ethanol......is it bad?

[Hanno Spoelstra]

Originally Posted by Richard Farrant

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.

Hi Richard,

My remark was not about the first use of a chemical compound containing lead, rather when its use became commonplace. After WW-2, increased power demand for car engines was (also) solved by raising the compression and the revolutions per minute. This was an ongoing "race" where engine and petrol engineering go hand in hand. After raising compression and revolutions came the exhaust turbo in the 80s and today the race is on to extract even more power from smaller engines because we strive to lower CO2 and other emissions. State of the art: a 1.4 litre engine delivering 170 hp thanks to a compressor plus a turbo.

Regards,
Hanno

[sapper740]

Originally Posted by Hanno Spoelstra

After WW-2, increased power demand for car engines was (also) solved by raising the compression and the revolutions per minute. This was an ongoing "race" where engine and petrol engineering go hand in hand. After raising compression and revolutions came the exhaust turbo in the 80s and today the race is on to extract even more power from smaller engines because we strive to lower CO2 and other emissions. State of the art: a 1.4 litre engine delivering 170 hp thanks to a compressor plus a turbo.

Two points:
It's amazing the power engineers are getting out of the smaller engines these days. Case in point: I remember my old 1968 Mercury Cougar put 210hp out of a 5.0l V8 while my wife's 2007 Mazda CX7 gets 244hp from it's diminutive 2.26l four cylinder. To add to the Ethanol debate, the manufacturer warns against using fuel that is higher than 15% ethanol due to detonation, I surmise with the compression from the turbo. How this is going to play out with talk of E85 fuel in the future is beyond me. Perhaps the U.S. government will have another Cash-for-Clunkers program as so many of the vehicles currently produced won't be able to use the new fuel. Whatever they decide, I'm sure it will be based on fuzzy science such as global cooling, sorry, warming and the need to quit financing Islamic terrorism with our petro dollars.

Derek.