Running e85?

I've used only E85 in all my gas vehicles for the past 6 years since it is 2 to 3x cheaper than gas here. A common practice is to replace the fuel filter one or two times during the first few thousand miles as the amount of crud removed from the fuel tank can be significant on older cars. Problems always have to do with poor ECU tunes or some stock ECUs not being able to ad enough fuel on non flexfuel/non converted cars. I've always wanted to know if valves/valve seats, cylinder liners, rings etc would wear out sooner but with the amount of high mileage cars running the stuff around me, and with non car people not doing anything different than they would with gas (OCI length, warm up time etc), i think it makes zero difference. Ethanol can attract water but on the other hand it produces almost no carbon deposits at all. About oil : I would run shorter OCIs than i would with gas if i did short trips but honestly, the only difference i ever noticed is that the only takes way longer to turn black, so who knows, maybe you can extend it with a good SN oil. There's a video somewhere on youtube where a guy from Blackstone explains that using E85 can in some cases result in a small drop in viscosity. I tend to avoid 5w30 and use a Xw40 now just to be extra safe.
 
I know that Toyota says to change the oil every 2.5k if E85 Is used instead of 5k on their FFV but is there any other manufacturer saying you have to shorten OCI with E85?
 
Most just run one step up higher weight oil if using a lot of e85 and change oil a bit more often. If you are using up to e40 or less you can use same oil with shorter OCI unless you are tracking or have a modified vehicle.
hey so i have been wondering if using a group V oil like a redline, with an ester/pao base stock, should one be worried about fuel dilution runing e85? and is there a difference in running straight e85 versus an e blend like the aforementioned e40? i run e40 in my fiesta st, but some of my friends running straight e85 in their rb26's have been asking me if they should stay away from oils like redline and stick to group IV oils, without ester....
 
hey so i have been wondering if using a group V oil like a redline, with an ester/pao base stock, should one be worried about fuel dilution runing e85? and is there a difference in running straight e85 versus an e blend like the aforementioned e40? i run e40 in my fiesta st, but some of my friends running straight e85 in their rb26's have been asking me if they should stay away from oils like redline and stick to group IV oils, without ester....
Yes from what I have heard the esters should be avoided with e85 but PAO is fine or any PAO/NON-ESTER oil and Group IV. I'm lucky I have a PAO/AN oil available in Australia. Motul have preferred e85 oils as well if you can contact them.

But in saying all that there are people that have run the ester oils with e85 with no apparent issues, they just change to short OCI's. If you want to leave it in there for awhile go up one weight and use a oil without any esters would be my 2c.
 
Yes from what I have heard the esters should be avoided with e85 but PAO is fine or any PAO/NON-ESTER oil and Group IV. I'm lucky I have a PAO/AN oil available in Australia. Motul have preferred e85 oils as well if you can contact them.

But in saying all that there are people that have run the ester oils with e85 with no apparent issues, they just change to short OCI's. If you want to leave it in there for awhile go up one weight and use a oil without any esters would be my 2c.
ill look into the e85-specific motul oil, didnt know they carried one-thats awesome. ill be switching my fuel from e40 to regular 92e10 here shortly when i go big turbo, so i wont have to worry as much as i do now with the effects ethanol has on oil degradation. but as it stands now i have amsoil ss 530 (ford recc's 0w20) with about 8,000 miles on it lol. trying to hold off until i do my swap, and have to change oil twice..

im halfway through your linked chemistry website test, great read. thanks
 
on my 2007 F150 5.4 3V Flex Fuel the Owner's Manual warned (as yours does) about filling with non E-85 at least once between oil changes and to change the oil more often...I noticed perhaps a slight bump in engine power (but nothing to continue using E-85 in my case) and more than a 10% drop in fuel economy...

in my area of ChicagoLand the price of E-85 rarely made it worth the loss in fuel economy over buying regular 87 octane fuel...

good luck with your choice

Bill
 
Used to drive an E 85 fueled 3.5 liter 2017 Taurus ( US Gov. GSA fleet vehicle) just about daily with mostly short trips (20 miles or so one way).
Average mileage according to on board monitor was around 16 mpg. I often wondered what mpg would have been running on E 10.
 
Used to drive an E 85 fueled 3.5 liter 2017 Taurus ( US Gov. GSA fleet vehicle) just about daily with mostly short trips (20 miles or so one way).
Average mileage according to on board monitor was around 16 mpg. I often wondered what mpg would have been running on E 10.
Around 21 to 25mpg. I've had it close to 30mpg once with all highway.
 
That Amsoil SS 5w-30 should be fine to 15,000 miles with e85 Amsoil says. Motul has this one which is similar and in the technical sheet is approved for ethanol fuels but the Amsoil is very good as well.

https://www.motul.com/au/en/products/8100-eco-nergy-5w30

@subzerospeed
Actually that is severe service long drain interval. It says its not suitable for any long drain intervals if using e85. So you are probably ready for a change. I always change at 5k in modified or e85 use.
 
