Gas Question

[big 8s in Weakley county]

What octane gas do you run in your boat.

 

[stik]

usually mid grade NO ETHANOL!!!

 

[big 8s in Weakley county]

I can only get no ethanol gas in 87. Would you run it in a 75hp Mercury over mid with ethanol

 

[stik]

yes. absolutely. ethanol cost me a good motor.

 

[BACKWOODS BOY]

nothin but 93 NO ETHANOL

 

[Kirk]

Ethanol can destroy a boat motor. Use a non ethanol gas if you can find it. Any grade non-ethanol is better than a high grade ethanol blend.

Ethanol effects on boat motors

 

[TheLBLman]

I agree about driving out of your way to find NON-ethanol gas --- just do it.
Have had several mechanics tell me that ethanol has been the best thing ever happened to boost their business. Just switching over to 100% gasoline solved some problems on lawn mower engines for me.

Would you dump corn syrup in your engine?
That's kinda what you're doing with ethanol gas.

Often, if your engine is "just not running right, rough idle, etc.", the entire problem can be related to ethanol gumming up things.

If you've been using ethanol gas in your small engines, boats, 4-wheelers, etc. ---- STOP.
And get some "Sea Foam" cleaner to run thru along with your next few tanks of 100% gasoline. You can get the Sea Foam at most any auto parts store.

Ethanol seems to be a particular problem for small engines, but I've now stopped using it in any vehicle. The 100% gasoline is getting easier to find and additionally seems to boost fuel mileage a tad.

 

[TheLBLman]

Would someone please tell me again just why we're using ethanol in our gasoline anyway?

So far, thru tax-payer subsidies, we're spending much more for ethanol gas than we would be for 100% gasoline, and driving up the price of food in the process. Seems to be a losing proposition, since we have no real shortage of oil, and would never be able to produce enough corn to both use it as a major fuel alternative and as a food source. Keep in mind as more land is used for corn production, it is usually at the expense of wheat and soybean production.

Don't we need that corn more for food to feed the world? Only a slight increase in the ALLOWABLE oil drilling (but allowed in places that are known to have oil) would totally replace that 10% ethanol that's now in most of our gasoline at the pumps.

By the way, show me a corn farmer that would put ethanol gas in his tractor. According to the TN Farmers Co-Ops, the farmers demand 100% gasoline for their tractors and combines. Go figure, and understand I have nothing against corn farmers, having come from a family of them, and having been one myself.

 

[Crow Terminator]

I was told that boat marinas couldn't sell ethanol and thus is where I found it. For a price though...$3.69 a gallon for 87! I just wanted to fill my 1 gal jug for my Shindaiwa and my 5 gal jug for the lawnmower. I prepaid with $20 and didn't get the jugs full. Since then I have found 1 gas station locally that still carries regular gas at a better price. All the ethanol stuff is running about $1.45 a gal here, but that one station has regular gas 87 for about 2.00 a gal.

There are a few products out now that are additives to make ethanol easier on your engines. WalMart has some for sure back in the boat section where the StaBil stuff is. It's a blue color. Never used it but I've seen it.

 

[A/M/G]

Where do you get the non ethanol? CO-OP? I do not know of any store that sells it.

 

[stik]

Where do you get the non ethanol? CO-OP? I do not know of any store that sells it.

there is 1 station in lenoir city and 2 in loudon that have pure gas.

 

[TheLBLman]

Since I travel regularly from Knoxville to Union City,
here's a few places I regularly fill up with 100% gas:

1) Any Conoco around the Knoxville area.
The one I use most on Kingston Pike has nothing but 100% gas in all grades, and usually about the same price per gallon as the nearby ethanol stations.

2) Any county Co-Op, although I do NOT like to use the one in Clarkville on Wilma Rudolph Blvd as they don't have "pay at the pump" and there's always a bunch of folks in line there. Last time I stopped there for gas took me over 30 minutes to get up to the pump. Never again there.

