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So, how many of you guys are taking advantage of this wonderful fuel? For the people that aren't aware of what E85 is, it is a blended fuel containing 85% ethanol and 15% percent unleaded fuel. Which is awsome news for us running boost and for n/a guys running high compression.

 
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it have been shown that the amount of miles to the gallon is less than a regular thank of gas and eventually it gets more expensive than regular gasoline

 
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it does decrease milage but does have a much higher oct rating

 
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so what, is it good for if your heading off to the track? then again if your going to the track a local station probrably has a 103 or 104 octane. With 103 or 104 wouldn't you keep the fuel economy and still get the higher octane for power.......... it just seems higher octane gas would beat out e85

 
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I don't think any Honda's where even designed to run on e85. I read somewhere (owners manual I think) that if you use it in a car not designed for it you can do some damage...

 
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How high of an octane rating can we use in the civics

 
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Most race fuels are leaded.. leaded fuels typically don't get along well with o2 sensors and cats. If you buy the high octane unleaded, it should work fine. It will not make any more hp than pump gas on a stock D17, so it's probably not worth spending your money on. It may even make less...

A few years back, some spec ford racers I know did dyno testing with different fuels to see if any brand or type worked better. In the stock Ford I4 they can use, the regular pump 87 made slightly better power than race fuel. Without a high CR, boost or nitrous, it's just not needed.

 
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the cool thing with e85 is that its made from corn which is grown not drilled. there are a million little things involved that pretty much kill the environmental benifit of e85 but look them up yourself, i'm not writting a book on it. It is a fair bit cheaper and the price will likely continue to fall as more and more refinaries are built to produce it.

Here is the important part. If you put e85 in a regular civic it will burn too lean which can cause a loss of power and significant engine damage. There is a company in the process of making an epa nad carb approved pigyback system to allow you to burn e85 in any obd2 car, like the civic. The companies name is Flex fuel USA and the product should be released pretty soon. at $2.30 a gallon its not much of an improvment but lets say it gets down to $1.70 a gallon, all of a sudden its a huge deal.

 
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flex fuel systems are already in production. all the newer chevy's have it. i had an 01 s10 2.2l 4cyl that was able to run off either fuel. the problem is that it takes much more fuel to achieve the same combustion. so the fuel system has to be able to pump high volumes when it detects a lean condition. this is actually great if you ever want to boost a flex fuel vehicle.
for instance my trucks stock fuel system could handle 10-12psi of boost with out running lean. this is ont he stock injectors and pump and just a rising rate FMU to control pressure at the rail. most cars will lean out at about 4-6psi of boost with out a larger pump and FPR.

 
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yeah i thought civics arent designed for E85 fuel. Only a handful of domestic vehicles can run on them i believe.

 
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I'm not refering to flex fuel vehicles, I'm talking about a system you could add to an existing non flex fuel car that would allow you to use E85. Every thing built in the last ten years or so already has fuel lines and seals that are ethanol rated because they use ethanol instead of MTBE now. This system adds fuel with additional injectors to correct the lean condition.

 
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sounds like a sds extra injection system. although its gotta have a o2 to correct the afr. its gotta be pretty expensive if that is the case

 
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chevy is promoting it much more but i believe ford will soon offer it as well

 
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you need to convert something in your fuel system to run e85. do not just go and put this in your civic.

 
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Yeah, E85 doesn't have as much potential energy as gasoline does, hence why you get less MPG

 
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what octane is e85?

 
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its about 105. Costco is considering carying it nationwide.

anyway, I cant give you details yet but when this flex fuel thing is all done its going to be rad. The guy who is building it is a pretty sharp dude. It will be carb approved and fully epa certified. In a very exciting preproduction test a prius was fitted with one of his systems then the hybrid motors were disabled so the car ran only on the gas engine. It went from 66hp on gas to mid 70s on e85 with nothing else done. the system is supposed to cost less then $1000 and is totaly self activating. the only permanant modification required is to have a bung for the O2 sensor welded into the pipe.

