RB25DET RUNNING ON E85... IT CAN BE DONE AND WORKS WELL...

[kcsturbocustoms]

This is for all those who are wondering on how to setup your car for e85, let's cut through all the bullsh#t. I have done it and am still running e85 with great results.

My decision to go e85 was mostly due to the fact that it is 105 octane. e85 also acts as a 'poor man's intercooler', reducing the air intake temps (which alone can produce more horsepower). Rather than spending $7.89/gal on race gas, I chose to spend a little more $ up front on the nescessary parts - and then only spend $2.39/gal in the long run. RB25's love to run on high octane since the Japanese fuel standards are higher than those of the US.

Here is the basic setup you will need:

RB25DET S2750cc rc injectors (more than enough for stock turbo) eBay special fuel railRunning 14psi Walboro 255 lph HPHVAeromotive regulator AFC NEO (which works fine for now)Innovate motorsports afr (MUST HAVE!)Stock lines except those going to fuel rail and regulator.

Stoichiometric on e85 should be 9.7:1. However, on Florida's e85 (which is no less than 70% ethanol but varies from state to state), I have found that AFR's on e85 runs well between 11.5 and 12.1 as shown on the LC-1. Anything less was too rich, anything more and you may experience detonation - so this seems to be a happy medium.

Setting the AFPR to 40psi keeps the fuel pressure up even at redline, and still allows plenty of supply.

The car is street tuned on the AFC. With 750cc injectors the AFR's on E85 are more than adequate, I have actually had to pull a slight amount of fuel away at high throttle settings while adding fuel under lower RPM settings. Dont be fooled by others who say you need more injector... For those of you that can't afford a full standalone, the AFC will work just fine for street tuning however if you are not familiar with setting it up, you should see a professional tuner. Remember when installing the AFC, always solder all contacts for positive contact and a better signal.

When street tuning, take your time and ALWAYS keep your eye on the AFR's. Remember that lean is mean. Rich is always better under boost. And never tune on a cold engine, get it to operating temps first to get the ECU out of the closed loop mode.

SOTP feel? The difference between gasoline and E85 made a night and day difference. While I am running the same amount of boost (14psi), the car pulls SO MUCH HARDER. In addition to a MUCH stronger pull, the car runs noticeably cooler and I can now run more agressive timing. With the higher timing, the low RPM pull helps get the car out of the hole a little faster.

[kcsturbocustoms]

BTW, I'll put some pics up of the engine bay ASAP. If you have any questions or requests for pics of certain areas, feel free to ask.

The reason I posted this up is because when I needed help getting the e85 setup on my car, there was no credible and detailed information available. Hopefully this helps out when you need it.

[eh?]

http://video.google.com/videop...hl=en

it's been done on an rb and they've made wayyyyyyyyyy more power than you are.I think krayton on here has an rb25 and he's made ~500whp with e85.

[kcsturbocustoms]

This post is for those that have a basic stock setup ie (stock turbo, maybe manual boost controller) And i know iam not the first. Nice video though, seen it before. Its shows that good power can be made with e85 just look at the 300z with the rb25 on e85 running very well. 10.8 at 129 just posted not to long ago.

[kcsturbocustoms]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b183dnkFpkM

[AZhitman]

Half the local forum guys with SR's are running E85.

[kcsturbocustoms]

If only more people started to use it down here in South Florida we would have more stations. Allot of people are skepticale about the hole e85 deal.Just the other day i had some one who obviously didnt know about the fuel tell me "Its 85 octane right why would you but that in your car" lol

[DrifterProdigy85]

Check out SupraForums. They have a ton of high horsepower setups running on e85. There seeing the same power levels as Q16 right now. Personally i wouldnt use e85 unless i went standalone cause you have to change the timing because of its excellent resistence to knock and AFR's can run lower than 11.0 and still make power. I plan on doing a Twin Turbo LS1 or LQ4 build in the next year and will be setting that up to run on e85.

[StricNyne]

i find this pretty cool, i know there is no e85 in nj thoughs so i dont know too much about it, why do u use such large injectors for stock turbo out of curosity

[Sil240]

Kcustoms -

I'm in Ft lauderdaleHit me up

[email protected]

@ work right now, later I'll check out your vids.

[WhatsADSM]

Been running on E85 for over a year now. Dual pumps, 1000s, and new fuel lines to support decent power (enough to run 10s). But it works well, can't argue with the price.

Check out SupraForums. They have a ton of high horsepower setups running on e85. There seeing the same power levels as Q16 right now. Personally i wouldnt use e85 unless i went standalone cause you have to change the timing because of its excellent resistence to knock and AFR's can run lower than 11.0 and still make power. I plan on doing a Twin Turbo LS1 or LQ4 build in the next year and will be setting that up to run on e85.

