10% Ethanol Gasoline: Yes or No?

There is significant debate/ conversation out there on other BMW forums, but to offer up my $.02, the indicated enthanol content on the fuel pumps at the stations does state 10%. This is a minimum observation around here. I had worked at a BMW dealership in the state of Maine and the shop foreman (prior to the now infamous HPFP service bulletin issued for replacement in conjunction with injectors) decided that he wanted to get fuel samples (from all of the vehicles that started to come into the shop with injector and fuel pump failure) analyzed for ethanol content. Of 12 samples he had looked at, the MINIMUM content was 15% and the average of them being 18% ethanol. That is insane.

But it makes sense that injectors would be failing. Trying to compress water and passing it through an injector at 2000PSI will have poor results and only cause failure, as many of you could assume. The majority of fuel does have ethanol in it and we won't really be able to escape that these days. 91 octane is the maximum AKI fuel offered in the state of Maine and from what I have seen on pumps, even the 91 octane V-Power at Shell contains ethanol. Many who race or build race engines will use a mixture of pump fuel and tolulene. This does come with a warning as tolulene does eat through rubber fuel lines, can cause cylinder bore wear, decrease the life of the fuel pump and doesn't have any lubricating properties as fuel does. From what I have noted (I believe it was an article in Grassroots Motorsport) a mixture of 1 gallon of tolulene to 14 gallons of 91 octane will net 98 octane fuel. This theory could be wrong.

I do not recommend doing this as it causes premature wear to internal components of your engine.

I am lucky that in the state of Nebraska, there is a choice.
Only Octane 89 has 10% Ethanol.
Octane 87 and 91 do not contain Ethanol (I verified with a few gas stations).
Anyway, I am staying away from Ethanol for now.

Originally Posted by cn90

I am lucky that in the state of Nebraska, there is a choice.
Only Octane 89 has 10% Ethanol.
Octane 87 and 91 do not contain Ethanol (I verified with a few gas stations).
Anyway, I am staying away from Ethanol for now.

Don't always believe the gas stations...
At least I would not.

For the record, someone asked today:
- E39 (1997 - 2003) > ETHANOL Effects on Our Engines

Originally Posted by mda419

While trying to come up with some pre-emptive measures to counter effects of Ethanol on my E39. I did a quick research and stumbled upon "Mix-I-Go" mfd by Bell Performance.

Ethanol is a corn scam. By that alone you should by trying not to put it in your car. I avoid corn in general because of their scamming.
Less MPG too. We only have it in our cars because of the corn scam still going on. Thank god finally many corn subsides are ending, and maybe they will realize Ethanol from *corn* is especially ungreen.

Subsidies are ending, but the mandatory content isn't. So you'll notice a considerable increase in the price of gas pretty soon.

Originally Posted by aspensilver540

Ethanol is a corn scam. By that alone you should by trying not to put it in your car. I avoid corn in general because of their scamming.
Less MPG too. We only have it in our cars because of the corn scam still going on. Thank god finally many corn subsides are ending, and maybe they will realize Ethanol from *corn* is especially ungreen.

+1 on that one! Wish people would wake up like they are in Germany and stand up for getting that crap out of our fuel!

Holy Sh1t are you guys a bunch of ignorant idiots. The corn used is feed corn for cattle, which by nature eat grass but McDonalds wants them fat so they feed them corn. The byproduct of the ethanol procedure is distillers grains; which is fed to the cattle. The corn oil is used to feed chickens. Who's losing out? Currently we spend multi millions of dollars to protect barge after barge from foreign countries to get oil here. How good is that? What exactly is the problem with using AMERICAN corn to make AMERICAN fuel? Are you telling me it's better to fund terrorist countries?

"Ethanol ruins engines" someone said. Um, have you ever run detergent through a dirty hose? All the junk comes out the other end with the detergent. The fossil fuel is the problem, not the ethanol. Ethanol is alchohol, a cleaner. Yes, you will get some crap come through as it cleans your engine and components.

"Ethanol has water in it" someone said. If you take a gallon of water and a gallon of alcohol you wont' net two gallons. That's because the alcohol and water combine due to physics. How much water do you currently run in your car? If you have a fuel injected car you have a sealed and pressurized tank. Not much water get's in there.

