ive got a 1993 blade, should i get ready to chuck it in the bin if i wont have anthing to run it on soon?

pistonheads



[Edited on 27/12/11 by andyfiggy2002]

domed

From what I gather the affect can be to break down rubber and cause corrosion of aluminium.

My concerns are fuel hose (lots of problems already on here with second rate fuel hose), and injector o-rings.

I wouldn't worry unless you want to use it as a 'reason' to upgrade.

I am sure I have seen some petrol additives for the extra ethanol content.

It'll be ten years until "normal" petrol starts disappearing...

Also any car that is sold with the same powertrain in the USA tends to be okay for ethanol blends as I believe over there quite a lot of fuels are blended with up to 10% ethanol, and it's just called regular, not E10...


I wouldn't worry about it too much. The biggest problem are seals (and hoses to a certain extent, but if you read the fuel hose sticky you'll see that it's not just E10 causing problems) - simply replace with viton (?) and you're good to go. By 2020 most "unsuitable" motors will no doubt need minor stuff replacing anyway...

I read something about it deforming plastic petrol tanks on certain motorbikes (Ducati for one) and Acerbis who make the tanks have been replacing them under warranty in the USA

Anyone want to buy an original 'plastictankman' (currently non leaky) MK tank? LOL
Looks like I'll be safer going to an alloy tank before they start upping the ethanol content

Regards
Rob

"not compatible" is not "terminally damages", I think we should remember here. Manufacturers will warn against use of things with non-compatible engines but they may still work just fine, or require minor adjustments/retrofittings to sort. I'd not lose any sleep over it until the normal fuels become rare, by then there's going to be a solution anyway.

I wouldnt worry too much - Brazil have been using 20-25% ethanol mix in petrol, (gasohol) since the early 1980s at least. I dont believe any manufacturers make major changes to run their cars there (maybe some settings for emissions control I suppose).
For diesel they have been using 15+% veg oil in hungary since the late 80s. When I was thinking of buying a BMW and running on biodiesel mix BMW sail 'no way'/'0% maximum allowed' offically, but when I enquired what mods were needed to buy one in hungary, import a uk one to hungary 'no changes required'.
Regards
Hugh

The really brain dead thing is that introducing ethanol into the fuel lowers the energy in the fuel giving less power and it has a significant impact on economy.

i work at nissan where we will be making the next generation of cars - electric - like it or hate it seems thats the way they are going rightly or wrongly we cant stop board room decisions / politics / money....

the company only intends summink like 10% of all models to be electric overall for a long way to come yet and we seem to be leading the way with Leaf and the renault range of cars - we have a battery technology / production plant just coming on line now which will increase technology and eventually range of the cars but personally i cant see any significant loss of petrol car use for at least 10 - 15 years - maybe more. people just dont want electric - they dont want to pay shed loads for a car and im not sure it will take off myself -

so i would keep running petrol engines for the foreseable future its not gonna dissappear overnight thats for sure

with regards to petrol types - markets dictate what is sold - they can bring stuff out thats new but if noone buys it the new tech wont survive

[Edited on 28/12/11 by :{THC}:YosamiteSam]

Aye the energy density of ethanol is lower, ~20 vs 32ish MJ/l. But it's a much higher RON rating meaning it can be run at much higher compression (it's about 109 RON IIRC) to help re-gain some of the efficiency. The europeans and IIRC americans have been running E85 for decades now without much complaint and many of their cars come with sensors to auto switch between fuels etc. While you might make the car less efficient litre for litre, all that means is that your ethanol production needs to be relatively carbon-light. It being supposedly a renewable sustainable fuel means that you can burn twice as much and still not cause as much damage as burning the normal fuel twice as efficiently. Of course if you cut down half the rainforests to plant ethanol fuels then something has gone awry.