Top Tier E0

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted By: Garak
And there are still a bunch of methyl hydrate ones out there, too, much more prominently sold than the isopropanol ones. People still buy it, I guess. If I were worried and felt a need for the alcohol, there is at least one E10 premium, and I've used it once in a blue moon, quite happily. There's just no cost benefit, since it's more than ordinary premium, because it's something like 94 octane instead of the usual 91, and only one brand has it.

The offerings from standard fuel supplies around here stop at 91 (R+M)/2. I remember visiting Washington state, and typical premium was 92. Basically the only way to get anything higher than that in California is via a mixture of street legal race gas. I also haven't seen any fuel here that is sold as free of oxygenates.

 

[SHOZ]

Originally Posted By: y_p_w
Originally Posted By: Garak
Originally Posted By: y_p_w
Granted, I think the worry about water contamination in a car tank with modern emissions systems is overblown.

Yes, it is. I haven't needed to use gas line antifreeze basically ever. When carbs were the norm, most of the "gassers" I had were on LPG. I don't think I've ever purchased the product, despite using almost exclusively E0 for the past number of years.

Modern fuel systems are pretty well sealed. I know a popular conception is that they're filled with air that might contain water vapor, but I've heard they're pressurized with fuel vapor.

E10 is supposed to be pretty good at mixing with water. Makes me wonder why anyone buys fuel line water remover/antifreeze unless there's no alcohol at all.
Exactly. Adding more alcohol to E10 gas is a waste of money. If there is too much water in the fuel the E10 will drop out with the water. No amount of alcohol will fix this.

And yes fuel tanks run around 1-2psi on pressure. Anything below this when running you will get a DTC, usually the loose gas cap one.

 

[Garak]

Originally Posted By: y_p_w
The offerings from standard fuel supplies around here stop at 91 (R+M)/2. I remember visiting Washington state, and typical premium was 92. Basically the only way to get anything higher than that in California is via a mixture of street legal race gas. I also haven't seen any fuel here that is sold as free of oxygenates.

Here, and in at least a few other Canadian jurisdictions, the ethanol mandate is an average. It must be so many percent over total volume of fuel sold. So, E10 regular, E5 midgrade, and E0 premium tends to satisfy the mandate. If everyone switched to premium tomorrow, there would be trouble, though. Husky/Mohawk, which pioneered ethanol blends up here long before any mandates, has an E0 premium and an ethanol blended super-premium. I think the mandate ended up hurting them more than anything else, since they lost their uniqueness, part of which was an 89 octane midgrade for the price of regular, which is automatically a good selling point.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted By: Garak
Originally Posted By: y_p_w
The offerings from standard fuel supplies around here stop at 91 (R+M)/2. I remember visiting Washington state, and typical premium was 92. Basically the only way to get anything higher than that in California is via a mixture of street legal race gas. I also haven't seen any fuel here that is sold as free of oxygenates.

Here, and in at least a few other Canadian jurisdictions, the ethanol mandate is an average. It must be so many percent over total volume of fuel sold. So, E10 regular, E5 midgrade, and E0 premium tends to satisfy the mandate. If everyone switched to premium tomorrow, there would be trouble, though. Husky/Mohawk, which pioneered ethanol blends up here long before any mandates, has an E0 premium and an ethanol blended super-premium. I think the mandate ended up hurting them more than anything else, since they lost their uniqueness, part of which was an 89 octane midgrade for the price of regular, which is automatically a good selling point.

In California I don't believe there's any particular general ethanol mandate per se, but a tailpipe emissions requirement. There may be a few counties (with particularly bad air) where there is.

Part of the issue here is that there are a lot of cars where premium fuel is "required". It's kind of tough to meet the demand for it without some sort of oxygenate. MTBE is out these days. We already shifted to 91 octane premium years ago, which helped with the supply. On top of that, the current price of ethanol delivered to the fuel terminal is cheaper than the gasoline, so there's somewhat of an incentive to use ethanol. It's possible to meet Phase III California reformulated gasoline standards without an oxygenate, but using ethanol does make sense for many reasons.

I do remember when the old Union Oil (branded over the years as 76, Unocal, Union 76) had 89 octane mid-grade as their lowest octane rated fuel, and was sold at competitive prices with other brands' 87 octane. Supposedly they had a patent on some cheap octane boosting ingredient or process. I think others could pay them to use it, but they were charging too much. Then they sold off their gasoline refining/marketing business to Tosco, but apparently kept that patent. I read one article that cited that as one reason why 91 octane became the standard in California.

