ethanol......is it bad?

[Alex Blair (RIP)]

Originally Posted by elvis3006

ok so lead was bad,but it helped lubricate the engine. we no longer use lead,so what can we do or use to protect and lubricate engines when using ethanol fuel, besides a lead additive? a mixture of stabil and automatic transmission fluid?

If you really want to see some of the differences,study up on Formula 1 racing(Europe) and IRL(Indy Racing League)..United States and study the performance of both cars and fuels..
The IRL runs on Methanol...the Formula 1 cars run on Petrol,with some ethanol..
Here are some of the HP developed by methanol fuel on IRL cars..

http://members.fortunecity.com/1acci...eld_guide.html

An interesting fact is that the teams can not open up the engines or repair or tinker with them at all..strange as it seems but the engine manufacturer is the only one that can play with the engines..I ,as an old school mechanic ,asked my son in law about tinkering with the engines and he said that they are factory sealed and you would only break the seal if you had a death wish..they can pull them out and change the engine complete but not open them at all..(He is a a Racing car engineer in Indianapolis,who is on a team there and lives there and is starting to teach a course to other mechanical engineers at the University there ,on a part time basis)so knows his stuff..
I was surprised to learn that they actually have university courses to teach mechanical engineers how to be Racing car engineers in Indianapolis...


Specifications:
Engine: 3.5 L V8 Normally Aspirated
Horsepower: 650+
Wheelbase: 122in. / 309.9cm
Overall Length: 193.74in. / 492.1cm
Overall Width: 79.55in. / 202.1cm
Overall Height: 37.3in. / 94.7cm
Minimum Weight: 1585lb / 719kg
Habitat: Seen only on Oval courses in the United States. Their main roosting place is the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Feeding: Methanol

[Dave Page]

Hi Guys,
As was mentioned, if the engine is operating over 3,000 rpm for - extended periods - then some wear would occur, this would still happen even if you were running with a period fuel mix. Modern engines have been designed to withstand running with throttles wide open at highway speeds for extended periods, they also have much higher compression ratios.
The very high temperatures are only generated at the wide open throttle settings. This does not mean you cannot operate your WW2 vehicle above 3,000 rpm for short or reasonable periods, after all, different engine designs ( porting for instance) tuning and etc will produce differences in internal temperature. Just don't try and drive as if it were a modern vehicle capable of modern road speeds, they were not designed for it and cannot stop as do modern vehicles. We have seen the ugly results of that.
If you want to witness the heat generated even by a low compression engine, drive a cmp up a long steep climb at night with the engine cover off. At full throttle under load the exhaust manifold will start to glow red, then orange, then yellow. Not sure those in Holland have access to hills for this test.
Enjoy them while in your care,
Dave

[Skoda boy]

I work for a very large namelss company whose main buisness is repairing petrol bowsers here in Australia. Having seen the damage E10 does to pumps, lines and tanks I would not use the stuff even if it was free!

[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.