scottmphoto

Non-ethanol locations:

www.pure-gas.org

MonacaYankee

Yep it's so awesome the government has to subsidize and mandate it. Not to mention it has half the energy of real gas, clogs carbs, soaks up water, and eats fuel system lines.
But it's awesome apparently

dmill89

It depends on the kind of ethanol and what it is being used in. Ethanol from more efficient sources (such as sugarcane, or ag-waste/grass if they ever prefect that process) in engines specifically designed to run it and fuel systems specifically designed to handle it (such as what they have in Brazil) does make sense.


Corn ethanol is completely asinine, it takes more energy (most of which comes from "dirty" off-road Diesel non-emissions farm equipment and coal-fired power plants) to produce than it yields, and can do damage to engines/fuel systems not specifically designed for it (virtually all small equipment engines and most older automotive engines). Not to mention its effects on food supplies/prices and the fact that it incentivizes to plow/plant more land doing even more environmental and ecological damage, increased use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, etc..


Corn ethanol is not sustainable either environmentally or economically (without govt. subsidies and mandates) and has no business being in the US fuel supply.

salad

^^^ This. North American ethanol is a complete scam that only benefits corn farmers. Burning food for fuel while farm land is constantly being turned into suburbs is absolutely insane. Especially with such a low energy density and high processing requirement.

joe652

Yeah I've noticed it here in Ohio too. I just try not to accelerate as fast and take it easy on my jeep.

jedijeb

I will agree that corn ethanol is a bad idea as a fuel from every perspective for us here in the US. The one thing that most people mistakenly believe is that it helps farmers get rich. In the end farmers get very little of the subsidies and incentives, most go to the ethanol producers and are eaten up by the middle men in the markets. Currently farmers are getting around $4.50 per bushel of corn, in 1970 they were getting around $2.50 per bushel. Since that time land, fuel, labor and equipment prices have gone up something like 7-10X while what they sell, corn, wheat, cattle, ect has gone up maybe 2X-3X.

I won't rant on, because I could go on for days, but the media really gives a bad deal to farmers on subjects like this.

salad

Appreciated - thank you for the perspective.

kikstand454

All of this is very informative and enlightening!

But to the OP- ill bet 5 bucks that your fuel mileage is actually due to the cold weather reducing the air pressure in your tires. Go outside and check it. I bet its less than 20lbs.

Air them all back up and enjoy your gas mileage on me!

joe652

Hahaha that is a great point but the cold can also affect your lines causing more pressure needed meaning less power and more consumption. Just keep you tank above 1/4 and you'll be golden.

kikstand454

This too!

jedijeb

They are still at about 32psi cold, I keep an eye on them because I don't like uneven wear. When I first saw lower gas mileage that was the first thing I checked, because it used to happen to me in the pickup. They max out at 35psi or I would take them up even more.

Before all the snow here it had dropped to 14mpg, temps were still in teh 40-50F range. With the snow it drops to about 10mpg but that is because I can't get up to 40mph to get the torque converter to lock up. When the roads are clear though it is now down to 12mpg. Waiting to see if it gets better once summer arrives.

On a side note, would fixing a vacuum leak ever make mileage worse instead of better? I found a small hole in the line going from the PCV into the bottom of the carburetor and replaced that line, but I think it had gotten bad a month after I fixed that.

jedijeb

Well back again, warmer weather and possibly the change to summer blend has begun.

I ran several tanks averaging 12-13mpg, then I got a tank that was just over 14mpg. Thought it might be a fluke but the next was right there with it. Weekend before last I filled up on my way to visit my parents, 120 mile trip from that station to their house and back, all two lane country roads with I think 3 stop signs all the way. When I got back to that same station I averaged 17.4mpg on the round trip. Filled up there again and drove on home and after a week and a half of driving to work through some stoplights in my small town I got 16.2mpg.

Seems maybe there is something to the mileage drop due to different blends. Going to keep an eye on it over the next few weeks and use different stations to see if it averages out with higher mileage on both vehicles. I am hoping for that near 20mpg I got last summer

If it was the different blends that caused the problem, then that means I lost 30% or more of my mpg when using the winter blend versus the summer blend.

Twinfin

In the winter I get roughly 15
In the summer I get roughly 15
On the highway I get roughly 15
On the city I get roughly 15
In 4wd.... I get 8

Bustedback

Gasoline has 128,000 BTUs, where as E10 has only about 95,000 BTUs. The higher the BTU rating the more energy the fuel has. E10 has less energy so it requires more fuel to do the same amount of work as gasoline. It's also harder to ignite because it has less carbon atoms. The carbon atoms help carry the spark across the spark plug gap because carbon is conductive. So how is ethanol fuel better than gasoline? It's only good for the government, not the consumer.

MonacaYankee

It's all feel-good tree hugger crap. The gov. Loves it because they get the same tax per gallon of e0 while we get less less mile per gallon of e10 ethanol crap.