First of all, there is no 'explosion' going on in your combustion chamber. Sometimes there is, they call that pre-detonation or pinging and can really screw up your pistons, head gaskets, and all kinds of stuff.

As far as higher octane gasoline, it burns hotter than a lower octane. It's less likely to ping in higher compression engines, and when your engine is tuned for it, it will give more horsepower and slightly better gas mileage.

But if you read my entire statement, you'd see that I didn't mention octane. E85 might be rated at a higher octane than standard 87 gasoline, but it's not the same. E85, per volume, contains 72% of the energy that gasoline contains. Which simply means that it's a less-efficient fuel and worse at creating power to push your pistons down.

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And yes, you probably can't burn tire anymore because of the E85.

 

Rember,your TAXES are subsidizing the price of E85. Notice any price increase on meat,cornflakes.or anything made with corn ? Corn prices are rising because of the switch to E85.
It ain't as great as the spindoctors say it is. Around here it's E15;85% gas & 15% ethanol so us folks with out flexfuel vehicles can contribute to the "feelgood" folks.

 

Give me a break. Of course it will. Supply & demand. Basic economics. Just like the lack of bread and milk at the grocery store before a snow storm. Would you rather send your money overseas to country's that are building islands in the shapes of palm trees, or give it to our farmers HERE in the good ol' U.S. of A? Don't know about you, but I would pay the price to be self sufficient and not depend on oil from elsewhere.

 

What were you filling up that took 50 gallons?

 

Dunno about out there but around here farmers are loving the $4.50 per bushel corn, beats the heck out of the $1.50 it was a couple years ago when a lot of people were either selling out or thinking about it. I bet you liked that though because your cereal was cheap. Fuel prices would be higher yet without ethanol, since everyone that runs now ethonal would then be running straight gas.

I bet at one point in time it took more than a gallon of gasoline to make a gallon of gasoline too, you have to practice something for a while to get good at it.

 

Or how about this? Get the friggen dumbocrats out of office so we can drill the oil we have here, and allow more refineries to be built? This is the reason the price of gas is so high. Don't deny it either. That is total fact. ethanol is a pipe dream. Corn prices WILL rise to an unacceptable level, and ethenol causes more smog. It isn't as clean as they lead you to believe. And the fact that a vehicle has to use so much more ethenol than gasoline to get the same power, it exabarates the problems.

 

deapee bud i wasnt knockin anything you were saying, and i never would for i'm about as ignorant as they come to engines yet. i just remembered what i had read and nothing about what you said about the spark and stuff so i thought i'd throw that out there and see where my confusions were. consequently, i found this pretty neat page for anyone else in my shoes.

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/question90.htm

 

I know...I was just trying to help you out. I re-read what I said, and now I realize that I came off wrong when I said "first of all" -- all I meant by that was first on my list to discuss real quick. My bad.

 

switching back to 87, or maybe premium to try that out, otherwise, thanks for the advice all

 

Good eye Norm, I was just wondering the same thing myself.

So basically the math here is you're saving AT MOST 10% buying E85 and getting 35% worse mileage. Hmmm, I'm no calculus whiz but I'd say that for it to make sense to burn E85 it would look something like this: savings > drop in mileage. Maybe this is just another tax on stupid people?

 

Well at least the farmers aren't flying planes into skyscapers or tryin' to set off a dirty bomb down at the local mall or killin' our soldiers...

as far as "just another tax on stupid people" I think that would be payin' billions of dollars a year to OPEC...

 

you guys need to stop complaining about bad gas mileage, less power and more smog cause thats never been the selling point of e85. its an alternative fuel, just like all the hybrids out now. we need to be less dependant on oil and help out our countrys farmers. and yes the price of corn will continue to rise but so is the price of gas.

 

i'm not singling out anyone, but seriously, research both positions from multiple sources before forming an opinion, and especially before posting said opinion

few things are black and white, and this particular issue happens to reveal many shades of grey between a pro and con position

ethanol as an auto fuel for the u.s. is not without merit, see cellulose-derivative varieties

nor is ethanol going to save us from the terrorists, see studies of predicted corn shortage as relating to world hunger, drought

in the age of the soundbyte, it's easy to get bored

 

Tru dat yo!