I totally agree with DrifterProdigy on this one. There is no need to go to e85 unless you plan to raise the boost with the added octane, or increase timing for the same boost level. So in the case of the stock turbo, there is no increasing the boost. So you would want some way to increase timing. If you have a standalone/rom tune then it might be worth it, otherwise you will need to play with a static advance or know what you are doing with a piggyback to get it to add a little.

i find this pretty cool, i know there is no e85 in nj thoughs so i dont know too much about it, why do u use such large injectors for stock turbo out of curosity

E85 contains less energy per volume. So you need to increase the volume so it can support the same power. Rough rule of thumb is +30-40%.
Modified by WhatsADSM at 8:57 AM 8/13/2009

[WhatsADSM]

Stoichiometric on e85 should be 9.7:1. However, on Florida's e85 (which is no less than 70% ethanol but varies from state to state), I have found that AFR's on e85 runs well between 11.5 and 12.1 as shown on the LC-1. Anything less was too rich, anything more and you may experience detonation - so this seems to be a happy medium.

Just to clarify this.. this is actually not exactly correct.

Stoich is 9.7:1 on E85... However the AFRs under full load should be in the 7.5:1-8.3:1 range. When you are quoting 11.5 and 12.1 that is the equivalence ratio for GAS and not E85.

Here is where it gets a little confusing. A wideband actually always reads in lambda.... which is an easy way to measure how much above/below stoich you are. To convert lambda to an AFR it needs to know what gas you are running and then apply a scalar multiplier to the lambda reading. However the wideband actually doesn't know what gas you are running. When they create the widebands they use the scalar for regular gas since that is what most people use. So when you switched to e85, if you wanted the TRUE AFR numbers to be displayed you would have to configure the wideband to read for e85 which would change the scalars.

So what does it all mean? The simplest method to tune when you switch to e85, if you don't mind that the AFR numbers being displayed aren't exactly true, is to simply continue to use what you know... when on e85 and a standard gas configured wideband, tune for 14.7:1 (which is really 9.7:1 in the engine) under cruising, and 11.5:1 to 12.5:1 under WOT (which is really 7.5:1 to 8.3:1 in the engine) . (e85 can be run a bit leaner than regular gas at WOT BTW).

If you want to be a purist and read the TRUE afr readings, then see if your wideband can be configured to show the AFRs for e85 and tune for 9.7:1 crusing and about 8:1 WOT. Or finally, configure the wideband to just read in lambda (almost all widebands can be configured to do this) and run 1.0 at cruise and 0.8 at WOT.

[DrifterProdigy85]

AWD Motorsports Evo is on E85 doing over 900whp using a 67mm turbo (40+psi). The guy that tunes that car says that e85 will make more power when its ran on the rich side. Like below 11.0. Riggs from Underground Motorsports used e85 on his Rb26 street/drag car and found it made more power when on the rich side too. An 11.0 AFR compared to an 12.0 AFR with proper timing might be something to compare.

[kcsturbocustoms]

Kcustoms -

I'm in Ft lauderdaleHit me up

[email protected]

@ work right now, later I'll check out your vids.

I'll send you a message tomorrow morning... sorry for the late response.

Just to clarify this.. this is actually not exactly correct.

Stoich is 9.7:1 on E85... However the AFRs under full load should be in the 7.5:1-8.3:1 range. When you are quoting 11.5 and 12.1 that is the equivalence ratio for GAS and not E85.

Here is where it gets a little confusing. A wideband actually always reads in lambda.... which is an easy way to measure how much above/below stoich you are. To convert lambda to an AFR it needs to know what gas you are running and then apply a scalar multiplier to the lambda reading. However the wideband actually doesn't know what gas you are running. When they create the widebands they use the scalar for regular gas since that is what most people use. So when you switched to e85, if you wanted the TRUE AFR numbers to be displayed you would have to configure the wideband to read for e85 which would change the scalars.

So what does it all mean? The simplest method to tune when you switch to e85, if you don't mind that the AFR numbers being displayed aren't exactly true, is to simply continue to use what you know... when on e85 and a standard gas configured wideband, tune for 14.7:1 (which is really 9.7:1 in the engine) under cruising, and 11.5:1 to 12.5:1 under WOT (which is really 7.5:1 to 8.3:1 in the engine) . (e85 can be run a bit leaner than regular gas at WOT BTW).

If you want to be a purist and read the TRUE afr readings, then see if your wideband can be configured to show the AFRs for e85 and tune for 9.7:1 crusing and about 8:1 WOT. Or finally, configure the wideband to just read in lambda (almost all widebands can be configured to do this) and run 1.0 at cruise and 0.8 at WOT.