The knowledge out there is either old, or misrepresented by those of you fearing a loss in Mobil, Exxon and Shell profits.

Top fuel dragsters run pure alcohol. They seem to be running just fine.

America has more than enough corn to supply the fuel needs (blended) with our domestic oil supply. Since ethanol has been mandated in fuel the 65% of foreign oil brought here has been reduced to 55%.

I ran a full tank of e85 in my 98 528 and found NO loss of fuel economy and NO problems starting. Test it for yourself before listening to a bunch of armchair quarterbacks.

Originally Posted by helpmyfive

Holy Sh1t are you guys a bunch of ignorant idiots. The corn used is feed corn for cattle, which by nature eat grass but McDonalds wants them fat so they feed them corn. The byproduct of the ethanol procedure is distillers grains; which is fed to the cattle. The corn oil is used to feed chickens. Who's losing out? Currently we spend multi millions of dollars to protect barge after barge from foreign countries to get oil here. How good is that? What exactly is the problem with using AMERICAN corn to make AMERICAN fuel? Are you telling me it's better to fund terrorist countries?

I'm not even going to start on how to try and figure out what any of that paragraph meant or what you were trying to say but since you mentioned terrorists that tells me quite a bit. Anyway as for Ethanol though, if the vehicle is designed to use it like E85 vehicles are it probably works ok and there should be no noticeable difference in performance but ethanol doesn't burn as efficiently so the more you have per gallon, the less mpg you get and that's a scientific fact. E85 gives you approx 25% less mpg than gas with 10% ethonol. And gas with 10% ethanol doesn't give you as good a mpg as straight gas. Then there's the fact that Ethanol doesn't work well as a fuel in cold weather so more gas has to be added to the mix in winter. But here's the big problem... If your car was built before Ethanol was a common thing in fuel it WILL eventually cause damage to your fuel system. The main issue is Ethanol eats rubber and since there's lots of rubber in a fuel system, it ends up destroying fuel lines as well as o-rings and seals. My business is PWCs and we're having lots of problems with Ethanol fuels used in them doing just what I described when people use fuels from the local gas station. Luckily marinas still sell us 100% good 'ol gas though!

Then there's the whole "using food for fuel" thing. When you choose to use food for fuel, guess what... the price of corn rises and since our food (cows, chickens, etc) eat corn and since practically every product we consume has corn in it (even Coke and our crap popular domestic beers), the price of milk, steak, chicken, and pretty much everything else goes up. That's probably why every time I eat fast food now, it costs the same as a nice sit down restaurant with fine china used to. Then what really ticks me off is since the price of corn is so high, mexican agave farmers start chopping their fields to plant corn and now I'm paying more for Tequila too!

And I haven't even gotten to the really stupid fact that at current corn prices, it takes at least $5 worth of corn and energy to make a gallon of ethanol that they sell for around $2 due to subsidies (soon gone). If you want to learn something about Corn Ethanol and how dumb an idea it is for a fuel, there is plenty of info out there on google and just a quick search yielded the good article below...
http://healthandenergy.com/ethanol.htm
Try and avoid reading anything from the corn industry or farmers though since that's a bit biased to say the least!


P.S. Although as I stated, I think Ethanol is a stupid idea to replace gasoline, I'm actually having a 700+ HP straight alcohol injected small block built for my 'Vette to be driven on the street and it will be running next summer. It's a high octane fuel that will allow for some crazy compression and since my buddy races sprint cars and buys it by the barrel, fuel is going to be crazy cheap (around $2 a gallon). I figure if the gov't wants to price it like they want to give it away, I'm going to take advantage! If I ever toast the engine in my 540i, it might get a similar conversion as well. That would really turn some heads!

Don't take my word for it, read for yourself.



Actually, ethanol produced in a modern plant has a net positive energy balance returning about 2.4 to 2.5 time the amount of energy invested in both crop and ethanol production. Reference the recently released USDA report "2008 Energy Balance for the Corn-Ethanol Industry" at: http://www.usda.gov/oce/reports/index.htm. In addition, ethanol's energy balance continues to improve along side improvements in crop/ethanol production and yields. Also, the source of the vast majority of energy used to produce corn and ethanol is natural gas. Thus, one gallon of oil based fuels such as gasoline and diesel fuel produces about 20 gallons of ethanol.



