87 Octane Ethanol free vs 89 with Ethanol

[Burla]

People say moving from the different summer/winter blends is a decrease in mileage and that is less btu difference.

 

[tidefan1967]

Never messed with it on my truck but my wife’s Lexus IS350 gets 347 miles on a full tank (according to the onboard computer) on regular 87 octane w/ethanol, but gets 421miles on 91 octane ethanol free.

The increase in fuel economy can probably attributed to the higher octane as much as to the lack of ethanol in the 91E0. I don't think I've ever seen a Lexus where 91 wasn't the recommended octane. We have 88 E15 here for .05 less a gallon than E10 87. I've bought it a couple of times and couldn't tell any difference in the fuel economy between it and 89 E10.

 

[rvance]

btu on various fuels

gas 114,000
e10 111,800
e85 81,000

No the engines aren't the same on various fuels, as everyone with flex fuel vehicles know, the gas mileage is way way less. here is edmunds test. Trucks that get 18 mpg on gas, get 12 mpg on e85, and the other tests similar results. Maybe e85 should be the future, but let's not tell tall stories about it. I'm not big on subsidies, but maybe farming (especially meat production) and e85 should be subsidized these days.

My truck got exactly the same mileage on E85 as it did on regular. I am not lying or telling a tall tale. I know that it should not be, but it was. I was as surprised as anyone.

 

[Burla]

I just leave it to people to research the info by themselves rather to delve into this any further. Follow science as always would be my suggestion.

 

[SunDevilJeeper]

Incidentally even pure petroleum (and e10) fuel in Arizona has two separate blends based on the geographic latitude at which they're sold, since the Northern half of Arizona has a higher average elevation than the Southern half of Arizona. This is also done to keep evaporative emissions below established standards and reduce incidence of vapor lock on older carburated vehicles with a draw type fuel system.

CBG is used for Maricopa County, possibly around Tucson as well, conventional is used everywhere else in the state. The EPA and ADEQ will have a damn conniption if you drop conventional at a gas station in Maricopa County as well, so it's a big deal and a very expensive mistake when it happens.

CBG is oxygenated and what not for what you said, and to reduce tailpipe emissions. As to whether or not it actually reduces emissions, not many of us tanker drivers truly know because not many of us give a flying ****.

I have a document on my phone that I downloaded from a county website stating what CBG is, why it's mandated in MC, and what it's supposed to do. Also gives figures for fuel consumption in the county. As of 2014 we were consuming around 4.5 million gallons of gasoline a day in the valley according to the document.

 

[kurek]

As of 2014 we were consuming around 4.5 million gallons of gasoline a day in the valley according to the document.

That leads to some fun correlations, 4.5 million gallons of gasoline (ignoring diesel?) contain a little over half a trillion BTU's so spread across the roughly 15000 square miles the Phoenix metro area covers that's around 35 million BTU's per square mile per day of heat or around 1.5 million BTU's per hour per square mile. A normal 1500 watt space heater converts around 5100 BTU's per hour so that's the heat equivalent of around 280-300 space heaters per square mile distributed evenly throughout the city and operating continuously, or equivalent to if you placed half a billion such space heaters in a grid roughly every 300 feet across an area as large as Switzerland and just left 'em running.

 

[Rug_Trucker]

I'll dump what I may or may not know into this conversation. Dad had a 2001-ish Blazer. It ate fuel pumps. Mechanic who I went through automotive classes with in college told him that pump didn't like ethanol blends as it lacked the lubricity of non-ethanol. So living in Oklahoma he could buy the good stuff at Love's. Right now my daily drivers are GM. I dump 2oz per 5gallons of Marvel Mystery oil into the tank. I have non-ethanol available down the street. I buy it for my weedeaters, and my Husqvarna 21hp Kohler. The E10 makes then run leaner and will in time damage the engines. It will eat the fuel lines from the inside. The gas cap has a "no E10" emblem on it.

