Ethenol vs Octane

[Mike Ard]

Filled up our Jeep this morning at the new non ehtenol station here in Boise. They have premium but is only rated at 90 octane. While cost is not an issue it is also much more expensive than the premium at Chevron rated at 92 octane but has ethenol.

Just thought I would throw that out and see what others think.

Hope to get my F3 soon......hand brake is supposed to be about ready, in the meantime we are going out to Greenleaf to meet the mother of the German Shepard pup we put a deposit on. Pup's should be ready by the end of August.

[BikerDoc]

Good luck with the pup.. I would guess the 90 octane non ethanol would give you better performance than the so called 92 octant with ethanol... why not run a test for 500 mile each and tell us what you think... non ethanol is too hard to find around here for me to run that test for more than a tankful at a time

[GOZFST]

My Buell S1 Lightning goes about 40 miles further on pure premium over any octane ethanol. We have a number of stations here in Rapid that carry non oxygenated premium.

[Chupaca]

The non stuff is really rare around here but the RS runs wildly on full racing fuel.. that stuff is expensive but fun....

[jwulf74]

Luckily the stations here generally have nonethanol premium. All the other octanse have it. I run 91 nonethanol in the Spyders, my CTSV, the lawn mower, snowblower, trimmer, pressure washer... the only think I put ethanol in is the truck and only because it will run E85... but in never use that...just 87 and 89 with ethanol.

Our state produces a lot of it, but I would rather see it go away and the crop land be used for food production instead...

[Gray Ghost]

Ethanol is used as an octane booster. I articles I have seen on it estimate that it adds about 4 octane points to the gas, so 87 octane is getting about 83 octane from gas, 4 octane from ethanol. The other issue with ethanol is that if you get moisture in your tank, the ethanol, being attracted to water, will separate from the gas and mix with the water (phase separation). It also deteriorates as it ages, while pure gas does not. Given the choice I will always use non-ethanol in my small engine machinery.

[CanAmChris]

Never had a chance to run pure gas in the Spyder. I did it once in Vermont on the Harley and the bike loved it. I wish I could find some non-corn gas in SE PA.

[Bob Denman]

Try around the Boat Marinas...

[Gray Ghost]

I wish I could find some non-corn gas in SE PA.

http://pure-gas.org/

[Dan McNally]

During my cross country trip to Tucson, I found many gas stations which sold gas with no ethanol out west. . .

I consistently got 30 MPG at highway speed when the tank had been filled a couple times with pure gas with no ethanol, vs. the 26 or 27 MPG when using 10% ethanol . . .

that is slightly over 10% better gas mileage . . . which means we are, buying 10 gallons of ethanol/gas mix for every 9 gallons of gas we really need.

Washington and the lobbyists have screwed this nation . . . food prices are up as a result of farmers who grow corn for ethanol, rather than other crops they used to grow, in order to get the subsidies the tax payers give them, and the taxpayers are also subsidizing the folks who produce ethanol . . . so we buy 10% more gas than we need, pay taxes on that extra gas, and pay taxes to subsidize the entire ethanol producing process . . . just to get poorer gas mileage.

Can someone explain why any member of Congress ever gets re-elected?

[Genet]

Good luck with the pup.. I would guess the 90 octane non ethanol would give you better performance than the so called 92 octant with ethanol... why not run a test for 500 mile each and tell us what you think... non ethanol is too hard to find around here for me to run that test for more than a tankful at a time

Wawa seems to be having more and more stations with ethanol free gas.
there is one on 1792 in kissimmee now offered it. It's a little more than regular.
i haven't tried it yet,was not sure if it would be ok to run, but now that I have read that is ok,I'll get it on my next fill up

[CanAmChris]

Wawa seems to be having more and more stations with ethanol free gas.
there is one on 1792 in kissimmee now offered it. It's a little more than regular.
i haven't tried it yet,was not sure if it would be ok to run, but now that I have read that is ok,I'll get it on my next fill up

Story of my life. Wawa is based out of SE PA and I can't go 5 or 10 miles without going past one... but they don't sell corn free gas up here.

[CanAmChris]

http://pure-gas.org/

Thanks for the link Ghost, I did find that site and the closest one to me that sells anything other then 100 octane is 20 miles one way. I would love to use the 100 octane racing fuel but last I checked, it is at least $10 a gallon and that would add up fast.

[BLUEKNIGHT911]

Thanks for the link Ghost, I did find that site and the closest one to me that sells anything other then 100 octane is 20 miles one way. I would love to use the 100 octane racing fuel but last I checked, it is at least $10 a gallon and that would add up fast.

Chris do yourself a big financial favor .....Google OCTANE and read up on it .......Knowledge is REAL power........Mike

[CanAmChris]

Chris do yourself a big financial favor .....Google OCTANE and read up on it .......Knowledge is REAL power........Mike

Thanks Mike, I am very familiar with octane ratings.

A nice synapses can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octane_rating

I am more worried about the corn based ethanol additives and the impact they have. It is anecdotal evidence to be sure, but my bike sure did feel like it was much happier without the ethanol.

[petegtsv10]

Thanks for the link Ghost, I did find that site and the closest one to me that sells anything other then 100 octane is 20 miles one way. I would love to use the 100 octane racing fuel but last I checked, it is at least $10 a gallon and that would add up fast.

You will see NO benefits from 100 octane. The ECU will not adjust timing for that and the F3 compression doesn't need it at all.

[CanAmChris]

You will see NO benefits from 100 octane. The ECU will not adjust timing for that and the F3 compression doesn't need it at all.

I know, I just don't want the ethanol. As I said in my post, the only non-ethanol lower then 100 octane I can get is 20 miles away from home. I can get Sunoco 260 racing fuel two miles away but it does me no good and costs almost three time as much.

Sorry if I am causing a misunderstanding here but octane is not my concern. Ethanol is.