Excellent information and clarification on Lambda and stoich readings for petrol/e85 for those not in the know. I will be going to full standalone soon to get everything I can from it.

But as I said, I can feel a big difference just off the AFC street tune. Hopefully the combination of information helps out someone trying to get this done.

Sorry for the lack of pics... I WILL post them in the morning.

[Booztd 3]

Its actually an RB26

And its gone 10.4 on the stuff.......with a relatively stock motor

[Booztd 3]

E85 contains less energy per volume. So you need to increase the volume so it can support the same power. Rough rule of thumb is +30-40%.

Modified by WhatsADSM at 8:57 AM 8/13/2009

i shoot for around 30%

I didnt change a thing in my setup when I went to E85. (fuel pumps, injectors, etc)

My injector duties were at 60% at full power, and at full power on E85 my duties are 90%

[kcsturbocustoms]

SWEET That just goes to show you can really make some good power on e85. Out of curiousity what type of turbo are you runnng?

[l0nestar]

SWEET That just goes to show you can really make some good power on e85. Out of curiosity what type of turbo are you runnng?

One that is large enough to swallow small pets.

I believe it's a Borg-Warner, unless it's been updated since.

[Booztd 3]

Its a 'small' turbo to the heavy hitters, lol, but its decent enough

Its a borg-warner S300 chassis......66mm inducer

I believe if you visit full-races website, its labeled as 91-79

I really want to turn up the boost on this thing to make some power

[240z4u]

Andy, what size fuel lines are you using?

Evan

[Booztd 3]

Andy, what size fuel lines are you using?

Evan

Evan

I have twin 300ZX TT fuel pumps. The outlets on them arent the greatest size, but I attached -6 line to both of them. They "T" together right after the pumps into a -10 line.

That -10 line goes all the way up to the front of the car and "T"'s back off into dual -8's. I have those feeding the front and back of a JGY fuel rail.

I welded a bung in the middle of the JGY rail and ran a -6 return to the regulator, and then back to the tank

[240z4u]

Are you using braided line or something of that nature to get all the way to the front? I don't think that is NHRA legal (which is dumb IMO).

I had planned on running -8 all the way up and -6 back (using both the stock feed/return) to the tank. I already have all this stuff from another car.. so it won't be very expensive.

Evan

[Booztd 3]

Yeah you need to be running the teflon stuff or whatever it is......but...no ones ever said anything to me.

I've teched at Gateway and RT 66 raceway and they dont even get under the car to check for a driveshaft loop.....I also made it through two Pinks ALL Out inspections as well

[kcsturbocustoms]

hey iam trying to post pic can anyone walk me threw

[DrifterProdigy85]

upload it up on photobucket and then post the link.

[meet07]

i shoot for around 30%

I didnt change a thing in my setup when I went to E85. (fuel pumps, injectors, etc)

My injector duties were at 60% at full power, and at full power on E85 my duties are 90%

-So when you say increase volume by 30-40% your talking about the fuel pressure right??

-And if that is true should you get bigger injectors than need to race fuel? Like instead of running 600cc injectors for say 500 whp you will neeed something along the lines of 800cc??

this post is turning out good. There is only a hand full of high high whp rb25's

[kcsturbocustoms]

Remember its kinda of a rule of thumb in the e85 industry that you loss about 17% gas mileage when using e85. You increase the amount of fuel being used and yes increasing pressure is one way to pull more from your injectors but increasing the injector pulse is the correct way, with the combination of more pressure to feed thee injector properly.

[kcsturbocustoms]

http://www.importtuner.com/tec....html Awesome results

[Adrian gt]

Stoichiometric on e85 should be 9.7:1. However, on Florida's e85 (which is no less than 70% ethanol but varies from state to state)

The number following the "e" should be the percentage, as in some places you can find e98 which is a 98% ethanol blend. seems to me if the gas really is a 70% mix it should be relabeled.

[Booztd 3]

-So when you say increase volume by 30-40% your talking about the fuel pressure right??

-And if that is true should you get bigger injectors than need to race fuel? Like instead of running 600cc injectors for say 500 whp you will neeed something along the lines of 800cc??

this post is turning out good. There is only a hand full of high high whp rb25's

What i meant is fuel system capacity should be able to provide 30% more fuel than what it has now. I like to keep my base fuel pressure right around 40psi. I dont like bumping it up any higher than that, especially when the regulator is already bumping it up 1psi for every 1psi of boost.

If your injector duty cycles are anything over 60% right now, you're probably going to need to look at larger injectors, and then look at the fuel pumps to ensure they can supply the injectors with enough fuel.