Bode

E10 fuel (10% ethanol added) is now widely sold in the US. In fact it maybe difficult to find fuel without this product added.

I am curious what the deal is with regards to fuel economy, and found today this link to a American Coalition for Ethanol FUEL ECONOMY STUDY....

http://www.ethanol.org/documents/ACE...onomyStudy.pdf

Looks like hardly or no difference between normal fuel and E10. Is this an objective study? Have any of you found more info on this subject? What is your personal experience? I find it hard to compare.....

55fanatic

its not suppose to be more fuel effecient... its suppose to burn cleaner, so its better for the environment, and also suppose to limit how much oil is refined... it wasnt suppose to be better gas mileage

lkchris

Pure physics says it can't, as it contains less power than gasoline.

No "objectivity" debate on this.

JimPurdy

The study also made some invalid assumptions about costs. The cost of ethanol was running in the $5-6 per gallon last week - on the wholesale market. Since it is a lot more expensive than the wholesale price of gasoline, you can't save money by adding ethanol unless the ethanol produced greater gas mileage, which it doesn't. Gasoline contains about 115,000 btu/gallon and ethanol contains 76,000-84,000 btu/gallon depending on burn temperature. A study performed in Brazil a few years ago showed that 100% ethanol powered cars would get about 30% poorer mileage compared to 100% gasoline.

I performed a very unscientific study trip over the weekend - 160 miles each way. On the way out, with 10% ethanol, the mileage was 28.2 mpg. I refueled out of the 10% ethanol area. On the return trip we got 30.4 mpg. Both ways I drove on cruise as much as possible and kept the cruise at no more than 3 mph over the speed limit. ( I know, I was driving too slowly ) Some difference in mileage could be wind speed and direction since there was no real altitude difference.

randolphscott

I had a FIAT in the 1980's that had a problem with the fuel sensor gauge which was attributed to using an ethanol fuel mixture. I'm not sure how it worked, but as I recall, as ethanol aged it somehow became corrosive. Anyone heard of this? The FIAT definitely became corrosive to my sanity as it aged...

khaug

The current issue of Road & Track magazine has a brief article on this topic. Their conclusions: Ethanol has a calorific content that's about 68% of gasoline's. so using a 10% ethanol blend fuel would be expected to result in traveling only 97% as far on a gallon of E10 as a gallon of gasoline would take you. "...only a small hit, and not one easy to identify", the author summarizes.

OTOH, the E85 blend that's now appearing in some places (our corner Shell station, for example) could be expected to show a 27% drop in fuel economy. M-B approves only a 10% blend of ethanol/gasoline, according to the 2004 Factory Approved Service Products booklet that came with my car, so that's not an issue for us M-B drivers, at present.

Good luck.

55fanatic

it is VERY corrosive... my cousin owns an exxon and because of its corrosiveness he has to do gas tank checks pretty often, also it is thought that some older cars may have some problems as the ethanol eats away at some items in the fuel lines and system and def do some damage... it is recomended you run techron occasionally to make sure everything is clean and firing ok