ethanol......is it bad?

[Ron Pier]

Cor blimey! you Muricans. Blokes are still festering in the dungeons in the Tower of London for putting red diesel in their trucks to save a few bob! Ron

[sapper740]

Originally Posted by Ron Pier

Cor blimey! you Muricans. Blokes are still festering in the dungeons in the Tower of London for putting red diesel in their trucks to save a few bob! Ron

Well, you know, I am a member of the T.E.A. Party here in the U.S. ;>)

Of course, I'm not suggesting that anyone burn 100LL in their daily commuter, asides from ruining your catalytic converter and dumping more lead into the environment, you can face fines up to $10,000.00 which would quickly eat up any savings...even at European fuel prices!
I did fill up my 1942 GPW once with Avgas when I ran out at an event at the Delta Air Park in B.C. She purred like a kitten all the way home that day.

Derek.

[Alex Blair (RIP)]

Originally Posted by sapper740

Well, you know, I am a member of the T.E.A. Party here in the U.S. ;>)

Of course, I'm not suggesting that anyone burn 100LL in their daily commuter, asides from ruining your catalytic converter and dumping more lead into the environment, you can face fines up to $10,000.00 which would quickly eat up any savings...even at European fuel prices!
I did fill up my 1942 GPW once with Avgas when I ran out at an event at the Delta Air Park in B.C. She purred like a kitten all the way home that day.

Derek.

Derek,,
Back in my old Flat head Ford stock car days we ran Av gas 130..which had a higher lead content than todays AV LL1oo..
The octane remains the same a minimum of 99..but the power was certainly there..
Aviation Gasoline 100LL, which is dyed blue for easy identification, the product replaces Aviation Gasoline 100/130. Except for the content of lead (tetraethyl lead), all specifications for both products are the same. AvGas 100/130 (which has been dyed green) can have up to 1.28 grams per liter. AvGas 100LL is limited to 0.56 grams per liter, "LL" meaning "low lead". (Although this level of lead is only half that of AvGas 100/130, it is still twice the lead content of leaded gasoline automobile allowed in the 1980s.) PetroValue AvGas 100LL meets the specifications of CAN / CGSB ASTM D910 3.25.

Was running at $1.30/liter up till July this year but haven't checked lately..Regular this morning in Ottawa is running $1.16/liter..
I would imagine AV gas is close to two bucks a liter here now..
Happy New Year

[elvis3006]

to everyone thank you for this info,and experiences regarding ethanol. i also like to take this moment and wish all a Happy New Year!!

[lynx42]

Originally Posted by Ron Pier

Cor blimey! you Muricans. Blokes are still festering in the dungeons in the Tower of London for putting red diesel in their trucks to save a few bob! Ron

Happy New Year All!!

Ron, we hired a motor home in England last year and were pulled up twice to have the contents of the fuel tank checked for RED DIESEL. The first time I didn't know what they were talking about. So it seems that it is a common(?) practice in the UK to run on farmers fuel.

Regards Rick.

[Richard Farrant]

Originally Posted by lynx42

Happy New Year All!!

Ron, we hired a motor home in England last year and were pulled up twice to have the contents of the fuel tank checked for RED DIESEL. The first time I didn't know what they were talking about. So it seems that it is a common(?) practice in the UK to run on farmers fuel.

Regards Rick.

Hi Rick,

The Excise men must have thought you were suspicious........I've never been checked !

Happy New Year to you and Jill.

regards, Richard

[Bob Carriere]

Ssshhhttttt !!!!

It occurs in Canada once in a while to run the Ford diesel on red..... seems to like the brew..... at elast $10 cheaper per refill.....

A. NoKneemuss

[Dave Page]

Hi Guys,
This gasahol thing has caused a lot of confusion, I run standard low grade fuel with an octane booster ("Blendzall", a top end lubricant of castor oil) in my Indian and my Daimler, and they both run fine. I also add stabil to the mix over winter.
There are some very intelligent articles on-line and some very misleading ones, the latter will have you buying stainless valve seats and etc.
The truth is the older engines that we run are - low-compression - so do not generate the pressures and heat that would cause valve problems in a high-compression engine. It wasn't that many years before our ww2-engined vehicles that cars were running on an alcohol and castor oil mix.
During the war both unleaded and leaded fuels were used by the military, the lead being added in very high doses to boost the octane of lower grade fuels to eliminate engine knock, this saved a lot of money and time over actually making high quality fuel for everything to run on.
OK, so you need to understand that while lead does boost the octane level it does so at a cost, that being deterioration of the valve stems from the lead salts, and other issues. Let's not even go into the health issues.