I used to run Citgo ethanol blended premium in my 1981 2.2 Dodge Charger. The vapor lock was such a problem that it go to dying going down the interstate. The factory Holley didn't like it at all. I read a FSB at the dealer and they said, "no ethanol blends!" For a while I was carrying a bottle of rubbing alcohol to dump into the carb to start it when it didn't have enough time to cool. (yes I know it has water in it)

1993 Toyota Corolla. 1.8lt. 11.75:1 compression. Factory manual said 87 octane is fine no need for higher octane due to the design of then engine. E10 was okay, don't go to E15 or beyond. I did some testing with it. Ran E10 87, E10 93, 87 straight gas which came from the Marathon bulk plant. It was sold "non-branded" at the local convenience store so I'm not sure what additives were in it. I ran the non-ethanol 93 too. I got better mileage going up in octane, and going non-ethanol. Figuring the cost per mile for fuel at that time no matter what I ran it figured out to $.08 per mile in fuel costs. Now that is a "primitive" EFI and computer system VS the newer stuff. It still had a distributor

My daily drivers are Buicks. '97 Lesabre, and a '05 Lesabre. Both 3.8's. The '05 gets 2-4mpg more with real gas according to the in dash display and it runs pretty true to the calculator/odometer. I run the Marvel Mystery oil in them. I have the repair bills for the '97 and saw a bill for fuel pump replacement before 100K. I got the '05 from dad at 82K on the clicker. It is at 198K and still has the factory pump. The MMO lubes the top ring on the pistons, and lubes the injectors. Supposedly keeps them clean too.

Your E85 Flex fuel vehicles have different components in the fuel systems for the alcohol amounts. The pumps are different. I have heard (no scientific proof) that E85 vehicles get worse mileage on E10 than non-flex. I don't know any with a flex car or truck.

I was a fuel hauler for a short stint. E10 eats the O-rings we used with the delivery hoses. The black O-rings were that way. We had green colored ones that lasted longer. The polycarbonate "sight glass" on the loading heads would yellow, crack and leak. We always had to replace them. On a humid day the in ground storage tanks needed to be capped of quickly so as to not suck water out of the air. Ethanol and water will combine and sink to the bottom of the tank. Ethanol fuel is actually heavier than non. When the water and E sink to the bottom of the tank you can be left with 76-78 sub octane gas on the top. AFAIK all gasoline is 78 octane or so before they dump additives and ethanol into it.

Anything you have that is carbureted needs to have the rubber hoses replaced with fuel injection hoses with the proper clamps. Ethanol eats them from the inside.The diaphragm in your fuel pump(?) Keep an eye on it. Never use plastic see through fuel filters! It will crack them.

I have a 72 Duster I am going to bring back on the road some day. I may go EFI.

 

[Rug_Trucker]

People say moving from the different summer/winter blends is a decrease in mileage and that is less btu difference.

As a former fuel hauler.......yes, you heard right. In the Nashville area E10 gas in the summer was called 7.8lb gas. In the winter it was switched to 9lb which is better for mileage. Outside Nashville and the surrounding counties 9lb is the norm. A year or 2 ago they quit selling 7.8 in the summer and it is all 9lb now.

I saw a map at a bulk plant that had all the fuel type listings for the SE. Metro Atlanta IIRC was 7.2 or 7.4. Swill...............

 

[Burla]

I'll dump what I may or may not know into this conversation. Dad had a 2001-ish Blazer. It ate fuel pumps. Mechanic who I went through automotive classes with in college told him that pump didn't like ethanol blends as it lacked the lubricity of non-ethanol. So living in Oklahoma he could buy the good stuff at Love's. Right now my daily drivers are GM. I dump 2oz per 5gallons of Marvel Mystery oil into the tank. I have non-ethanol available down the street. I buy it for my weedeaters, and my Husqvarna 21hp Kohler. The E10 makes then run leaner and will in time damage the engines. It will eat the fuel lines from the inside. The gas cap has a "no E10" emblem on it.

