w5kfg

My Feedback: (1)

Sopwith

I would like to get into trying E85. How many oz of oil do you add to a gal of E85
I am going to have to blend my own as here in Mississippi we don't have e85 yet

Bill

Ralphbf

My Feedback: (27)

E-85 is 15% gas and 85% Alcohol.
For the oil content you will need to add what ever the engine manufacture recommends.
So if you were running 10/18 as glow fuel you would need to add 18% oil.

Are you going to base your E-85 on Glow Fuel? If so which one?

planepounder

Hey, RE your thoughts on E-85 and glow plugs. Wolud not the opposite be true? If glow fuel is mainly methanol and methanol supports the cataylitic action with the platinum in the glow plug then would not the plug with the higher platinum content be the hotter plug? I assume a colder plug is for a hotter running engine and vice-versa (given the same fuel) I know for me an OS A3 generally runs better than an 8. Some one please explain.

planepounder

Hey all this was in response to Sopwith @ the bottom of page 2 I forgot to add the quote, sorry.

planepounder

Back again, after reading about 10,000 goggle pages, Sopwith is right. I finally found an article that stated % of methanol in fuel. The author stated any fuel with less than 65% methanol should use a VERY cold plug, how about that!

av8tor1977

My Feedback: (6)

Generally, when you run more nitro, you run a colder plug. If your methanol percentage is low in a glow fuel, then your nitro percentage would be high and you would run a cold plug.

In my Gas/Glow experiments, the engines ran better with a hot, four stroke plug. I believe this was due to the low methanol percentage in the Gas/Glow mix, and thus a better or more reliable ignition with a hotter plug.

AV8TOR

w5kfg

My Feedback: (1)

Ralph
I was going to mix my own, 85% grain alcohol to 15% 97 oct gasoline. that was why I was asking how much oil I needed to asdd to my mix of 1 gal of e85
Bill

wingspan99

My Feedback: (2)

Hi Bill,
I may be asking an obvious question that you've considered, but how much is grain alcohol going to cost you? I'm assuming you'd have to buy grain alcohol from a hardware store for probably 8-11 dollars a gallon...
If I were living in an area that didn't have E-85 I think I'd try to make a glow engine run on the gas/glow mix of mainly gasoline with some standard glow fuel mixed in to fire the glow plug. There's a whole thread on the basically 2:1 mix of gas/glow. The only reason I'm even messing with E-85 is because it is found at my gas stations locally for almost a dollar cheaper than gasoline. Can you buy grain alcohol for $2.09 a gallon? That is the current price of E-85 in Colorado Springs, and it's sold at about eight gas stations in town, all of them Western gas stations. I have begun to run my cars on half E-85, half regular gas, with no problems. At my 6800' altitude, my injectors can keep up with the increased flow required for running E-43. There's some conversion kits out there that consist of a computer plugged in between the car's ECU and the injectors to fire them more frequently so that E-85 can be run in almost any car 20 years old or newer. Check out Change2E85.com to see what I mean. -Tom Edited to correct web addy.

av8tor1977

My Feedback: (6)

Interesting. Can you check that link however?? Nothing comes up on www.changetoe85.com nor http://changetoe85.com.

Thanks,
AV8TOR

Ralphbf

My Feedback: (27)

Try this; http://www.change2e85.com/servlet/StoreFront

av8tor1977

My Feedback: (6)

That's it! Thanks. Interesting stuff. Now I need to figure out a way to make my 450 horsepower 454 Blazer "Flex Fuel".... (Then maybe I could afford to drive it again!!) []

AV8TOR

box car

That story on ethanol is a little short on fact. Our ethanol plant is paying $5.42 a bushel for corn so at 2.7 gals a bushel thats $2 a gal. they don't make it for free must be were your tax money comes in and they did not tell about the 3 gals of water it takes to make a gal of ethanol. Last year corn sold for about $2.50 a bushel. Sorry for getting carried away I had to pay $3.80 for diesel today and this ethanol thing just set me off.

Ralphbf

My Feedback: (27)

Actually the mash left over is a better feed than when it started off as whole grain.
It can easily be resold as feed and this country uses a lot of cattle feed.

I would think a feed lot would buy the grain, allow it to be processed for free and then use it.

It's that good.

av8tor1977

My Feedback: (6)

Grain alcohol can be made out of nearly anything that grows. Better that they plant crops that have a decent yield of alcohol without cutting into food crops. I'm a pilot, and I can fly you over hundreds of thousands of acres of farms that are no longer planted in Arizona. MANY of (the farms here) have all "gone under" for one reason or another. They could all be planted in whatever would make the best yield for ethanol, depending of course on the climate, yield per acre, etc. All this talk of the world going hungry while we convert to alcohol is nothing but oil company boosted **** c r a p. There are literally millions of acres of land that could be planted in crops for alcohol in America. If a "Third World Country" like Brazil can do it, why can't we????

AV8TOR

Ralphbf

My Feedback: (27)

The next thing your going to tell us is that GM and Ford have been sending cars to Brazil
since the seventies that ran on Alcohol.

av8tor1977

My Feedback: (6)

It's really no trick at all to make an engine run on ethyl alcohol. Just richen up the mixture, and make the fuel system out of components that are alcohol resistant. If the engine is purpose built for alcohol, it can have higher compression, which boosts engine efficiency. The engine will have more power, and about the same fuel economy as with gasoline if it is purpose built for alcohol.

