Talk to Johnand about E85 - he is our resident expert on the subject.

 

i finally found a gas station that had it

 

What do you want to know about it? I have run well over 100 tanks of the stuff.

For me, I get a 21% reduction in fuel economy, but in my area E85 is readily available and runs 35-40% less in cost than premium. Since I drive 25-30K miles per year, that is a significant savings.

With all the latest flashes for the ECM and TCM, the car runs pretty damn good on E85. Can take a second or 2 longer to startup than premium at times.

I also feel a decent increase in performance, as it is 105 octane.

I have done oil analysis and the Mobil 1 0W-40 Euro oil has no issues running exclusively E85 for the 13K service interval.

The station that I get mine at, gets it's E85 from the recently started cellulose based E85 refinery, so that is a much more environmentally friendly E85 than standard corn based if you care about such things.

 

I'd never put that crap in my car.

 

 

............^^^^^............hahahahaahaha........ ...come on MD reply...........hehehehee

 

I Lol'd.

Good one John :P lmao

 

i would use e85 if i could. That extra power would be nice.

 

Boost and E85 they are friends. I've seen cars making well over 500whp on E85.

 

??? I thought we wanted to achieve "pure-er" fuel! (Less ethanol)

 

i think the ethanol helps keep the engine clean from the high alcohol content. correct me if im wrong john

 

Hey John, did you have to retrofit (modify in any ways) your car to handle E85?

 

I'm going to have to say that this is probably all in your mind. Unless an engine is designed to run on high octane fuel, ie: extreme boost or high compression, its not going to give any more power. You can get a little more power by advancing the timing, but the ECU will not advance more than what it is set for running on 93 octane.

Now, if you are running in extreme heat, to the point where you are getting detonation on regular 93 octane, E85 will restore the power lost. However, the one thing that could actually add power is the fact that E85 uses so much more fuel, it actually cools the intake air a little bit, but I doubt its noticeable on a NA car. It would be more noticeable on a FI car, kind of like methanol/water injection.

Now that E85 is available on LI, I tried to convince my dad to set up the Cobra to run on E85. The only thing we would have to change is the carb (more CFMs) and a smaller pulley on the supercharger, as we have a fuel pump designed for 2000hp, and we just changed the fuel lines to a bigger SS lines for more fuel, as we maxed out the original fuel lines! Even though the extra power would be useless, its cool for the bragging rights.

 

Very true. If you can find E85 you might as well set your car up to run on it.

 

My 2004 MY C240 is Flex Fuel compliant right out of the box. No set-up or special preparation needed, short of a few recomendations on fuel levels, running the engine for at least five mins after switching, etc when switching from gas to E85. Not sure if all Benz engines carry the FFV rating or not for the 04 MY, but the mighty 2.6L V6 does.

 

Does the Flux Capacitor go out quickly on the E85 models?

 

I wanted to try this on my car. The gas tank on my 2007 C230 says "Premium Gasoline or E85 only" but I'm not sure what is the switching procedure...maybe I should read the manual.

 

You just change fuel - that's all!

PLEASE do not run E85 in none Flex fuel cars - It will attack elastomers in the fuel system & cause corrosion.

 

Aha! Manual says, switch when at least fuel is below 1/2 tank low but no lower than on reserve level.

Now where is that gas station...

 

That wont matter! By the time that takes effect, the engine will have blown up from running too lean. Most non E85 compatible engines don't have fuel systems that can handle the extra fuel required!

 

Most Benz engines will run just fine on Alcohols & are more than capable of adjusting AF ratio adequately. It's alcohol proofing of the fuel system that is the real issue.

 

Oh, trust me, I know what alcohol can do to a fuel system. All the damage E10 created in the marine industry... I personally lost use of my boat for a year while I tried to fix all the problems it created. A friend of mine had to have his fiberglass gas tanks cut out and new custom roto-molded plastic tanks put in after it ate through the fiberglass.

As far as Benz engines adjusting, that's not true! Most MB engines are flex fuel compatible, but those that aren't may not be able to. If I recall, some M271 guys couldn't get enough fuel to compensate for the lean condition at high rpm's after putting in an overdrive pulley for the supercharger. This required no where near the extra fuel needed to run E85. They went as far as putting in new injectors, FPR, etc.

 

I come from the petroleum industry & had a global job. I've been involved in testing Benz engines on the dyno from Brazil to using Sasol heavy alcohols in SA. Most Benz engines will be fine. You have picked on one engine that I can believe in the US state of tune might run into trouble at high RPM. The M271 in C180 & C200 tune will run OK - we've tried it. In C230 tune with the bigger blower (& especially if you overspeed that blower) you might tip it over the edge due to borderline injector sizes/capacity at high RPM.

Model Eng capacity Compression ratio Power Torque
180 Kompressor 1796 cc 10.0 : 1 143hp @ 5200rpm 162 lbft @ 2500rpm
200 Kompressor 1796 cc 9.3 : 1 163hp @ 5500rpm 177 lbft @ 3000rpm
200 CGI 1796 cc 10.3 : 1 170hp @ 5300rpm 184 lbft @ 3000rpm
230 Kompressor 1796 cc 8.5 : 1 192hp @ 5800rpm 192 lbft @ 3500-4000rpm

Most W204's in US are not fitted with Flex fuel systems. C230 2.5 V6's to the US were flex fuel. It's likely that most M111 & M271 were not flex fuel in the US - hence my warning. In ROW the American spec M271 engine was only fitted to a short run of Coupe's before they were moved to the 2.5l V6.

 

Well, yeah, I'm specifically talking about US engines... Apparently European manufacturers think we can only use gasoline here, and don't give us many other options. I'm sure if they figured a way to cheaply make an engine that can run either run on gas or diesel, Europe would get it and we wont!