a methanol chevy company car awhile ago, but you needed to fill it a lot. Though, driving was a blast. Much perkier performance than the gas car. I was driving it when companies were encouraged to have a percentage of these vehicles in their fleet. E85 is a mystery to me though. Until I get an official word that my LGT will well with it,E85 will continue to be a mystery. I know GM has a big push on it these days though. For your car audio/video needs:D Audio Crafters IS it. In Pasadena Ca. Arthur rules. www.audio-crafters.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
vincedog3 Posted May 21, 2006 Share Posted May 21, 2006 That is run well with it. Sorry about the poor grammer. For your car audio/video needs:D Audio Crafters IS it. In Pasadena Ca. Arthur rules. www.audio-crafters.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
elxkid Posted May 21, 2006 Author Share Posted May 21, 2006 ok i need to interrupt my thread here. As I understand it, ethanol is a high octane, high performance fuel. As a gasoline addive it functions an an octane booster. High performance indy cars run on pure ethanol. What I'm trying to say here is that given all this shouldn't ethanol in a car tuned for it significantly improve performance, especially in a turbo car like an LGT? It also burns hotter=more heat in the turbo=more power. Expert opinions on this? ...sporting the hottest Legacy on the westside of my block:icon_bigg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Irrational Exuberance Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 It's kind of ironic that CA would have so few E85 pumps considering all the government CARB nazis and their nonsensical emissions regulations. whats really funny is that for all the saved carbon emissions on e85, producing it generates so much dam methane (which is either released or burned) that its not really gona do shit about global warming. it will reduce dependance on foreign oil tho, which is nice. indy is running 80% ethanol this year (or is it next season?) to prove it can work as a "performance fuel"... all i want to know is where the hell is my deisel hybrid! oh, and in case anyone hadnt heard... 3rd gen Prius supposedly gets 92mpg @55mph. "i like my women the way i like terrorists... ...screaming gods name and ready to explode." http://img255.imageshack.us/img255/5479/troy3nu5.jpg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RabidMonk Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 That's not true at all^^^^ E85 has less energy than straight gasoline. To get the same power you have to burn more E85. The higher octane doesn't mean more power either. You can up boost and/or compression a buttload and get a bigger punch out of the E85, but regular gas gets the same punch on less compression/boost I'm not sure why you disagree when our two posts seem to agree. If an engine is tuned for E85 (higher compression), E85 provides more energy than you can get out of pure gasoline. That equates to more power and better mileage. However, once you do so you can no longer safely burn pure gasoline in the engine as the engine would detonate itself to death. However, if you burn E85 in an engine that is tuned for gasoline (all of today's flex-fuel E85 engines), the E85 produces substantially less energy (~40% less per gallon) so you lose power and burn much more fuel. Again, I think we are saying the same thing. E85 could be more efficient and provide more power than gasoline, but only if you sacrifice the engine's ability to burn conventional gas. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
praedet Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 There is a new Turbo'ed Saab that senses E85. When running E85 it gets better gas mileage and more power/torque. This is due to the adv timing and higher boost it is able to run... Ted Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deer Killer Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 1 gallon ethanol 84,400 BTU's 1 gallon gasoline 125,000 BTU's Yes gas has nearly 50% more energy per unit volume than ethanol. Maybe you can run ethanol more efficiently than gas if you tune for it, but 50%? Actually this is more of a problem system-wide than for cars. If it takes more energy to make on gallon of ethanol than one gallon of ethanol contains, you are actually losing energy. Let's not even consider other problems like emissions, etc. The only way for ethanol to be viable in the marketplace is for a goverment hand-out, like what they've done. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
petmor Posted May 22, 2006 Share Posted May 22, 2006 we could have 105 to 110 ... like they do in europe ... if people were willing to pay for it .... i thing want 98 is regular in germany idk lol Please tell me where we can get 105 to 110 octane. It's just not there Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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