Anyone playing around with E85 in a turbo motor?

[ComputerJLT]

Just curious; I just moved here from west texas and we dont have E85 there. I plan on running it solely in my civic when I get it up here. 105+ octane fuel for about the same price or less than regular unleaded is fine in my book :)
My friend dan is putting the finishing touches on his integra and we'll playing with some E85 in it; I've already figured out what to change in crome pro (software I use to tune) and recalibrated the display on my wideband. I also have a few more guys up here that want to play with E85.
Anyone else discovered this great fuel?


Anyway my civic when I get it up here will have a stock sleve/crank b18a1; gsr girdle; eagle rods; 11 or 12:1 SRP pistons mildly ported LS head; cams; obx lsd'd LS trans; home made mounts; home made top mount manifold; my old turbo off my built d16z6 a t3/t04e 57 trim compressor; etc etc etc. I have 90% of the parts I just need to make the mounts; get the trans put together; get the car up here; get the machine work on the block done (bore/hone/balance); assemble the motor and drop it in. Should be about 3 months away i'm hoping.

[john]

I've been doing some e85 research, and have an audi pal in Chicago who has been playing with blending e85 w/93 octane.

I topped my tank of 91 octane with 3 gallons if e85 last week. There should be enough flexibility in the ECU & its fuel trims to handle the blend. I anticipate MPG dropping between 1-3 mpg, but I expect that the motor is running cleaner, and in a perfect world ready to make more power.

There's a somewhat local guy (in Golden, I believe) who is really into e85 - he swapped some 440 injectors into his otherwise stock scooby impreza RS, non-turbo. Even though it's not turbo, he's done his homework and is seemingly in the know regarding e85. Here is a link to his website (http://www.gt-labs.net/).

And here is a link (http://www.highaltitudeimports.com/showthread.php?p=543545#post543545) to his latest update, here on HAI. The thing that grabbed my attention is that stioch for e85 is around 9.0:1 vs 14.7:1 for gasoline. So while the price per gallon may be less, and the octane rating is somewhere between 105 and 110, fuel consumption goes way up.

For me the bottom line is that it's renewable, pretty damned high octane, and if I had my car built like I hope to (some day), I could have enough injector capacity for an E85 map in my UTEC.

[2fastNturn]

I ran e-85 for a couple tanks. I had to add about 20% more fuel to run the same a/f. Worked good, but there are no stations close to my home.


These are dsm sites, but it still works the same for every car.
http://www.rmdsm.org/forums/showthread.php?t=6052
http://www.dsmtuners.com/forums/showthread.php?t=168760&highlight=e85

[HONDA GHANDI]

Im working on a project vehicle to run E only but it is still a few months out.

[kevino002]

Me and Jeremy (Servion)were talking about e85 this weekend at the dyno, I am going to be using it, I just need to get some new injectors, I have 880cc now, but I want to go with 1000cc. I will be tunning for it here really soon. Like you said high octane gas for cheaper then regular gas, FTW in my book.

[servion]

I have tuned a handful of cars recently on e85 (using both NepTune and AEM EMS) and its a great fuel. As long as you can handle the higher fuel consumption, its great! You make more power at the same boost levels because it burns cooler.

[Brian]

Has anyone done any cost comparisons taking into consideration the price of fuel versus the increased consumption? I'm told that my vette has E85 fuel and timing tables in the ecu already.

[ComputerJLT]

Has anyone done any cost comparisons taking into consideration the price of fuel versus the increased consumption? I'm told that my vette has E85 fuel and timing tables in the ecu already.


retrofitting a low compression motor you'll lose a lot of gas milleage.

BUT

if you build around the fuel like i am and go high compression plus boost then you wont loose much you may even gain some. Otherwise all you can do when you go to e85 is increase the timing a shitload and run it so lean you barely make enough power to suppor the vehicle under cruise. E85 can run a much wider band of AFRs and be safe compared to gas; it burns so cool that under cruise conditions a super lean mix won't melt pistons. So leaning it out and adding a lot of timing will get you back some fuel milleage.
Ford has their FFV's running within a few % fuel economy on e85 and gas while e makes about 5-10% more power. If ford of all oe's can do it you know its possible.

/edit: And I didnt think gm made a flex fuel vette.
Most of the oe fffv's have a sensor in the fuel line that detects the % of alcohol in the mix and add's fuel/timing to compensate. there really isn't any seperate maps; just a % enrichment. Back when dodge played around with M85 flex fuel (nasty stuff btw) people disected the code in the computers there and just found that the maps were scaled for bigger injectors and the flex fuel sensor just added a certain % of enrichment.

[Brian]

They don't make a flex fuel vette, but word on the corvette forums is that there are maps specifically for it in the ecu. I have no idea and haven't been able to confirm much. If I run it it will likely be when the car is turbocharged so I can take advantage of the higher octane rating. Should make the setup a bit safer.

[ComputerJLT]

I've been doing some e85 research, and have an audi pal in Chicago who has been playing with blending e85 w/93 octane.

I topped my tank of 91 octane with 3 gallons if e85 last week. There should be enough flexibility in the ECU & its fuel trims to handle the blend. I anticipate MPG dropping between 1-3 mpg, but I expect that the motor is running cleaner, and in a perfect world ready to make more power.

There's a somewhat local guy (in Golden, I believe) who is really into e85 - he swapped some 440 injectors into his otherwise stock scooby impreza RS, non-turbo. Even though it's not turbo, he's done his homework and is seemingly in the know regarding e85. Here is a link to his website (http://www.gt-labs.net/).

And here is a link (http://www.highaltitudeimports.com/showthread.php?p=543545#post543545) to his latest update, here on HAI. The thing that grabbed my attention is that stioch for e85 is around 9.0:1 vs 14.7:1 for gasoline. So while the price per gallon may be less, and the octane rating is somewhere between 105 and 110, fuel consumption goes way up.

For me the bottom line is that it's renewable, pretty damned high octane, and if I had my car built like I hope to (some day), I could have enough injector capacity for an E85 map in my UTEC.


wierd i searched for e85 and that thread didnt show up.
Its kinda pointless running that fuel in that car; low compression and all. whatever i guess. tell him to throw a turbo on it.

And like i just said ethanol can run a wide range of afrs; you dont have to run it 9:1 stoich (1.00 lambda) you can run it much leaner and still make power but w/ less fuel consumption.

And to address everyone's bitchyness about ethanol being corrosive: it's not HARDLY as corrosive as Methanol and EVERY car sold in the US since 1988 has had to comply with at least 10% ethanol mix. and to comply with that a lot of the sensitive fuel system components were replaced. MOST guys running e85 do so on stock fuel systems with no problems. however since you do have to run more a bigger fuel system will be in order only because of the quantity of fuel required not the type of fuel itself. Methanol on the other hand would need practically every part along the way replaced.
Also the gasoline mixed in with the ethanol helps protect a lot of the metal in the fuel system. Gas creates a protective film over aluminum that keeps it from reacting to a lot of nasties in the environment; same goes with e85 though its slightly diluted.

[ComputerJLT]

They don't make a flex fuel vette, but word on the corvette forums is that there are maps specifically for it in the ecu. I have no idea and haven't been able to confirm much. If I run it it will likely be when the car is turbocharged so I can take advantage of the higher octane rating. Should make the setup a bit safer.


wierd; either way you wont gain anything from going E85; only time youd gain is a high output turbo; super high compresion na or supercharger

[Prelude97]

Does anyone know if anyone has tried using e85 on a motorcycle?