Long Term E85 Use: A Discussion

[drgmt]

It's hard to determine long term side effects, when there is so much variability in composition of e85 from location to location.

Much of the so called e85 here in Australia - isn't really e85 at all.

[SflBimmer8484]

Originally Posted by nars3000

Ahh, thanks for the clarification. It sounded like you ran E85 for 15k miles straight in your previous post.

The GTR guys swear by this product: https://lucasoil.com/products/fuel-t...th-stabilizers

No I would never do that. A tank only lasts me 3-4 days max so its not staying in there very long anyway.

I looked into that stuff as well. There is no concrete proof to any of that stuff works so I rather just go back to 93 more often.

[hellokitty]

Originally Posted by Andrew@ActiveAutowerke

No I would never do that. A tank only lasts me 3-4 days max so its not staying in there very long anyway.

I looked into that stuff as well. There is no concrete proof to any of that stuff works so I rather just go back to 93 more often.

Lucas helped me with long cranks on E85. Not a problem anymore though after I replaced my injectors (on my N54).

Basically spool performance just ripped apart their HPFP and there is a weak point which degraded over time with high ethanol use.

So either use a fuel conditioner or run pump gas every month.

[Eggplant]

Curious how you guys go from E85 to 91/93

I've been on E85 about a month and have asked my self how I'd ever swap to 91 when going on long trips and didn't really want to get under the car to drain the system.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

[CMFT]

I'm new to all of this so please beg my pardon if this sounds ignorant, but do you need a tune in order to run e85 or is the s55 ready to run on it straight from the factory?

[hellokitty]

Originally Posted by CMFT

I'm new to all of this so please beg my pardon if this sounds ignorant, but do you need a tune in order to run e85 or is the s55 ready to run on it straight from the factory?

Need a tune

[CMFT]

Originally Posted by hellokitty

Need a tune

Copy. Thanks.

[SflBimmer8484]

Originally Posted by Eggplant

Curious how you guys go from E85 to 91/93

I've been on E85 about a month and have asked my self how I'd ever swap to 91 when going on long trips and didn't really want to get under the car to drain the system.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

You would just try and get the gas level as low as possible. I try and get it to 0 miles then swap tunes and fill with 91.

[mdma-zn]

Originally Posted by Eggplant

Curious how you guys go from E85 to 91/93

I've been on E85 about a month and have asked my self how I'd ever swap to 91 when going on long trips and didn't really want to get under the car to drain the system.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

Run tank down
top up with 91/93
start car and let it idle for at least 5 mins.
Then switch maps


Often I don't run the tank below reserve but top up tank and switch to the CS map which is more than capable of handling 30 to 40 vol % ethanol -this works for me...

[Race82]

Originally Posted by drgmt

It's hard to determine long term side effects, when there is so much variability in composition of e85 from location to location.

Much of the so called e85 here in Australia - isn't really e85 at all.

What do you mean by that?

[Race82]

Originally Posted by mdma-zn

Run tank down
top up with 91/93
start car and let it idle for at least 5 mins.
Then switch maps


Often I don't run the tank below reserve but top up tank and switch to the CS map which is more than capable of handling 30 to 40 vol % ethanol -this works for me...

You don’t drain the tank at a workshop? Just run it down as close to zero as possible?

[hellokitty]

Originally Posted by awbmw

What do you mean by that?

Ethanol content changes by season, at least in the US. Summer has the highest concentration of ethanol (e70-e85) and winter can drop down to E55-E65. You should get an ethanol tester or ethanol sensor to make sure what you pump is what you are getting.

[Commanderwiggin]

Originally Posted by Eggplant

Curious how you guys go from E85 to 91/93

I've been on E85 about a month and have asked my self how I'd ever swap to 91 when going on long trips and didn't really want to get under the car to drain the system.

Can anyone shed some light on this?

Could always run a flex sensor setup with Ecutek for true flex fuel tuning...then you never have to worry about what % is in the tank as it automatically calibrates for the exact ethanol content. I run this setup and it's awesome...also good since my wife generally finds the closest shell and doesn't want to fuss about with E85.

[mdma-zn]

Originally Posted by awbmw

You don’t drain the tank at a workshop? Just run it down as close to zero as possible?

Yes just run it down as much as you can...

[JSealz_F82]

Bringing this back to life.

How many of you actually run an ethanol content analyzer?

I ran my tank down till the car shut off - added 15 galls of OneEthanol, car ran great (560/560) but lost an injector seal in the process.

[Commanderwiggin]

Originally Posted by JSealz_F82

Bringing this back to life.

How many of you actually run an ethanol content analyzer?

I ran my tank down till the car shut off - added 15 galls of OneEthanol, car ran great (560/560) but lost an injector seal in the process.

I run an ethanol content sensor which is connected to the Canbus and automatically calibrates the tune via my ecutek flash.

Do you have more details or photos of this seal that failed?

[theweebabySeamus]

I have to admit, there's at least a small part of me that thinks the injector failures on E85 are partly tied to tuners advising people to run their tanks all the way down to empty when using E85. In older cars it used to be a big no-no to run a tank that low and even though newer cars are setup a lot better fueling-wise, I still don't really love the idea.

[DanMpower]

Been on E85 F80Paul tune for 4 months now, 2 months in a bank 1 upstream O2 sensor died on me. Coincidence maybe? Other than that, the car runs like a complete BEAST, pulls so hard everything else feels tame. Drove a Hellcat recently and it felt kinda slow..

[DanMpower]

Originally Posted by Commanderwiggin

Could always run a flex sensor setup with Ecutek for true flex fuel tuning...then you never have to worry about what % is in the tank as it automatically calibrates for the exact ethanol content. I run this setup and it's awesome...also good since my wife generally finds the closest shell and doesn't want to fuss about with E85.

That sounds like an awesome setup...

[BlownOne]

You really don’t need to run the tank completely down to switch to 91/93 or e85 switch because if there’s a little ethanol left when you switch to 91 it will help make the 91/93 better and if you run the 91/93 until your fuel light comes on and put in 13.5 gallons of e85, your e content will be fine.

[Shadow2]

Just don't get into boost when your switching fuels for a few miles, you won't cause any damage to the motor, turbos etc. unless your pushing them. Also, don't run the tank dry. I try and wait until the display shows 5-10 miles to empty, before I switch.

[BlownOne]

^+1. Just cruise for a few miles after initially switching fuels to let the new fuel clear out the entire system. I like to let the car idle while adding the new fuel, then switch maps after filling up and cruise 5-10 miles to thoroughly complete the fuel transition.

Convincing yourself to switch from e85 to 91 is the real battle lmao.