AV8TOR

Jezmo

I'm with ya brother. We could (and should) be doing a h*ll of a lot more.

w5kfg

My Feedback: (1)

Tom
Thanks for the info. I will check that out. I also ran across this site
Bill
http://running_on_alcohol.tripod.com/id8.html
and this site
http://www.smartplugs.com/about.htm

w5kfg

My Feedback: (1)

Tom
I ran an fx .46 on the mix you suggested today. Runs real good, but when I remove the glow starter the rpms drop off a lot and then dies. I guess i need to install a new glow plug.
Any suggestions as to what type?
My mix was 2:1. I only had 87 octane and mixed glow fuel that had 18%castor oil and 15% nitro.
Dop I need to go to a higher octane on the gasoline?

Regards
Bill B

jpr72c

My Feedback: (1)

What are your thoughts on this mixture. 3 parts E-85 and 1 part 20/12 glow fuel. This gives the following:

Nitro - 5%
Oil - 3% (33:1)
Methanol - 17%
Ethanol - 63.75%
Gas - 11.25%

I have ran gas/glow with good results, but I am only able to get 20/12 glow fuel, and I needed to mix methanol along with gas/glow. I want to find a mix that I do not have to buy straight methanol for - but still use the 20/12 glow fuel. Will the Ethanol burn "easier" than gas?

Thanks

wingspan99

My Feedback: (2)

That mix of 3:1 sounds good to me. We know methanol reacts with the glow plug so I'm not sure nitro is even needed, but even 3% nitro makes a noticeable difference, although I mixed glow fuel to get that 3% nitro and it might have just been the methanol making it run better. You HAVE to increase the oil content though for a glow engine, the parts weren't designed to run on the same oil content as the gasoline engines like a Quadra or weedie conversion. The nitro will make it purr compared to 0% nitro.
Bill B, if your engine dies when you pull the igniter off your .46fx try a quality glow plug with a pure platinum coil. There were some good suggestions earlier in the week on this thread. The K&B seems to work ok but I'm still not sure what works best. I have a couple more to try. I'd like to try some pure methanol added to the E85 to see if the nitro is necessary at all, but I suspect the nitro will make it run so much better in glow engines that it's worth it to get about 5%. That said, if I thought I could get a decent idle with an on-board glow system that only comes on at low throttle using only some methanol to get the top end smooth, I'd make do without the nitro entirely.

sopwith

There have been some questions about E85 fuel usage. I will answer as well as I can.

I buy Morgan fuels Green Heavy Kart oil directly from Morgan fuels. When you buy 4 gallons, shipping is free. You have to order by phone, as they have no on line ordering. They are in Alabama, and the number is 334-347-3525. My last order, about a year ago cost me (as I recall) $23.25 per gallon. They have a web site with info but no ordering. I hope this info is still current. I put 12 to 13 fluid ounces of the oil, 8 drops of Armoral (silicon to reduce foaming)in a gallon jug, and fill the remainder with either methanol, E85, or a combination of the two. Adding methanol greatly improves igniton. Adding acetone also helps in cold weather starting (5 to 10 percent, 6 to 12 ounces). Note in the winter E85 can contain up to 30 percent gasoline making the fuel even poorer in a glow engine (the normal mix is 15 percent gasoline).

The heat ratings for glow plugs are misleading. Hot means lower platinum content, cold means higher platinum content. Ignition occurs due to the catalitic reaction of methanol with platinum. If you heat methanol in the presence of platinum it will ignite. If you heat platinum in the presence of methanol, the methanol will ignite. I will try to find a video I have seen showing this, along with any other like info that I can. Since ethanol does not have the strong catalytic reaction as does methanol, you need more platinum. I can only use trial and error for fuel testing, since the glow plug manufacturers do not give actual metalurgy info on their product (and they lie alot as well).

I don't have time to research now, but will try to post some useful info in a couple of days.

planepounder

Hey all, kinda on the subject and off,I found a real cold Odonnell glow plug to try, but have not had the chance. RE the Ryobi 4 stroke I have been working with, I have it ready to go on my flying dyno (an 8ft Telemaster). I was doing some last minute runs on the test stand when it occurred to me to mix some "new" fuel. I have just taken up flying helis and had a new gallon of 30% heli fuel, so mixed gas/glow in the usual manner. I has just tached a WOT run @ 7400 with an 18x6 which was great. With 30%, 8300! This is an expensive mix (heli fuel is $30.00/gal) but it makes the four stroke rock and roll! besides the 4 stroke just sips fuel.

sopwith

Here is a short tutorial on glow plugs for those of you who had questions:

http://www.members.shaw.ca/mcdougall...ow%20Plugs.htm

wingspan99

My Feedback: (2)

I have been wondering about the best way to get Morgan green synthetic oil. That's a great price on it too. Klotz KL-200 is about $11/quart! I bought a gallon of Sig AA Castor, so I'll use that up first. All those huge thirsty glow engines like the Supertigre 4500 suddenly look pretty good to me if I can run them on E85. -Tom