1. E85 will NOT necessarily eat through aluminum, only certain alloys and other certain un-anodized.
2. E85 will generally NOT destroy rubber seals and hoses on vehicles built after 1988...obviously if your vehicle is very old, and the rubber is degraded, the E85 may worsen the problem.
3. Not all vehicles experience a 20-25% drop in FE, some may only drop 10-15% in FE. It all depends on the vehicle, native compression, timing, and fuel management software.
4. Almost any vehicle with an O2 sensor built after 1988 can handle upto 50-60% ethanol without any issues such as burning too lean. Though the optimal fuel/air ratio is different for ethanol and gasoline, the O2 sensor senses lambda not the air/fuel ratio...so when ethanol is burned it will naturally burn richer to keep the optimal fuel/air ratio.
5. Advancing the ignition does little to help FE or power on an E85 vehicle. Though the octane is 105, and the engine will not knock even with significant ignition advance, the nature of the fuel does not provide for noticeable increase in FE or power. Higher compression, however, can give noticeable increase in power and FE. So mill the heads and call it good.
6. I have a '94 Acura Vigor with ~202k miles on it. Threw in larger injectors and it runs fine on 100% gasoline, 100% E85 or anything inbetween. No check engine lights, stumbling, fouled plugs or anything of the sort. No issues with seals, lines, or other leaks or part degradation. The oil even looks cleaner after 5k miles than normal because the ethanol burns cleaner. I have been running well over 5k miles on E85.
My mileage has dropped about 17-18% compared to gasoline, but E85 is 19-20% cheaper here, so I'm ahead.
As a note, before installing larger injectors, I was able to run about 60% ethanol without any issues...~65% and you would notice stumbling once in a while and a check engine light would pop once a week for a "lean condition".
Remember, a lot of the "scare" you hear about ethanol is from back in the 70's when methanol was added to the gasoline in the last gas crunch. Methanol is much more corrosive than ethanol, plus the fuel lines and seals back then were not made to handle any level of alcohol in the fuel. Ethanol is a much milder alcohol, and like I said previously, most cars built after 1988 have federally mandated fuel lines and seals able to with-stand alcohol.
Quote:
Originally Posted by red91sit
One more thing to keep in mind, Ethanol and aluminum do not get along, and you should consider changing fuel filters after your first tank or two of e-85, as it's a very good fuel system cleaner, it will quickly gunk up the filters.
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