Ethanol

[yodawill2000]

Can somebody wise in the ways of injectors (Q45Tech) explain to me and others how and why Ethanol is bad for our injectors ??

Chemical reaction with the plastic ?Just curious as here in DFW I have no choice but to get 10% ethanol mix.

[driverdriver]

We've had anywhere from 10% to 20% ethanol mixed into our gasoline since the mid 90's. Never had any adverse effects on the fuel injectors, just age related failures.

[Q45tech]

Ethanol and Alcohols in general attack plastics and rubber hoses.

Gasoline without oxygenates is much easier and cheaper to protect against damage.

Ethanol was rare when these cars were designed so thought unnecessary to protect against beyond 70k.

Experiments have shown than brand new injectors will fail fast with 85% ethanol............ E10 just takes longer.

The plastic body on injector swells and eventually totally disconnects the crimp between the copper wire and the connector...................usually the 12-14 ohms nominal resistance goes up progressively first.

[yodawill2000]

Thanks Mystery solved Figured it was something like that but wanted hard facts from a guy with your knowledge,Thanks again.

[emerald-j]

not just that, don't forget that the ecu has to compensate for the change, which in turn for our cars will be beyond the limits. This will cause detonation and failure of the engine. The actual octane rating of E85 is suppose to be 105, which is basically race fuel. I read up the rating through an article of a 1000hp mustang running strictly on E85. It would take allot of modifications to run on this fuel. Not just that, ethanol will become a gel if it make contact with water so waterproofing everything in the fuel system will be needed. It would me a nightmare to do this on our cars but if someone does it, my congrats would go out to them.

[yodawill2000]

Interesting.My wifes 02 Caravan is E85 ready and I was wondering what the injectors were made of.Sounds like somebody need to start working on a J30 ECU chip !!

[emerald-j]

I agree, if someone here finds a way to pull it off, I will for sure help out in finding the neccesary parts that would be needed for the job. Since I used to work for shell oil I got some of that know-how on E85 so I wouldn't mind sharing my knowledge with you all on this.