Today the US imports $300 Billion of oil per year for our energy needs. We spend another $50 Billion per year to have our naval fleet secure the shipping lanes for crude oil super tankers coming out of the middle east. We are transfering American wealth to hostile regions of the world and essentially funding our enemies. Any energy produced domestically that reduces this epidemic is essential to protecting America's future.
Ethanol is a fast-changing industry, and a lot of old information – as well as misleading rumors – have been spread over the past few years. Here are the top myths about ethanol, and a few of the facts to set them straight.
Food vs. Fuel

Food prices have gone up over the past few years – just as they have throughout history. Recently though, big food has attempted to blame ethanol for those increases. The facts speak differently. According to the United States Department of Agriculture, for every dollar consumers spend on food, less than 20 cents goes towards the actual cost of food. Over 80 cents goes to other costs including marketing, packaging and transportation.

Further, the World Bank - who published a research paper several years ago claiming biofuels were to blame for rising food prices - reversed its position recently with a new study entitled "Placing the 2006/08 Commodity Price Boom into Perspective." The study's authors found that "the effect of biofuels on food prices has not been as large as originally thought, but that the use of commodities by financial investors (the so-called 'financialization of commodities') may have been partly responsible for the 2007/08 spike." Read this report - and others like it - in our Research & Reports center.

Indirect Land Use Change

Indirect Land Use Change (ILUC) is an untested and heavily disputed theory that assumes corn used for ethanol will displace other crops, like soybeans, and in turn, cause farmers in other countries to cut down rainforests to grow soybeans and fill the demand. Estimates vary drastically depending on the assumptions of the researchers. Some are based on false or out-of-date assumptions. More dependable recent studies have shown no indirect land use change in other countries due to U.S. ethanol production. They have shown that corn-based ethanol production is far better for the environment than oil.

Water Use

Water is an essential ingredient in ethanol production. It currently takes about 3 gallons of water to produce a gallon of ethanol. That number is rapidly decreasing with environmental efforts and developments in technology. To put ethanol's water use into perspective, it takes about 41.5 gallons of water to produce 1 gallon of oil and 280 gallons of water to produce one Sunday newspaper.

Ethanol Production is getting cleaner while gasoline is getting dirtier.
Ethanol Production in 2008 vs. 2001
*28% less thermal energy used per gallon
*32.1% less electricity used per gallon
*5.3% higher ethanol yield per bushel
(source: Detailed Report: 2008 National Dry Mill Corn Ethanol Survey," Dr.Steffen Mueller, May 2010)
Current U.S. Ethanol production is approximately 45% energy positive when evaluating the complete life cycle. 20 year old information is routinely sited by Tim Serchinger
As for susidies; For years we subsidised farmers to produce corn and other grain with with counter cyclical payments because their was mass surpusses of grain. Corn ethanol production has brought and end to this because it has stabilized grain prices above break-even for farmers. Also, dry mill ethanol plants produce distiller's dried grains which is sold as a high protein livestock feed.
Learn more about oil industry subsidies here. http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/04/business/04bptax.html
We have a tremendous opportunity ahead in the form of broadening our energy mix. Ethanol is just part of the answer. We can produce ethanol out of so much more than corn and break our addiction to oil coming from hostile regions of the world.

Sorry I don't put much faith in the gov't telling me corn ethanol (or anything else they recommend for that matter) is good for me! You must either be a farmer or be buddies with some is all I can figure... everyone knows corn ethanol makes no sense. Just do some searching on Google and learn something. I would much rather use up the resources of other countries then when they're gone, use ours. Why should we suffer with crap fuel and expensive cars to run on it when we can just use more cheap imported fuel?!

Lets do some math though that I think you'll see shows corn ethanol makes no sense...

It takes approx 1/3 bushel of corn to produce a gallon of ethanol
It takes approx $0.50 in energy to make a gallon of ethanol
Then there's production costs (employees, equipment, yeast, etc) at $0.50 per gal (probably a low est)

If a bushel of corn is $7 (I think it's more)...

