cashout

I usually wait till I have 2 litres left in the tank to fill up. However yesterday the station I go to was closed plus I waited until I only had .5 litres in the tank (kept forgetting to fill up). So I had to go to the next closest station and put their 98 petrol.

It wasn't until I was finished that I noticed the "Contains ethanol" stiker on the pump. I asked the attendant and he said it was a 5% blend.

Question is, how this is going to affect me 1/2 of a V6 turbo smart?

AusS2000

Won't be a problem. Not a high enough content to cause problems nor to see much benefit.

Austblue

Why do you run the tank so low? Have you had to clean your injectors since you've owned it? When I bought the ute I almost filled up on bio-diesel because I was low and it looked cheap Turns out it's not good for common rail diesels.

I'm sure Aus will be able to answer this for you but I think you're safe myself.

Austblue

Oops I kept that page open a tad too long

AusS2000

The issues with ethanol is that some older rubbers absorb it and swell up. This can lead to blockages. And when the source of ethanol is removed the rubber shrinks to a soft goo.

Newer cars are made with ethanol in mind and will be fine. Even the 2004 onwards S2000 is ethanol certified. And it won't be a major job to convert cars to ethanol at a later date.

Ethanol has a lower calorific value than petrol so you'll get less Ks per litre, and it'n no cheaper. But it has a higher octane so you can tune more aggressively.

It also doesn't emit any less CO2 than petrol but when you consider that it's product involves agriculture and plant growth involves the absorption of CO2 the net reduction is something like 70%.

On top of that, with rising oil prices and increasing interest in biofuels it won't be long before ethanol and conversion makes economical sense. Another nice thing is that it means less reliance on outside providers. Australia can grow all the cane and produce all the ethanol it needs and will probably find a nice export market too.

So whilst we can currently buy E5 (5% ethanol) and E10 (10%) it won't be long before E85 (85%) is available at the bowser.

MattG

The greenhouse benefits of Ethanol are still being debated. Some believe that once you taken into account growing the crops it has a net reducation in CO2 gasses overall.

Others believe once you consider ploughing the fields, harvesting the crops, fermenting, delivering the ethanol etc that it is still not an overall benefit.

As for economic sense. Currently in the US corn is used to make Ethanol. This has led to the prices of meat rising significantly as they are corn fed.

The Germans (Bavaria) had this Reinheitsgebot (spelling?) which was a purity law regarding the production of beer. One aim was to cut out all the crap people put in as preservatives, another was to prevent the shortage of wheat (which is used to make bread).

I would also like to know how much land would require to be used to produce enough ethanol to power the entire country's cars on 85 blend.
Given the current "water crisis" farming for fuel may not make so much sense afterall.

Yes I believe Ethanol probably is less of a pollutant, but we need to be looking at other sources of fuel, this is only a very short stop gap solution.

...
However back onto topic, as Aus said above, higher octane, less power. Shouldn't really hurt modern materials.

AusS2000

The preferred Aus stock is sugar cane. Queensland could be the next Kuwait.

cashout

It is a leftover from my days driving a Hybrid. No, I haven't had to clean the injectors at all. Only had to change the sparkplugs at 40k kms (although most other owners had to change them at 30k kms)


Also, you have to remember that 2 litres lasts me about 35 kms...