I posted this in the fuel forums but it fits here also...

I was at the I-Hobby Expo in Chicago today. Nothing out of the ordinary. Lots of car stuff, electric stuff, and other stuff (trains, plastics) I'm not into. So, I walk into the Great Planes booth. There is a display case with OS and Super Tigre glow engines but nobody behind it. I walk away and came back a few hours later. I wanted to handle the new FSa-56 and 81 so I asked somebody. A gentleman came over and opened up the case and we started talking.

I asked about the OS .55 BioEthanol. He said it's a Japanese thing. They are environmentally conscious and do things like that even though it doesn't make monetary sense. He said it works fine, but the problem with importing it to the US is the fuel. Apparently, OS's fuel is such that it would be taxed as consumable alcohol, there is nothing added to denature it and I guess it would be very easy to remove the oil. He said the ethanol was pure. So the chances of this engine making it to the US market is some between zero and none.

We continued to talk about engines and I mentioned converting the OS four strokes to diesel. He said he's done it for a UAV application. He said they used a spark ignition to get it started and then it was run as a diesel. We talked about Walbro carbs, and changing needle tapers in two needle carbs to account for the differences in fuel. He told me that he would get Jet-A at an airport instead of other sources of kerosene and it was much easier to start. It was an interesting talk and I forgot to get a card from him.

I talked with a glow plug manufacturer about ethanol. He said that it's just and issue of the right heat range.

There is a new exclusive importer for NovaRossi. This might be nice for those into high performance engines. Also www.mscompositusa.com might be picking up the Webra engine line, they only had a few on display.