I used to run Citgo ethanol blended premium in my 1981 2.2 Dodge Charger. The vapor lock was such a problem that it go to dying going down the interstate. The factory Holley didn't like it at all. I read a FSB at the dealer and they said, "no ethanol blends!" For a while I was carrying a bottle of rubbing alcohol to dump into the carb to start it when it didn't have enough time to cool. (yes I know it has water in it)

1993 Toyota Corolla. 1.8lt. 11.75:1 compression. Factory manual said 87 octane is fine no need for higher octane due to the design of then engine. E10 was okay, don't go to E15 or beyond. I did some testing with it. Ran E10 87, E10 93, 87 straight gas which came from the Marathon bulk plant. It was sold "non-branded" at the local convenience store so I'm not sure what additives were in it. I ran the non-ethanol 93 too. I got better mileage going up in octane, and going non-ethanol. Figuring the cost per mile for fuel at that time no matter what I ran it figured out to $.08 per mile in fuel costs. Now that is a "primitive" EFI and computer system VS the newer stuff. It still had a distributor

My daily drivers are Buicks. '97 Lesabre, and a '05 Lesabre. Both 3.8's. The '05 gets 2-4mpg more with real gas according to the in dash display and it runs pretty true to the calculator/odometer. I run the Marvel Mystery oil in them. I have the repair bills for the '97 and saw a bill for fuel pump replacement before 100K. I got the '05 from dad at 82K on the clicker. It is at 198K and still has the factory pump. The MMO lubes the top ring on the pistons, and lubes the injectors. Supposedly keeps them clean too.

Your E85 Flex fuel vehicles have different components in the fuel systems for the alcohol amounts. The pumps are different. I have heard (no scientific proof) that E85 vehicles get worse mileage on E10 than non-flex. I don't know any with a flex car or truck.

I was a fuel hauler for a short stint. E10 eats the O-rings we used with the delivery hoses. The black O-rings were that way. We had green colored ones that lasted longer. The polycarbonate "sight glass" on the loading heads would yellow, crack and leak. We always had to replace them. On a humid day the in ground storage tanks needed to be capped of quickly so as to not suck water out of the air. Ethanol and water will combine and sink to the bottom of the tank. Ethanol fuel is actually heavier than non. When the water and E sink to the bottom of the tank you can be left with 76-78 sub octane gas on the top. AFAIK all gasoline is 78 octane or so before they dump additives and ethanol into it.

Anything you have that is carbureted needs to have the rubber hoses replaced with fuel injection hoses with the proper clamps. Ethanol eats them from the inside.The diaphragm in your fuel pump(?) Keep an eye on it. Never use plastic see through fuel filters! It will crack them.

I have a 72 Duster I am going to bring back on the road some day. I may go EFI.

I love the run e10 it is ok but whatever you do don't run e15 because it will cause damage. How can the gov't convince me there is absolutely no problem with e10 because it has less of the product that at a slightly higher % causes damage. Maybe our choice is being made for us, maybe it does cause long term damage but our gov't deems that acceptable rate of decline. Maybe we all should be running UCL.s, lucas gallon ucl is fairly cheap and would likely last years, 25 bucks a gallon.

I'd use redline si-1 for cleaning maybe twice a year, but for every tank use maybe something like this will help general lubricity.

 

[Mikes578514]

More Octane than necessary is a waste of money, it blows dollar bills out the exhaust pipe. Ethanol is designed to “lower emissions” but causes other issues such as reduced mileage due to a lower heat (BTU content) than straight gasoline.

a couple of anecdotes about my experiences with E-10 otherwise known as gasohol.

1. In the mid 1970s when ethanol was first introduced into the petroleum marketplace what the general public didn’t know was how much water (hygroscopic) alcohol would absorb. I purchased gasohol from the first tank a gas station had and it was the middle of winter. The water it picked up from the underground tanks froze in my automobiles fuel pump causing it to burst and need replacement.

