Ethanol in fuel.

[Tahitian_Red]

I put race fuel in my old bikes, because I only use them for race day.  Fuels with ethanol I put in my modern bike for everyday riding and Vet races

Ethanol damages rubber parts and fiberglass and vintage parts are expense to fix and or hard to find. 

[Nathan S]

ROFL - "Its the boogey man!".

Its all about the way you use your motor, and the state of tune its in.
Would you fill you aeroplane up from the local 7-11? Even with E0?
Would you fill the wife's car with $15/litre ELF racing fuel for a trip to the shops?
Its all about the way you use your motor, and the state of tune its in.

I won't run E10 in my bikes because I've still got unanswered questions about its compatability with non-castor 2T oils, but The Wife and I must have done 250,000+kms in various cars on E10, without a hint of drama - even those that don't get the tick on the fcai website.
Maybe I'm doing it wrong?  

Similarly, I know plenty of people running E85 in race and serious performance cars without a drama - and they're getting way more power than they would on 98 octane.

AvGas is crap for performance piston motors. All of the rally guys with properly built AvGas rally motors who decompressed them and retuned to run 98, got an extra ~10% power. As Wasp says, its only positive feature is that its super-consistant. It is very detonation resistant, but only because it burn impossibly slowly... I mean, running your engine on straight water would stop it detonating too...  

The energy density per dollar of E10 vs E0 is virtually identical. Notable that ALL of my cars have gotten marginally better fuel economy on United E10 than on 91/92 octane E0 - even the crappy old carby XF ute (this doesn't make sense, but we proved it repeatedly).
The Volvos (that depend heavily on the O2 sensor and knock sensor) significantly better fuel economy, as the extra octane of the United E10 (was 95, now 94) allows a leaner tune than 91/92 - it more than compensates for the supposedly lower energy density.

 

[Mike52]

If Ethanol is hygroscopic [ attracts water ] then is it possible that this could result from leaving your bike sitting ?

Magnesium c/case from Husqvarna.

[Mike52]

http://www.fcai.com.au/publications/all/all/all/3/can-my-vehicle-operate-on-ethanol-blend-petrol-

Woops
See the bottom bit about which bikes can use E5/E10.

[Freakshow]

Been using that 100 promax gas that liberty sell, sure its 10% but G.U.F, it seem to be fine and no pinging on motors that previuosly did.  im going to keep using it and its only a few cents more.   I went that way after a few shit batches of juice from shell and BP.  so far this cheap fuel we E has been great to me.

[Nathan S]

If Ethanol is hygroscopic [ attracts water ] then is it possible that this could result from leaving your bike sitting ?

Magnesium c/case from Husqvarna.

No time to type, but google what Hydroscopic really means. And don't trust forums like this one for the correct definition!

[Mike52]

http://www.thefreedictionary.com/hygroscopic

[Tim754]

Hygro and Hydro..... watch how you spell it OK.

[Nathan S]

I always f%^k that one up... 

[Nathan S]

Anyhow, to save myself from a lot of typing:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethanol_fuel

Modern fuels gum shit up, with or without ethanol.

The water that can end up in ethanol blended fuels is held in solution, and so does not appreciably contribute to corrosion.
Brake fluid is also hygroscopic, but do you get more rust on the inside of your car's unpainted master cylinder than the outside?

[EML]

The best thing about it that I have read is that it can be made from Blue Agave. That's the same stuff that they make Tiquila out of and it grows all over Mexico.
Mexico is alot like our outback so it stands to reason that we could grow lots of it here and not have to drill for oil--- or "Frack" for gas.
AND if they put it in cars we wont have to drink the awful shite

[Montynut]

The water that can end up in ethanol blended fuels is held in solution, and so does not appreciably contribute to corrosion.
Brake fluid is also hygroscopic, but do you get more rust on the inside of your car's unpainted master cylinder than the outside?

The water held in solution does seperate out as the liquid passes through 0degC due to the different freezing points and I believe the same thing happens with brake fluid which is why water settles at the lowest point of the system. Now corrosion needs oxygen.

The amount of water taken up by the max 10% enthanol would be small relative to the total volume of the total fuel. Ethanol is more volatile than the petrol and would evaporate leaving its water content behind as well.

I don't think that is really a big issue the E10 in old fuel systems is just bad news all round.

[Freakshow]

EML, you do that Aguve, in the NT and all the black fella's we be into your cars tanks.... and doing congo lines.... do ..do do do... do do do ....hey   

[maico police]

I remember when if you wanted to fark someones motor, you put sugar in it....

It doesn't work. Well not according to Mythbusters anyhow. They poured kilos of the stuff into some 'ol Yank Tank and it just kept on running with no drop in anything. The only thing that killed it was dropping the sump plug and running it flat out (it still lasted about an hour I think!).

And why oh why would you bother putting E10 in your racing bike that you've spent hours of time and money on. For Farks SAKE!! It's like making your own air filters or trying to find a cheaper alternative to filter oil. Crazy!

[pancho]

  The reason brake master cylinders don't rust these days is because the modern master cyl. are not vented to atmosphere. Go back a few years when m.cyl's were vented to atmosphere and rust used to get every where including inside wheel cylinders.
 
A friendly engine reco man I know suggests that since e10 has been around he sees a lot more cylinder head gaskets on cars blown across the bridge between two cylinders and not so much into water jackets.
 
I have noticed this in recent years but it could have some other cause. Maybe it's because higher running temps in
modern car thermostats open 'round 100c
 
The general consenses in the past was that methanol improved engine cooling and I suspect ethanol would be the same.
 
 I recently saw a steel fuel tank taken off a car that was full of rust. The owner had been running on LPG consistantly , then one day he ran out , so being dual fuel he switched over to petrol which he had not used for a year or so. Result was Wrecked fuel pump, lines, filter and all injectors!. So if you run dual fuel warm up first every day on petrol and don't use e10.

I figure that if you pay ten cents less p/l for e10 it probably works out square in cost.
 Yesterday I got fuel with only 2 cents difference so I naturally did'nt use the e10.
 cheers pancho