(1/3*$7)+$0.50+$0.50 = $3.33

No matter what process you use to make it, making ethanol from corn is going to cost at least $3 per gallon and what you get is a fuel with like 75% the efficiency of gas. And as the price of corn keeps rising due to ethanol demand, so so will the cost to make it. How can you tell me that makes any sense ever?!

Originally Posted by HaveTwoWagons

as the price of corn keeps rising due to ethanol demand, so so will the cost to make it.

I heard on the car radio (so I didn't substantiate it further), that the corn crop took a beating this year due to high heat and low rainfall.

OK. I don't want to be like that guy who spouts unsubstantiated rot ... so gimme a sec to google ...

• 8/22 Drought and ethanol crunch U.S. corn crop
  • The U.S. shifting from fueling animals with corn to fueling cars with corn

Oh oh. It's more complicated than I at first thought:

This year, despite the devastating drought, there's still plenty of corn being produced. Total corn production is right at the level of the middle of the last decade (the 2003-2007 average, to be precise). The supply issue is about ethanol, which is expected to use up almost 42% of this year's corn crop

So, I won't predict anything. Especially since I came here just now simply to xref an ethanol thread today... as this thread by cn90 should be the canonical ethanol thread for reference:
-> E39 (1997 - 2003) > pure gasoline vs. 10% ethanol

Originally Posted by abrookey

Just wanted to see if anyone out there has any experience with ethanol/alcohol free gas, real 92 octane, 100% gas. I live on the eastside of the Seattle area, there is a place called The Grange, in Issaquah Wa that sells it. The price is identical to Chevron's 92 octane, which I have always used, but I am guessing has no addatives to clean the intake valves etc....Everything I hear says the car will run better and get a bit better milage. Could always pick up an addative from strictly BMW in Bellevue once in awhile. Any knowledge on this?

Just found out that there is a push to increase the amount of Alky going into our fuel--they want to raise it to 15%--this is nuts and just plain wrong--someone posted above that we shouldn't be concerned because this is feed grain for animals--well we should be--we need to feed the animals the feed grain they need and the rest should be for planting corn to help feed people--
Quote Originally Posted by helpmyfive
Holy Sh1t are you guys a bunch of ignorant idiots. The corn used is feed corn for cattle, which by nature eat grass but McDonalds wants them fat so they feed them corn. The byproduct of the ethanol procedure is distillers grains; which is fed to the cattle. The corn oil is used to feed chickens. Who's losing out? Currently we spend multi millions of dollars to protect barge after barge from foreign countries to get oil here. How good is that? What exactly is the problem with using AMERICAN corn to make AMERICAN fuel? Are you telling me it's better to fund terrorist countries?

We wouldn't be funding the terrorist countries if we were to go after our own sorces of petrol that we have at our desposal--natrual gas--we have more that the rest of the world--coal--it's being outlawed to be used with out thought of what to replace it with and with out care of what the costs are to the consumer--oil--reserves--we got more than the Saudia's---

Since this post was started over a year ago, I'm seeing some bad problems out of this Al gas mix mess--older cars with carbs and having the carbs almost melt there guts out--newer cars fuel systems have the 0 rings and rubber parts degrade and clog up injectors--freind pull a fuel pump out the other day from a car that hadn't been started for a few months and the filter on the pump was shut down from the mess that had desolved from alchy being in the gas tank---Freinds that have boats have had real problemsd with melt down of 0 rings and such--the boat indy's are working like nuts to keep engines running and in tune because of this mess---What started out as what we thought was going to be a good idea, is starting to look like the same idea that has taken our light bulbs away from us---Govt doesn't know best and the best Govt is the least--my 2 cents issued

Originally Posted by poolman

Just found out that there is a push to increase the amount of Alky going into our fuel.

They want to raise it to 15%

This is nuts and just plain wrong.

Someone posted above that we shouldn't be concerned because this is feed grain for animals.

Well we should be!

We need to feed the animals the feed grain they need and the rest should be for planting corn to help feed people.