2. when I was teaching people how to ride motorcycles we had a fleet of approximately 250 125-250cc motorcycles. We had to run staybil or some other stabilizer in the fuel and run the carbs dry because if the bikes sat more than a week between classes we could count on 3 or 4 not starting at the beginning of the next class

Mike

The only Ethanol free fuel that I have access to is 87 octane. Is it better to run 87 octane Ethanol free than 89 octane with ethanol?

 

[Ocelot]

The v6 is the only engine in the trucks thats E85 Compatible

My 2011 4.7 is E-85 Flex Fuel. I have the Flex Fuel badge and the yellow fuel cap. I wonder what is different as far as engine parts that makes it a flex fuel and/or if those parts are better or worse for general longevity with regular E-10 or E-15.

 

[tom martley]

The only Ethanol free fuel that I have access to is 87 octane. Is it better to run 87 octane Ethanol free than 89 octane with ethanol?

 

[tom martley]

My 2019 1500 5.7 gets about 2 miles a gallon better with 89. However, it does cost a bit more. Suggest dividing your mileage into cost per gallon on the 87 octane and see what your per mileage cost is. Do the same on the 89 octane and then you will know what to do. My owner's book recommends 89. I use 89 and get 1.5 to 2 mpg better. But, since it costs more, I only save a few cents to the good on the 89, and, it should run a little better.

 

[Rug_Trucker]

Ex#1 bought a 2001 4.3 Silverado. They had to re-flash the computer. It pinged on 87. Took it in and the service manager showed me either in a TSB, or owner manual that it was fine to run 87 and to expect pinging. She ran 89 with no ping. He claimed it wouldn't hurt the engine. "I used to build top fuel motors that pinged, it didn't hurt them!" Ummm...........yeah right.

 

[Bigskyroadglide]

My 11 5.7 with 3.55s runs the 91 tune no MDS from Diablo.

I run 91 non ethanol gas and get 18.6 routinely per tank with a mix of City and freeway driving.

100% freeway I typically see low 20s and have seen a 23 on occasion.

This is avg speed of about 85 on freeway.

My truck has 137k.

I don't think the mileage per gallon will get much better.

I average driving approximately 600 miles per week.

I'm just monitoring going forward.

 

[Brandon-w]

My 2011 4.7 is E-85 Flex Fuel. I have the Flex Fuel badge and the yellow fuel cap. I wonder what is different as far as engine parts that makes it a flex fuel and/or if those parts are better or worse for general longevity with regular E-10 or E-15.

Parts include: e-85 compatable injectors, E85 o rings on injectors and all fuel connections, a larger fuel pump as it will require alot more volume, plastic fuel lines ethanol and non coated steel don't get along. Possibly a sensor in the tanks or lines that can detect which fuel is being used depending on mfgr And an ecm/pcm flash for the correct fuel injection rate, timing and ignition curve.

 

[SunDevilJeeper]

That leads to some fun correlations, 4.5 million gallons of gasoline (ignoring diesel?) contain a little over half a trillion BTU's so spread across the roughly 15000 square miles the Phoenix metro area covers that's around 35 million BTU's per square mile per day of heat or around 1.5 million BTU's per hour per square mile. A normal 1500 watt space heater converts around 5100 BTU's per hour so that's the heat equivalent of around 280-300 space heaters per square mile distributed evenly throughout the city and operating continuously, or equivalent to if you placed half a billion such space heaters in a grid roughly every 300 feet across an area as large as Switzerland and just left 'em running.

Kinda puts things into perspective, doesn't it?

I'm a die hard gearhead to the point that I made hauling the energy source for my passion my line of work, but even I'll say that at some point, we're going to have to move on to the next step in advancing civilization, which is pretty much leaving crude oil in the ground.

Of course that ain't happening anytime soon, and most people that are demanding clean energy now don't realize just how much money will have to be spent restructuring the entire planet to meet the energy demands of electric vehicles once they reach the scale we're at now with the internal combustion engine. All I hear are demands for moving the entire human race to clean energy, yet I'm still not hearing any good solutions for moving 8 billion people to a system that isn't going to have a negative impact in some other way. 8 billion people consume a lot of resources and create a lot of waste.

