servion

I have been tuning a fair number of cars lately owned by people who want to run E85, and I have been getting excellent results. Well, I finally got a change to do some back-to-back tuning on a single setup with no changes to the car except the fuel and tuning. This is pretty cool.

The setup is:
-100% stock H22 (still in a prelude)
-JRSC (a.k.a. the "hot-air blower")
-3" exhaust, no cat
-NepTune

The car was completely tuned for full-throttle as well as partial throttle all on the dyno, first on 91 octane and then on e85. No other changes were made to the setup, and all the tuning was done on the same day.

With this car, we used NepTune's pimp map-switching feature to build 2 different sets of maps: one for 91 and one for E85. So this car is 100% tuned using both fuel types, and all the owner has to do to switch between gas and E85 is to run the tank low, fill up with the desired fuel and flip the switch to the proper setting.

The first dyno sheet is the corrected hp and torque numbers. Since we are at a very high altitude here in Colorado Springs, Colorado, the correction is pretty high.

-It gained approximately 20whp with no changes but the fuel and tuning. Check out the torque gain across the board, the entire torque curve was shifted up significantly.

The second dyno sheet is the best guess equivalent to uncorrected dynojet horsepower along with the air/fuel reading.


- The engine coolant temps were on average 15 degrees cooler.
- The Exhaust gas temps were on average 200 degrees cooler.

The engine wanted approximately 4 degrees more ignition timing across the board with the alcohol. As you can see, I was able to run this car with a leaner lambda-based air/fuel ratio due to the main fact that E85 burns cooler, so it can be safely run with a relatively leaner a/f (not to mention that it has a much higher octane rating than 91). So, even though the car is using a much richer a/f ratio, the equivalent lambda reading is lower.

I plan to tune my SFWD car using NepTune's map switching feature on both racegas and E85 in the next couple of weeks... I am very curious too see exactly what kind of power this fuel will safely support in my personal car. I will post results as soon as I have them

The owner of this car will let me know on his fuel-economy difference with the alcohol as soon as he finishes a tank, but so far he says that it is not nearly as different as he expected. Although the car wanted 25-30% more fuel to reach the same equivalent lambda a/f ratios, it did not need that much at WOT because it is now running a leaner lambda value, and he is making more torque across the board in the partial throttle areas as well, which means that he should need to use the throttle less to get the same rate of acceleration he did with gas. But that will be dictated by driving style, and this guys likes to floor it lol

tony1

Great test! I've been wondering about this for a while. I haven't seen E85 at the pumps around here yet to test with.

Justin Olson

Sweet, I can't wait for E85 to make it to oregon.

Justin

Kelly.

pimp ****

i see jaysons car has taken the place of mine as the "hey lets test this out" car

what size injectors is he running?
any idea what the max power on e85 would be (on his car specifically, since i know all motors are different)

maybe we should go e85 on mine, see if we can squeeze alittle more power out of "pump gas"

Hyaboosta

Was any modification needed on the fuel system? Or only change the fuel?

SL0WEGG

Sick. I'm definatly converting to e85!!

david@didrace.com

Good stuff.

E85 definetly does run cooler.

SL0WEGG

i hear it smells good too.

Turbogixxer

Any Idea if this is the winter or summer blend?

Great test.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Kelly. &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">any idea what the max power on e85 would be</TD></TR></TABLE>

E85 has a octane rating of 100-105. But, the thing is, they have summer blends ( 85% ethanol, 15% 87 gas, thats why they call it E85) and winter blends (70% ethanol, 30% 87 gas). So puching the limits, you would know what you are getting

teg racer 877

nice work, what shop you at? Im up in monument, will the map switching work on hondata? If so I may want to come down and do this to my car, (ls-t), just pm me with a phone number, address whatever.

seen4ever

that's pretty amazing. good test as well.

servion

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Hyaboosta &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Was any modification needed on the fuel system? Or only change the fuel?</TD></TR></TABLE>

All we did was crank up the base fuel pressure a bit and tune. Still an intank walbro, nothing special about the injectors, all stock lines.

Kelly.

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Turbogixxer &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">
E85 has a octane rating of 100-105. But, the thing is, they have summer blends ( 85% ethanol, 15% 87 gas, thats why they call it E85) and winter blends (70% ethanol, 30% 87 gas). So puching the limits, you would know what you are getting </TD></TR></TABLE>

thanks,
i didnt realize there was a summer or a winter blend.
i am maxxing out 100 octane (pump gas) and thought since e85 was ~105oct i may be able to push it alittle more.
i dont even know if we get a winter blend here in vegas

servion

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Kelly. &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

thanks,
i didnt realize there was a summer or a winter blend.
i am maxxing out 100 octane (pump gas) and thought since e85 was ~105oct i may be able to push it alittle more.
i dont even know if we get a winter blend here in vegas </TD></TR></TABLE>

I am not sure if/who/where/when the E70 thing kicks in... but I think it will be something that will have to be researched for each person's specific area/gas station.


Kelly since you're alrealy pretty much maxing out your 750cc's alreay, you would need to step up to bigger ones at least But you would make more power on E85... but if you build it I'll tuned it! You should go try to run a 10 on gas first lol

eh3 93

Did a quick search on where to find E85 in my area, San Diego. There are 4 E85 fueling stations in California with only one being public and it happens to be here about 10-15 min. away. Can't wait to get my car together.


Modified by eh3 93 at 2:18 AM 7/26/2006

Kevin

This stuff looks really promising for performance vehicles. We do not have an e85 station here in south florida so i wont be using it anytime soon. I wonder if its possible to purchase it in barrels for race applications.

Justin Olson

Its really expensive to purchase ethanol by the barrel as it comes in 98% pure denatured ethanol. I think its around $5-6 a gallon when buying a 55 gallon drum.

Regards,
Justin

Boosted B6teen

Well, where the current gas prices are headed ethanol will gain popularity, not to mention it is much less destructive to our environment. Glad to see someone finnaly did a comparison between the two (E85 v. 91oct) on a "performance" vehicle. Good work sevion!! E85 will be powering my new set-up also

tegedrex

Nice Jeremy, youve been talking aout the E85 for a whle glad to see you got the test done. This should be a sticky

Full-Race Geoff

that is sooooooooo cool. we just started getting it in phoenix, i cant wait to tune all our cars on it

i honestly think this fuel is the future of ic engines

yee SERIOUS

iTrader: (1)

e85 huh? i better do some further research

Dunc

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by servion &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">

All we did was crank up the base fuel pressure a bit and tune. Still an intank walbro, nothing special about the injectors, all stock lines.

</TD></TR></TABLE>

Did you log the runs? If so, what was the injector duty cycle on the gas vs. E85?

Kevin

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Justin Olson &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Its really expensive to purchase ethanol by the barrel as it comes in 98% pure denatured ethanol. I think its around $5-6 a gallon when buying a 55 gallon drum.</TD></TR></TABLE>

No pre-mix 85% in barrels? I guess it defeats the purpose anyhow.

LeGeND4LiFe

Awesome test and nice results

Too bad there's no E85 publicly accessible around here

I wonder what the difference would be compared to 93 octane?

alpha

Thanks for posting the dyno results. Interesting to say the least. I'm less concerned with fuel consumption / gas mileage but it's something I would like to hear about. They began building an E85 factory here in Tampa earlier this year. We should have access to E85 within five years they said