Originally Posted by helpmyfive

Holy Sh1t are you guys a bunch of ignorant idiots.
The corn used is feed corn for cattle, which by nature eat grass but McDonalds wants them fat so they feed them corn.
The byproduct of the ethanol procedure is distiller grains; which is fed to the cattle.
The corn oil is used to feed chickens.
Who's losing out?
Currently we spend multi-millions of dollars to protect barge after barge from foreign countries to get oil here.
How good is that?
What exactly is the problem with using AMERICAN corn to make AMERICAN fuel?
Are you telling me it's better to fund terrorist countries?

"Ethanol ruins engines" someone said. Um, have you ever run detergent through a dirty hose?
All the junk comes out the other end with the detergent.
The fossil fuel is the problem, not the ethanol.
Ethanol is alcohol, a cleaner.
Yes, you will get some crap come through as it cleans your engine and components.

"Ethanol has water in it" someone said.
If you take a gallon of water and a gallon of alcohol you wont' net two gallons.
That's because the alcohol and water combine due to physics.
How much water do you currently run in your car?
If you have a fuel injected car you have a sealed and pressurized tank.
Not much water get's in there.

The knowledge out there is either old, or misrepresented by those of you fearing a loss in Mobil, Exxon and Shell profits.

Top fuel dragsters run pure alcohol. They seem to be running just fine.

America has more than enough corn to supply the fuel needs (blended) with our domestic oil supply. Since ethanol has been mandated in fuel the 65% of foreign oil brought here has been reduced to 55%.

I ran a full tank of e85 in my 98 528 and found NO loss of fuel economy and NO problems starting. Test it for yourself before listening to a bunch of armchair quarterbacks.

Originally Posted by poolman

We wouldn't be funding the terrorist countries if we were to go after our own sources of petrol that we have at our disposal.

Natural gas.

We have more that the rest of the world.

Coal.

It's being outlawed to be used with out thought of what to replace it with and with out care of what the costs are to the consumer.

Oil reserves.

We got more than the Saudia's.

Since this post was started over a year ago, I'm seeing some bad problems out of this Al gas mix mess.

Older cars with carbs and having the carbs almost melt there guts out.

Newer cars fuel systems have the 0 rings and rubber parts degrade and clog up injectors.

A friend of mine pulled a fuel pump out the other day from a car that hadn't been started for a few months and the filter on the pump was shut down from the mess that had dissolved from alchy being in the gas tank.

Friends that have boats have had real problems with melt down of 0 rings and such.

The boat indy's are working like nuts to keep engines running and in tune because of this mess.

What started out as what we thought was going to be a good idea, is starting to look like the same idea that has taken our light bulbs away from us.

Govt does NOT know best, and the best Govt is the least...!--my 2 cents issued.

Quoted for PURE AWESOMENESS....!!!!!

The E15 business and ethanol potential damage to car is discussed here.
Very good reliable source:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/cars...-damage-engine

Thanks for that input CNN--I hope they had a mispelling in that article--they stated that the Alcy was going to be 85% and the gas 15% mix--I hope that they just have that BACKWARDS.
Looks like they cover the whole gambit on just what problems that can be expected from this Alcy program---My Grand Dad was a Moonshiner--He made the good stuff and you could run a 32 Ford around on it when you didn't have gas--problem was it would smoke and backfire and sorts of --well you know you can make do with what you don't have at times--Thats what we Mountain Folk are like.

Originally Posted by poolman

Thanks for that input CNN--I hope they had a mispelling in that article--they stated that the Alcy was going to be 85% and the gas 15% mix--I hope that they just have that BACKWARDS.
Looks like they cover the whole gambit on just what problems that can be expected from this Alcy program---My Grand Dad was a Moonshiner--He made the good stuff and you could run a 32 Ford around on it when you didn't have gas--problem was it would smoke and backfire and sorts of --well you know you can make do with what you don't have at times--Thats what we Mountain Folk are like.

Your grand dad "popcorn" Sutton? lol, j/k!

Nope--but he and Popcorn would'a been good freinds fer sure--LOL---and make sure you capitalize the first letter in his name next time you post it buddy!!!!

Ethanol is bad stuff. A car can be hardened to handle it but it doesn't make it a better fuel additive it just makes your car better able to withstand the abuse from it.