Meanwhile, those of us here in the valley of the sun will continue to be really tan, eating tacos de carne, and enjoying the cruise on central every year.

 

[RAM08110719]

Hi. I'm new here. I have a 2008 ram 1500 with E85. After reading the above. I'm glad I have that engine. I got it used in november. In my name is the date I got it. E85 is really nice in it. When it's not cold. I read the warning about it grabbing water. So it got cold. I tried regular. Not good. Acceleration on the 4.7L V8 was just not there. So next tank I tried the middle stuff. Still the pep was not in its step. I bit my tongue and put premium in. Then it ran like E85 was in it. Thought. Well that's not affordable. My concern is how it performs not MPG. So my last experiment worked. I got cheap octane boost and put regular 87 in. I got what the tank of premium did. The E85 stations are few and far between. So winter mix now is the regular with a bottle of octane booster. I thought the engine might be dirty. New to me old truck. So I put some engine cleaner in that I use that is also a lubricant. It didnt like it at first. That's Lucas cleaner. Then after a drive everything got back to normal. I think it needed it. All around the engine does great. It just needs more octane. With my driving being almost all highway. I live in corn ville. So its rural and the highway connects everything. If their is a rise in ethanol coming. I'm glad I got this engine. In the nicer weather the savings on E85 makes it well worth it. I did a MPG on E85. I got 18 MPG. That's with enjoying my first big truck with a big engine. So I think it could go up. Unless it likes to race. Past I had SUVs. I know never again. This truck is a lot better. I think this is the right section because of ethanol talk.

 

[Rug_Trucker]

Hi. I'm new here. I have a 2008 ram 1500 with E85. After reading the above. I'm glad I have that engine. I got it used in november. In my name is the date I got it. E85 is really nice in it. When it's not cold. I read the warning about it grabbing water. So it got cold. I tried regular. Not good. Acceleration on the 4.7L V8 was just not there. So next tank I tried the middle stuff. Still the pep was not in its step. I bit my tongue and put premium in. Then it ran like E85 was in it. Thought. Well that's not affordable. My concern is how it performs not MPG. So my last experiment worked. I got cheap octane boost and put regular 87 in. I got what the tank of premium did. The E85 stations are few and far between. So winter mix now is the regular with a bottle of octane booster. I thought the engine might be dirty. New to me old truck. So I put some engine cleaner in that I use that is also a lubricant. It didnt like it at first. That's Lucas cleaner. Then after a drive everything got back to normal. I think it needed it. All around the engine does great. It just needs more octane. With my driving being almost all highway. I live in corn ville. So its rural and the highway connects everything. If their is a rise in ethanol coming. I'm glad I got this engine. In the nicer weather the savings on E85 makes it well worth it. I did a MPG on E85. I got 18 MPG. That's with enjoying my first big truck with a big engine. So I think it could go up. Unless it likes to race. Past I had SUVs. I know never again. This truck is a lot better. I think this is the right section because of ethanol talk.

I have a friend on the Moparts forum that built a 318 with a carb and built it with E85 as a steady diet in a '69 Barracuda. Running a 273 2bbl cam, 850 Thermoquad, Magnum heads, lots of compression, headers full length exhaust with no mufflers. He was a mad scientist. 29-31mpg with 2:73 gears. I lost track of him when he moved from TN to MT.

 

[Ed F]

Just for an FYI...non ethanol 87 is 60 cents more a gallon than ethanol 87 here in SC.
I know it was 50 years ago but I worked in a number of high volume Hess stations that got tankers in quite frequently. If the truck had too much regular to go in the tanks the hose was switched over to the premium tank because the rig had to go back empty. I still think of this occasionally when I grab the nozzle and wonder what I’m really pumping. This also happened at a Sunoco station I worked. The ‘260’ tank would get some regular dumped in it now and then. Not to the extent of Hess but it happened.