E85 Powered VR4?

[Ondontii]

While I dont really know that "wet" fuel pumps are going to fail in e85. Seems to me people get away with using walbros in the stuff.

You an always run a gravity feed and external pump. Supra guy here has a Weldon that can flow enough for about 1000hp worth of e85.

[a2j]

Originally Posted by 91vr4n00maxima

read the thread.


specifically post 103

yes a single supra will be enough until you upgrade turbos.

well, I'm not doing it just for now and this moment. I'll upgrade turbos eventually. I don't feel like buying 450cc now, 550cc next month, and 660cc next year. thats like waste of money. I just wanted to know biggest injector size that single supra pump can support with e85.

[leet]

Originally Posted by Ondontii

While I dont really know that "wet" fuel pumps are going to fail in e85. Seems to me people get away with using walbros in the stuff.

You an always run a gravity feed and external pump. Supra guy here has a Weldon that can flow enough for about 1000hp worth of e85.

the DSM shop I used to live by used walbros all the time with E85

[Ondontii]

As far as I am concerned, OEM treats E85 like its methanol but.....

Ethanol is nothing like methanol and e85 has petrol in it. Methanol eats up those viton seals. Methanol absorbs massive quantities of water and rusts your fuel lines from the inside. etc etc. About the worse thing I can think of for ethanol is that like any akly, it wont lubricate (it will actually clean off) your cylinder walls so if you have a cylinder misfiring or not completely combusting, you will ruin your rings. Luckily we do have some gasoline in that fuel and you hopefully avoid driving your car with a misfire.

All those E85 % sensors are meant to help the car deal with various mixes of gasoline and e85.

When you build an E85 car, you dont need that stuff because you are ONLY putting E85 in the car unless you have a couple safe tunes that you can swap over to when you dilute the E85 (and I would avoid that for safeties sake).

As far as I know, Dodge Flex fuel cars in the early 90's used basically the same fuel pumps as the turbo cars but had stainless fuel rails (not really necessary) and 20% larger injectors then the turbo cars (also not necessary because they didnt have turbos and made jack for power.

The flex fuel cars were seriously overbuilt even in the early 90's. They had 300hp worth of fuel injectors for a 90 hp car. Honestly that is horrible engineering.

I dont think you follow their example, but you follow the example of shops building awesome E85 cars that run hapilly on the street.

If you feel to lazy to maintain your fuel system parts then you probably should avoid building your car alltogether.

[a2j]

well I'm just tryin to decide which injectors should I get.

i.e. I wont get 660cc IF fuel pump wont be able to pump enough e85 for them.

[91vr4n00maxima]

ethanol is also hygroscopic.


they also sell oil to help with the lube problems. or you could use a few ounces of marvel mystery oil

[TiberiusTribun]

Does anyone know exactly what our fuel tank and the under car fuel lines are made of and wether they're E85 resistant on the long run?

[a2j]

I dont think e85 can damage fuel lines. if your car was made in early 90's and up, you're good to go.

[dlabonte]

Ok here are some links for you guys to review about running E85 in our cars.
First off I would like to point out that just because you read that some one is running E85 in a DSM or Evo does not make it safe. The auto manufactures incur additional cost and engineering expense to properly design a FFV. They would not be incurring these cost if it was not necessary.

Now, don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with using E85 and cutting into the oil companies pocket books. E85 has an octane rating of 100-105, so you can run more boost and make more power. You just need to run about 30% more fuel due to its lower energy content then dino fuel.

If you are going to use E85 Do it safely The last thing I want to read about is some member of this forum that was hurt or killed from running E85 in an improper setup.

Here is a link from the DoE that gives a good overview of what is needed in a FFV.

http://www.eere.energy.gov/afdc/pdfs/41597.pdf

Let me point your attention to the car photo on the second page. You will note that to be E85 compatible a FFV needs a spark arrestor in the fill hole. Why? Because E85 is more conductive then gasoline. This is why I recommend not using a wet pump with E85. Ever get out of your car and get an electric shock when you touch the door? Now imagine going to the filling station and you don't ground your self, you open the fill cap and discharge your self on the metal tube of the fill spout and create a spark. Boom. Also, if a fuel is conductive, you don't want to be exposing it to a high current motor or you are just asking for trouble.

Look around the photo and you will see a few other issues that need to be addressed for E85 compatibility in addition to greater fuel flow capacity.

Here is another link to vehicles that are currently rated for use as FFV

http://www.cleanairchoice.org/outdoo...elVehicles.asp

Don't see the Stealth listed or any other Mitsubishi vehicles.

Also you need to remember that our fuel line travels right over the passenger side exhaust pipe. If the fuel line dries out and cracks you are going to have fuel on that hot pipe. I have a section of stock fuel line from my 94 VR-4 left over when I did a pump upgrade. I placed it in a container of methanol tonight and will let it sit for a week. I will post up some pictures so you can see the effects. Yes methanol is more corrosive then Ethanol, but the effect of an alcohol based fuel will be the same. I can do some testing with denatured alcohol, or when I have time get some E85 from a local station.

You will note that the hose on the filling pumps for E85 are Blue and not Black like standard gasoline pumps. The hose is required to be compatible with alcohol fuels and as such is a different material then standard gasoline pumps.

In a nut shell, if your vehicle is not rated from the manufacture as a FFV then don't be running E85 unless you have done all the conversions required to do it safely.

Best regards,

Dan

[91vr4n00maxima]

doing what you did with the methanol isnt going to do a thing for us. E85 from a pump or denatured alcohol please. also last i checked hoses have a different rubber compound on the inside for fuel than they do on the outside.


E85 hoses are blue to allow them to be differentiated from standard gasoline....much like diesel hoses are green.

i wont argue about the spark arrestor in the filler neck. personally i HATE when i see ppl get back into their cars while pumping gas. its just asking for trouble.

otherwise good post. E85 shouldnt be attempted by someone who doesnt know what their doing.