By boosting the octane level of low grade fuel you are actually - slowing - the burn rate. Low octane fuel actually burns a lot faster and tend to produce
engine knock. To put this in layman's terms, low octane produces a fast explosion, whereas high octane produces a slower explosion, the latter being
much better for your engine. Think of the piston being hammered downward with low octane rather than progressively shoved downward as with high
octane. Not everyone has access to avgas so if you use the low octane and add a booster (unleaded) and tune your engine well, she will run fine

Also, methanol has been added to petrol tanks for years to absorb condensation, it readily mixed with the petrol, and while the engine may have
coughed a bit, that nasty rusty water was eventually removed from your tank. Having to clean or replace filters was cheaper than replacing the petrol tank.

Cheers,
Dave

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by Dave Page

There are some very intelligent articles on-line and some very misleading ones, the latter will have you buying stainless valve seats and etc.
The truth is the older engines that we run are - low-compression - so do not generate the pressures and heat that would cause valve problems in a high-compression engine. It wasn't that many years before our ww2-engined vehicles that cars were running on an alcohol and castor oil mix.
During the war both unleaded and leaded fuels were used by the military, the lead being added in very high doses to boost the octane of lower grade fuels to eliminate engine knock, this saved a lot of money and time over actually making high quality fuel for everything to run on.

I've been reading up on the subject in the past and a good source, among others, is a chapter on the subject in Dr. Ulrich von Pidoll's book "Kaefer: Ein Auto schreibt Geschichte" (Hamburg: Nikol, 1996, ISBN 3-930656-36-1).

Indeed, lead was not added to car petrol until after WW-2. Also, during the war, when the race for higher power output from aircraft engines was in full swing, it was found that by adding lead to petrol the octane rating could be raised (i.e. petrol became more resistant to spontaneous combustion). Thus higher compression ratios and supercharging became possible.

After WW-2, increased power output for car engines was also solved by raising the compression and the revolutions per minute. Adding lead again solved the pre-detonation problem (although up until the 1960s other additives were also used for this purpose). The advantage of lead additives is that after being burned, they act like a solid lubricant on the exhaust valves and seats, and thus reduce the amount of wear over a given period. (The process is comparable to the use of white metal in engine bearings.)

Now that leaded petrol is banned (for our own health), what can we do?

1) fit induction hardened valve seats and valves when rebuilding the engine. This is recommended by the Dutch Federation of Historic Car Clubs, as the cost of hardened seats and valves is only slightly higher than non-hardened ones, and is simply the most durable solution.

But what if we have an engine which is not yet due for a rebuild?

2) Dr. Von Pidoll quotes a 1986 SAE technical paper. A number of SAE tests (incl. one on Army vehicles) proved that the wear on valve seats and valves with unleaded petrol is not noticeably higher (compared with leaded petrol) if the engine is operated under 3,000 rpm.

My own opinion is that the latter is a good tip, as 1940s and 1950s MV engines are rarely operated above 3,000 rpm. over long periods.

HTH,
Hanno

[Richard Farrant]

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

Indeed, lead was not added to car petrol until after WW-2.

A number of SAE tests (incl. one on Army vehicles) proved that the wear on valve seats and valves with unleaded petrol is not noticeably higher (compared with leaded petrol) if the engine is operated under 3,000 rpm.

My own opinion is that the latter is a good tip, as 1940s and 1950s MV engines are rarely operated above 3,000 rpm. over long periods.

hi Hanno,

I must just comment on the first use of "lead" in car petrol. It was General Motors in the USA who came up with it in the early 1920's and produced the additive with an oil company. It was Tetra ethyl lead, or TEL. It was added to petrol in the UK in the early part of 1930's, I think from memory that you could buy petrol with or without. During WW2, in UK, TEL was added again for military use, in such large quantities, that it actually produced valve problems, and a number of modifications had to be done to engines of military vehicles during the last part of the war.

When leaded was phased out in the UK, a number of lead replacement additive were marketed here and laboratory tests were done at the motor industry research site, using BMC A series engines, the top performer being one called Superblend Zero 2000, which I have used ever since. The fact about engines running below 3000 rpm and not heavily loaded not suffering, was also made during the tests. As it is, I have not come across any noticeable rise in vehicles with valve problems, not like it was in years gone by, when decokes and burnt valves were a common occurance.