It eats orings and gaskets unless they are designed to resist the stuff. Which is why older carbs are especially weak to it. It also separates from gasoline when left sitting for a long time. Once the car driven for a bit it will recombine for the most part but can cause problems if it sits too long.

One thing I noticed long before I even paid any attention to the stuff being added to the fuel was how gas was going bad far faster than it did years before. In the past you could leave fuel in a lawn mower for instance and it would be fine for a few years if it didn't evaporate. Now your lucky to go 1 year and the thing still run with gas left in it. Same way with cars if I leave them sitting for a few years. My bmw had 100% ethanol free fuel in it when I parked it 4 years ago. It ran fine when I cranked it up after all that time. I have a old blazer we parked and after sitting for 2 years it could barely move under its own power and talk about some bad smelling fumes coming out the exhaust, it was 10% ethanol regular unleaded in it. Had to rebuild the carb and change the gasoline out to get it back to idling correctly.

I wish they could find some other product to invest their attention in and leave the freaking gasoline alone.

This thread was opened today:

Originally Posted by doru

Check this out. Among others, BMW voids any warranty (if you have a newer car), and actually there is no production car older than 2012 that can run with this stuff without getting damaged. Explanation is covered too:

Originally Posted by helpmyfive

Holy Sh1t are you guys a bunch of ignorant idiots. The corn used is feed corn for cattle, which by nature eat grass but McDonalds wants them fat so they feed them corn. The byproduct of the ethanol procedure is distillers grains; which is fed to the cattle. The corn oil is used to feed chickens. Who's losing out? Currently we spend multi millions of dollars to protect barge after barge from foreign countries to get oil here. How good is that? What exactly is the problem with using AMERICAN corn to make AMERICAN fuel? Are you telling me it's better to fund terrorist countries?

"Ethanol ruins engines" someone said. Um, have you ever run detergent through a dirty hose? All the junk comes out the other end with the detergent. The fossil fuel is the problem, not the ethanol. Ethanol is alchohol, a cleaner. Yes, you will get some crap come through as it cleans your engine and components.

"Ethanol has water in it" someone said. If you take a gallon of water and a gallon of alcohol you wont' net two gallons. That's because the alcohol and water combine due to physics. How much water do you currently run in your car? If you have a fuel injected car you have a sealed and pressurized tank. Not much water get's in there.

The knowledge out there is either old, or misrepresented by those of you fearing a loss in Mobil, Exxon and Shell profits.

Top fuel dragsters run pure alcohol. They seem to be running just fine.

America has more than enough corn to supply the fuel needs (blended) with our domestic oil supply. Since ethanol has been mandated in fuel the 65% of foreign oil brought here has been reduced to 55%.

I ran a full tank of e85 in my 98 528 and found NO loss of fuel economy and NO problems starting. Test it for yourself before listening to a bunch of armchair quarterbacks.

Your five IS gonna need a LOT of "help" if you keep running E85 through it. "e85 with no loss of fuel economy" That is now #1 in dumbest quotes Ive ever seen on an automotive forum.

Maybe that's why the fuel pump goes good-bye when you drive below 1/4 tank? Just a little water will separate the ethanol from gasoline, so in that instance, you pump....straight ethanol from the bottom of the gas tank, which will effectively ruin the fuel pump (and injectors).

Many car manufacturers void warranty if you use E15 fuel in cars older than 2012:
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/n...-cars/1735793/

There is a petition going on against that corn crap. Sign it:
https://petitions.whitehouse.gov/pet...lable/lhq1qgW4

Originally Posted by doru

Maybe that's why the fuel pump goes good-bye when you drive below 1/4 tank? Just a little water will separate the ethanol from gasoline, so in that instance, you pump....straight ethanol from the bottom of the gas tank, which will effectively ruin the fuel pump (and injectors).

I was very confused by the video wrt phase separation because they said at one point that the ethanol goes to the bottom and at another point that the ethanol burns first (which would be the case if it went to the bottom - right?).

So, it seemed to me the first gallon of E-whatever you burn is more ethanol than the last gallon you burn.

Can someone clear up this phase separation thing? (Meanwhile, I'll look it up.)