Quote:
Originally Posted by 10splaya22
Its better for boosted cars or cars with high compression engines since it resists detonation better. Hence the reason why cars running lots of boost need to run race fuel or e85 and are able to make more power. Yes if you don't have the high compression or boost you will lose mileage due to the lower energy content in the higher ethanol fuels.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by 370Z Purist
E85 is effective because it is largely ethanol, and has an octane number greater than octane itself, so yeah, anti-detonation qualities are good.
Unfortunately, for the regular joe (or anyone who runs pump fuel), 15% ethanol fuels will probably mean we pay the same price for less gasoline and more grain alcohol/moonshine in our fuel, lower fuel economy, while maintaining mildly better emissions at the loss of power.
In other words, this is terrible news and I would go with pure gasoline if it were still to be found.
I'm sure a professional tuner could figure out a way to change engine characteristics to make more use of the high octane numbers, but unless someone figures out an effective compression ratio updated to use E15 (perhaps a 11.5 or a 12 to 1) to preserve the literature value of crank horsepower, the next generations of Zs might have a lower power output merely due to the change in fuel. If only we have something like SkyActiv... that **** is crazy. 14:1?
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So let me get this straight, as you two seem to know what you're talking about. Ethanol is actually higher octane/more powerful, but it resists detonation more than regular gasoline? Therefore you need a higher compression ratio to make it explode properly/usable?
I'm guessing our engines aren't high compression enough for ethanol to be better for it, but for high compression engines ethanol is actually better?
p.s. Please pardon my ignorance
