Gains from E85 (ethanol) on an N/A bolt on 370Z

Elmo370z

Thats expected. Im talking about what he gained. OP's set up could never touch his set up in terms of gains on e85

RogueZ817

Great set-up... Mike at Moto-East installed this on a family members supercharged BRZ, works great! The car was also tuned with EcuTek...

jrb55gh

Vit, I am really intrigued by your running 100% e85 with stock fuel system. I would like to try it in my stock but ECUTEK tuned 370z. I am tuned for 93 octane. My data logs at part throttle show that the ecu is trying to run stoichiometric air-fuel ratio as normal. At WOT the afr across the rpm band holds at 11.99.

AT WOT can I run 100% E85 or a high percentage like 75% E85. I assume the fuel trims can adjust to the E85 at part throttle.

TwinTurboZ

I'm surprised that nobody has talked about the reason you don't run E85 in a car that wasn't designed for it. Yes, you can put it in, tune and run, however ethanol in high concentration is caustic to synthetic plastics, and will compromise the integrity of fuel lines, fuel pumps, and rubber components.

E85 cars from the factory use different fuel system components that will tolerate the higher ethanol percentages.

You can put it in and run it without the E85 conversion, but you will eventually have failures of the fuel system.

TwinTurboZ

I see this on most 370z dynos. What is the wobble in the torque and power curve? I feel it on my car too between 2,000 and 3,000 RPM. What did Nissan do here?

thewobble.PNG

synolimit

Ethanol is already in gasoline though. So a little or a lot, things should fail over time which they haven't. Phunks been running it straight for years and is fine. In fact all cars in this decade can run it. The difference you speak of is like my Regal GS. Everything is the same BUT an ethanol sensor which it didn't have. Buick doesn't make every Regal different with all new lines, seals etc. flex fuel cars just have the stuff available to be flexible. Check into the Subaru world. I know guys running 100k and running strong. I mean if they fail at 200k is that really a failure or an old part that let go? Only failures I've seen are 90's cars when ethanol wasn't in gasoline and therefor the lines were different. Running e85 in those will break the lines down and cause the gross black sludge in the filter sock which picks it up.

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13 370z-

Spooler

IF you are upgrading everything to do a TT, such a big nut, what is the $500 extra dollars it takes to upgrade everything. Tune with Ecuteck and all is good. Very small price to pay in my book.

jrb55gh

I filled my tank with a ~47% ethanol/ gasoline mix to see what would happen. I data logged a short time after the fill up with my ecutek software and noted the differences at full and part throttle.

The short term fuel trims increased 10-15%. Long term trims hadn’t moved yet. I guess they will after some more run time. So far there is no check engine light.

At part throttle the ethanol mix showed about the same afr for 93 octane, ~14.5. That indicates the ecu adjusted the fueling to maintain the O2 level in the exhaust to what it thought was stoich for straight 93 octane.

Full throttle showed ~12.5 afr. The normal full throttle afr for 93 octane with my tune is 11.97. That indicates the ecu followed the hard programmed fueling tables for full throttle operation. This is a quick way to lean your full throttle tune.

Ignition correction (because of knock detection?) was ~3 degrees was the same for both fuels. I am not sure if the retard was because of knock or a retard built into the ignition tables because of our 100 degree F. summer temps. I thought the extra ethanol would have increased the octane level of the fuel to prevent knock. Its time to google the octane levels of various ethanol gasoline mixes to get that answer.

Hard to tell about performance gain. Butt dyno says same or maybe slightly better response. If the ignition correction would go away, there should be a performance gain.

The E85 here is $1.59 and the 93 octane is $2.29. Looks like fuel mileage will be lower.

So far running 47% ethanol appears to be safe.

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Ecutek | DIY HR350 upper plenum | DIY ported lower manifold | TurboXS cbe | FI rhfc

jrb55gh

My butt dyno feels ethanol power gains similar to Vitviper’s dyno. With my Ecutek tune there is a performance gain with 47% ethanol compared to 93 octane E10. I have filled up with the 47% combination twice with a thankful of 93 octane in between. I have confirmed the more powerful “feel” twice.

The car definitely feels faster even at part throttle with the ethanol blend. When calling for a little extra torque, the amount of throttle pedal movement required is less with the ethanol blend. The extra torque available at light throttle has reduced the number of situations where a downshift is required in stop and go traffic.

During full throttle acceleration the car rips through the gears more quickly than with 93 octane.

In summary at 100 degrees F the ethanol blend performs about the same 93 octane at 80 degrees F. Below 60 degrees F this much ethanol may not be a good idea because the fuel required to maintain the afr at full throttle may exceed the stock injectors’ capability. But at summer temperatures high concentrations of ethanol offer a nice pick me up.

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Ecutek | DIY HR350 upper plenum | DIY ported lower manifold | TurboXS cbe | FI rhfc