 
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well guys...i was just wanting to see if anyone else besides me was using it. Apparently, so far nobody, but me is. I also was letting the guys that are running boosted cars and high comp. n/a cars about E85, as it is a much cheaper alternative to race gas or aviation fuel and works just the same as long as your car is tuned to it. And our cars do not require any special conversion to use it as long you are able to adjust how much fuel is injected into your car. Now that being said, I WOULD NOT ADVISE ANYBODY THAT IS STOCK TO USE THIS as I believe my original post stated.

 
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It's a fuel made from corn (ethanol) and is blended with unleaded gasoline. The blend is 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline.

 
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it will eat your fuel lines if they are not made for it, ford has been making vehicles that use e85 for years they just dont advertize it the same ( my 03 ranger used it ), you get worse mileage, its better for the enviroment, the corn used actually is wasted because they can only process a certain part of it, and they should be using sugar cane or switch grass.

 
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Here is a link to E85 compatible vehicles. These vehicles are called "Flex fuel vehicles".

http://e85vehicles.com/

You should notice when you click the link that HONDA IS NOT ON THE LIST, NOR ARE ANY IMPORTS.

 
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In all honesty i dont think E85 is worth it. After doing some research ive come to the realization that i wouldn't really save any money using it in my car *unless i only have an E85 race tune on my car. only because that would be cheeper than buying 104 race gas @ 7 dollars a gal* But even though E85 might still be about 2 bucks *here* in order for me to use it correctly i would have to use about 40% MORE of it to create the same power that i make now. So in the end i end up using almost twice as much fuel (which mean my mpg goes down) and spending amost twice as much to go as far. I dont know its just my 2 cents though.

 
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ogm please dont tell me he actually used in his civic lmao. say goodbye to all your rubber fuel system parts and maybe even engine after a while.

 
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I can tell by your comment that you have absolutely zero personal experince with the stuff.

Since 1988 the government has been requiring auto manufacturers to make their vehicles tolerant to 10% ethanol. Pump gas is commonly mixed with up to 10% ethanol all the time. Well, are they going to make it tolerant to 10% but not 15? 15 , but not 20? you see where I'm going with this...

I have tuned many people with 100% stock fuel lines who have been running for well over a year with zero problems. I tuned a GSR with 1000cc injectors and a 255 walbro pump, stock lines, e85: 515whp all day long. Just ran 11.2 @ 128 on wastegate boost (6psi less than what we tuned it up to when it made 515whp). I tuned an all-motor hatch that made 209whp with a stock fuel pump.

It requires ~30% more fuel, but you will make ~5% more power because it burns so much cooler.

 
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I've been hearing the same stuff that gearbox is saying. I've been told that the stock fuel system seals; rubber, neoprene or whatever can't remember off the top of my head aren't tolerant to 85% ethanol fuels.

 
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10% is a big difference from 85%!!! duh. youre the one who doesnt make sense. but go ahead and keep tuning people so they can make a few extra hp and use more fuel in the process while damaging their cars. oh hey washer fluid has a few percent methanol, why dont we put in 10 or 20 percent, how about 85? you should try it and tell me what your clear coat looks like after using it.

 
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exactly, and lets not forget the ecu, that little box that keeps the engine from blowing up by calculating fuel mix.

 
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Here in Brazil we only use Pure Ethanol at turbo cars. All civics from 7th gen here were made to use a mix of 80% gas and 20% ethanol.

If you use more ethanol than your car is prepared you will have trouble at:
1 - Fuel pump (you have to replace it to a Ethanol-made)
2 - Fuel filter (it wil be obstructed after 20k miles)
3 - Fuel injectors (you'll need 30-35% bigger injectors)

 
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Woho

old school thread...

 
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nice wow i wish there was some kind of retrofit option or something since there are civics that use em already.