ethanol, or no?

[Jakegday]

hello all. where i live, there are in general 3 kinds of gas. 87 octane. 89 octane with 10% ethanol. and 91-92 octane. out of the 3, the 89 with ethanol is ALWAYS the cheapest, followed by the 87, then 91-92. i always buy the cheapest, which contains 10% ethanol. a friend of mine told me that thats bad i should avoid ethanol whenever possible. although he couldnt really explain why, i couldnt explain why not.

so i am wondering, should i start going for the 100% gas, or is 10% ethanol meaningless?? this is for my 01 grand prix fwiw....

 

[beast3300]

Ethanol's stoich is much lower than gasoline. With E10 blends it will lower the overall stoich of the gasoline and ususally lowers fuel economy.

If you can get 100% gas that would be ideal. Not that it matters to most but, in my area only Shell doesn't have ethanol in it. I use Shell in everything including the lawnmower.

 

[beast3300]

Too bad you didn't live closer. I have a tuner that we could tweak your PCM with. I boosted cruise timing on both my W-bodies for alittle better fuel economy.

 

[Nick R]

Originally Posted By: beast3300
Too bad you didn't live closer. I have a tuner that we could tweak your PCM with. I boosted cruise timing on both my W-bodies for alittle better fuel economy.


Dude, can you do that with J-bodies too?

 

[beast3300]

Originally Posted By: rudolphna
Originally Posted By: beast3300
Too bad you didn't live closer. I have a tuner that we could tweak your PCM with. I boosted cruise timing on both my W-bodies for alittle better fuel economy.


Dude, can you do that with J-bodies too?


Unfortunetly not, my tuner is made by DHP (Digital Horsepower). They are gone now. They started with 3800s in W-bodies as their speciality.

DHP when they were still around could do 3100s, 3400s and 3800s. They never got into J bodies. HP Tuner is the only one currently that can do a vast majority of GM's, some Fords.

Another interesting note is DHP didn't get into LSx cars. You have to use HP Tuners (or a few other copycat ones out.)

 

[L_Sludger]

Ethanol is bad for your fuel economy and doesn't do your fuel system or motor any favors whatsoever. If you can get straight gas, go for it.

 

[willix]

Ethanol is a bad deal unless you are a farmer. Its bad for cars, food prices, fuel mileage, the air we breath, and the economy. Good for ethanol farmers though.

 

[Virtuoso]

As long as E10 is 3% cheaper than regular (it usually is around here), I don't mind running it. Modern fuel systems are designed to handle it.

I do wonder if the average fuel pump will last longer pumping regular gas it's whole life, though.

 

[CROWNVIC4LIFE]

My gas mileage dropped at least 1.5 mpg with the 10% corn juice...I can only imagine what will happen if they go to 15 or 20%.

 

[rpn453]

How much cheaper is the ethanol blend? It would have to be at least 5% cheaper for me to consider it.

I was buying non-ethanol 91 for a short time when it was only 6 cents per liter more (about 6%) a couple years ago, just to avoid the ethanol. But now it's 10 cents per liter more, so I buy the 10%-ethanol 87.

 

[mechtech2]

Your first consideration is to use enough octane so that the engine doesn't spark knock.
If it is 87, great.
If it is 91, great.
Next, if you have a choice, use pure gasoline. More power and gas economy.