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@subzerospeed
Actually that is severe service long drain interval. It says its not suitable for any long drain intervals if using e85. So you are probably ready for a change. I always change at 5k in modified or e85 use.
yeah im going to change it within 100 miles when i swap my turbos over this weekend. guess ill switch my tune map over to low boost until then 😔
 
My 2005 sierra with the L59 5.3 is a flex fuel engine. I've done some testing of my own with various fuels and there are definite upsides and downsides of running E85 in this engine when compared to the usual 87 octane E10 which is available in these parts.

First of all, the price spread of E85 vs. 87 octane E10 averages around 15-20% around here and this truck will usually get 20 MPG on the highway unloaded with E10 and will get about 13-14 MPG highway with E85 doing the same driving. So we're looking at a solid 30% reduction in gas mileage for a fuel which is only at best 20% less expensive so right off the bat you are losing money running E85 without any apparent upside because you really cannot feel a difference in power running unloaded with E85 with this truck. So unloaded with E85 is definitely not worth it and a waste of money.

Things get a bit more interesting once you hook a trailer up though. For testing with a trailer I pulled the same 3000 lb utility trailer with 87, 91, and E85 in the tank. This trailer is one of the ones where you stand the ramp vertical at the back of the trailer so it catches the wind and actually pulls quite hard with the ramp vertical. I monitored ignition timing advance with my torque pro app on my phone and hand calculated gas mileage on the same road, same distance, and running the same loop to take out the wind variable as much as possible. The loops consists of mostly country roads 60-65 mph with rolling hills where downshifts are quite common.

With 87 octane E10 running this loop my mileage was 12.5 MPG and while monitoring ignition timing with torque pro I would see about 14-15 degrees advanced while getting close to a downshift while going up one of these rolling hills. This is while towing in 4 gear with an RPM in the 16-1800 RPM range.

With 91 octane E10 running the same loop my mileage was 12.9 MPG and while monitoring ignition timing with torque pro I would see in the range of 20-22 degrees ignition advance at the same 16-1800 rpm range right before downshifting to 3rd gear. With the added advance the engine noticeably had more power and could carry speed easier going up these rolling hills.

With E85 in the tank running the same loop my mileage went down to 10.5 MPG and while monitoring ignition timing with torque pro I would see in the range of 28-31 degrees ignition advance at the same 16-1800 RPM range right before downshifting to 3rd gear. With this much advance the engine was substantially more capable carrying 4th gear going up these rolling hills, acceleration was noticeably more powerful and was substantially more enjoyable to tow with. For anyone that drives this vintage of 5.3 knows they can feel a tad under powered while towing and E85 made this into a different engine!

cliff notes
87 octane E10 gas mileage 12.5 MPG
E85 gas mileage 10.5 MPG

mileage drop percentage =16%
cost difference percentage =15-20%

Towing with E85 with this engine makes it a ton more enjoyable and the price difference is almost negligible. Therefore whenever I tow, I do it with E85 whenever possible.

Running unloaded with E85 where you cannot take advantage of the increased timing because you are not lugging the engine at all is not cost affective and more expensive.
 
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Uh, NO. The fermentation process alone puts more CO2 into the air than "growing corn" can absorb.

CO2 is a valuable marketable product and ethanol plants are the primary source of dry ice and weld gas
aka they don’t intentionally let it offgas since it’s marketable

Ethanol producers of today are self sustaining and no longer subsidized

Everything from alcohol to offgas to the hash itself is marketed.

It is believed that we would not be able to raise as many animals without the high protein ethanol biproducts being used as feed.

That said if ethanol would be produced “in season “ with better farming practices you could drop the need for heat and energy by 95% (as other countries do)
We just want everything fast and now energy use be ****ed

Much like our Amazon mindset, Amazon deliveries waste 5x more fuel than shopping at a local grocery but since the government pays Amazon $24billion a year to be in business with $7b a year in profit
But we don’t care cause it’s convenient.
 
CO2 is a valuable marketable product and ethanol plants are the primary source of dry ice and weld gas
aka they don’t intentionally let it offgas since it’s marketable
Which is of course ultimately released to the atmosphere. You're not suggesting that weld gas and dry ice are some sort of permanent sequestration, are you?

As for the rest of your ultimately political post, that's typical for arguments on this subject. People seem completely incapable of discussing this subject in strictly technical terms without side diversions such as some complaint about Amazon.
 
Which is of course ultimately released to the atmosphere. You're not suggesting that weld gas and dry ice are some sort of permanent sequestration, are you?

As for the rest of your ultimately political post,

Meh, I assume you figure my jeans are political too?


Formerly dry ice came from coal fired facilities but it required much more energy to freeze since extreme cold is already apart of our poorly thought out water free anhydrous ethanol system.
AKA the process makes it without additional inputs unlike the former process

Could we do better
sure, other countries already do
A big step would be hydrous ethanol and associated fuel systems.

Do I think ethanol should be made in northern latitudes in the winter from corn?
Nope

When one is cheaper at the pump do I burn it yep.
 
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