 

[SHOZ]

It's mostly E10 92 or 93 here in central Illinois for premium. Casey's has 91 E10. I seek out the 93 octane.

 

[Garak]

We've had 91 for a rather long time here, with only that one place offering higher.

 

[EP777]

Gasoline starts out ethanol free. Ethanol is a cheap way to add octane. Ethanol is injected after gasoline moves from refinery to pipeline terminal.

85 Pure Gas + 10% ethanol = 87 Octane
88 Pure Gas + 10% ethanol = 91 Octane

If you buy E10 premium, then you are getting 88 octane gas with a shot of alcohol making it 91.

(Note, octane does not mean energy content. 91 octane has no more energy than 87. Octane is a measure of resistance to detonation.)

Refiners are forced to buy RINS when they sell ethanol free. That's why it's not widely available. Big biz and big government working together.


The biggest benefit of E0 is shelf life. If you leave E10 in your lawn mower all winter, then good luck. E10 lasts about 90 days, 100% gas is good for 6 months or more. Second biggest benefit is older vehicles that weren't designed for E10.


https://www.epa.gov/renewable-fuel-stand...e-fuel-standard


http://www.pure-gas.org/about

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted By: EP777
Gasoline starts out ethanol free. Ethanol is a cheap way to add octane. Ethanol is injected after gasoline moves from refinery to pipeline terminal.

85 Pure Gas + 10% ethanol = 87 Octane
88 Pure Gas + 10% ethanol = 91 Octane

If you buy E10 premium, then you are getting 88 octane gas with a shot of alcohol making it 91.

(Note, octane does not mean energy content. 91 octane has no more energy than 87. Octane is a measure of resistance to detonation.)

Refiners are forced to buy RINS when they sell ethanol free. That's why it's not widely available. Big biz and big government working together.


The biggest benefit of E0 is shelf life. If you leave E10 in your lawn mower all winter, then good luck. E10 lasts about 90 days, 100% gas is good for 6 months or more. Second biggest benefit is older vehicles that weren't designed for E10.


https://www.epa.gov/renewable-fuel-stand...e-fuel-standard


http://www.pure-gas.org/about


It's not "octane" but rather "octane rating" where a blend of Iso-octane and n-heptane is the reference fuel. So a 91 octane rating is equivalent to a reference fuel of 91% iso-octane and 9% n-heptane. There's also a difference between research and motor octane ratings. The average is the way it's sold in the US, but other countries use just the research number.

Ethanol is typically stored at the terminal in separate tanks and is blended on demand when filling transport tankers. It has certain qualities which are useful, and others which are not. While it does attract water, it also allows water to blend rather than pool. Modern vehicle tanks are pretty good at sealing out external air, but small engines and marine engine tanks aren't well sealed.

Right now it's not as if ethanol or some other oxygenate could be eliminated. However, there's supposed to be a promising oxygenate in development.

 

[kschachn]

Originally Posted By: EP777
The biggest benefit of E0 is shelf life. If you leave E10 in your lawn mower all winter, then good luck. E10 lasts about 90 days, 100% gas is good for 6 months or more. Second biggest benefit is older vehicles that weren't designed for E10.


I read that all the time, yet I leave E10 in my 25 year old lawnmower, my 18 year old snow thrower, my 17 year old garden tractor and my 10 year old string trimmer all winter with no problems yet. I guess it has just been "good luck" like you say.

My 23 year old BMW runs on it too so I don't know how much older you have to get. All we can buy here in southeastern Wisconsin is E10 so I don't have a choice.

 

[SHOZ]

Originally Posted By: kschachn
Originally Posted By: EP777
The biggest benefit of E0 is shelf life. If you leave E10 in your lawn mower all winter, then good luck. E10 lasts about 90 days, 100% gas is good for 6 months or more. Second biggest benefit is older vehicles that weren't designed for E10.


I read that all the time, yet I leave E10 in my 25 year old lawnmower, my 18 year old snow thrower, my 17 year old garden tractor and my 10 year old string trimmer all winter with no problems yet. I guess it has just been "good luck" like you say.

My 23 year old BMW runs on it too so I don't know how much older you have to get. All we can buy here in southeastern Wisconsin is E10 so I don't have a choice.
Same here. I do use some regular Stabil though. The E10 is kind of rough on the fuel lines inside the tanks on 2 cycle motors I have.

 

[TiredTrucker]

Cenex near me in Iowa has had E0 for quite some time. And they are Top Tier. I don't really worry about the Top Tier thing, but I use the Cenex station as it is part of the Farmer's Coop and I have their fuel card that gives me 5 cents off a gallon.