ethanol based gasoline

[Stage1 Jeff]

need an opinion as to whether gasoline with 10% ethanol is safe for carbureted engines. i would plan on only using no more than 5 gallons per fillup(with these high prices, i never let mine get too far off full) any thoughts would be appreciated. engine is a 350-4

[guzzi4v]

I did a bit of ethanol testing in college when I was getting my engineering degree and have run a carburetered car on 85% ethanol without major modifications. Using 10% ethanol fuel shouldn't hurt a thing, but if you allready have a lean condition or detonation problems due to a lean condition it'll only make things worse because ethanol has less btu's per gallon than straight gas. ten percent shouldn't require a jet change unless your looking for max performance or it is cold out and your car allready runs lean. A good rule of thumb if you live in the midwest and would like to try e-85 rather than race fuel is to up the jetting by 25% and then mess with your timing a little. I wouldn't recommend running e-85 in a car with a carter or rochester carb as I'm not positive it won't hurt the seals, if you get the alchohol accelerator pump diaphram and the blue gaskets for a holley you won't have any problems. 10% ethanol you can run in anything and won't have a problem

[Willy]

thats some great info on the E85. I've always run stuff with 10% ethanol without any problems but was wondering what it would take to run the E85 in "non approved" cars. I put it in my late model daily driver at $1.62/gal last week...much better than the $2.25/gal for 87 octane.

[guzzi4v]

just remember with E-85 usually you will get 20-25% WORSE gas mileage because of the btu per gallon factor, but when you compare it to $4.25+ a gallon for race gas and I can pull the car straight up to a pump and put it in rather than having to fill it out of cans its becomes a more atractive alternative. But it sure dosen't smell as good!

cheers

and remember when you re jet a carb for e-85 you actually have to calculate the square inches of the hole size in the jet rather than just going up 25% in jet number. I'd hate to see someone get pissed at me for not explaining that!!!!

[Schurkey]

For many years, and perhaps even now, GM stated in the owners manual that up to 10% ethanol, or 5% methanol was acceptable. I think the Methanol needed a "cosolvent" but I have no idea what that is.

I've used nothing but 10% ethanol (around here, that's pronounced "Ett-nol) for near twenty years.

A long time ago, ('78-79) Methanol caused a lot of problems. Gas stations had lots of crap in the underground tanks, and folks had lots of crap in the car's gas tank. Methanol cleared a lot of that crap...right into the car's fuel filter or carb.

[guzzi4v]

yea, methanol is a much more aggressive chemical than ethanol, it even attacks a lot of metals, I wouldn't run that in anything without a fuel system built specifically for it.