3) There are three stations with 100% gas on Hwy 79 between Clarkville & Dover.

---- a) One is a small new place near Clarksville. But NOTE their 87 octane CONTAINS ethanol! Only their higher octanes are 100% gasoline.

---- b) Just a little farther west on 79 there is another fairly new place (think it's a BP) ---- lots of pumps but only ONE (1) pump around back of the place has
100% gas. All the pumps in front have ethanol.

---- c) Pit Stop Market just before you come into Dover on Hwy 79.

4) The Farmers' Co-Op in Paris, TN (main drag thru Paris on West side of town). I stop there a lot, and unlike the Co-Op in Clarksville, this one has "pay at the pump" and is usually quick to pull in and fill 'er up. All grades 100% gasoline.

5) On the east side of Paris, there is also another station directly across Hwy 79 from the Shell that's near Trolinger's (near where Uncle Lee's used to be).

With many of these stations, I've found little difference in the price of 100% gasoline vs. the ethanol gas at nearby stations. Sometimes the 100% gas is even a penny cheaper than the ethanol gas across the street.

There's more around and the numbers seem to be increasing.
These are just the ones I've been regularly using.

 

[stik]

another thing on the ethanol gas milage. we rented a 2010 flex-fuel dodge truck for a trip to southern illinois. ran pure gas on the way up and got 22 mpg. filled up with E85 for the trip home and got 16 mpg.

 

[JimFromTN]

I use sta-bil with ethenol treatment and have never had an issue. Most motors run just fine with the lower octane unless you have had mods done to your engine to boost the horse power like having the heads cut.

 

[TheLBLman]

. . . . we rented a 2010 flex-fuel dodge truck for a trip to southern illinois. ran pure gas on the way up and got 22 mpg. filled up with E85 for the trip home and got 16 mpg.

Using "Wes Parrish Math" you got 27% less fuel efficiency while using the ethanol gas. :D
Or we could say you did 38% better using 100% gas. ;)

Stik, don't doubt your numbers for a second, but there SHOULDN'T have been THAT MUCH difference. Possibly had a tailwind going up and was driving into a headwind coming back?

Day in and day out, I think the fuel efficiency might be more like 1 or 2% better with 100% gas instead of ethanol gas.

One other thought:

IF 100% gas provides 2% better mileage than ethanol gas,
and IF ethanol gas were going for $2.50 a gallon,
then 100% gas could go for $2.55, and in reality cost you no more than the $2.50 gas, since you would use about 2% less to go the same distance.

 

[A/M/G]

Wes thanks. I am in paris pretty often, I will keep these places in mind.

I will start visting my local coop also.

 

[woodchuckc]

. . . . we rented a 2010 flex-fuel dodge truck for a trip to southern illinois. ran pure gas on the way up and got 22 mpg. filled up with E85 for the trip home and got 16 mpg.

Using "Wes Parrish Math" you got 27% less fuel efficiency while using the ethanol gas. :D
Or we could say you did 38% better using 100% gas. ;)

Stik, don't doubt your numbers for a second, but there SHOULDN'T have been THAT MUCH difference. Possibly had a tailwind going up and was driving into a headwind coming back?

Day in and day out, I think the fuel efficiency might be more like 1 or 2% better with 100% gas instead of ethanol gas.

One other thought:

IF 100% gas provides 2% better mileage than ethanol gas,
and IF ethanol gas were going for $2.50 a gallon,
then 100% gas could go for $2.55, and in reality cost you no more than the $2.50 gas, since you would use about 2% less to go the same distance.

That was E85 stik used on the return trip, not gas with 10% ethanol. I don't doubt that his MPG dropped that much - ethanol has much less stored energy per volume than gasoline.

 

[stik]

. . . . we rented a 2010 flex-fuel dodge truck for a trip to southern illinois. ran pure gas on the way up and got 22 mpg. filled up with E85 for the trip home and got 16 mpg.

Using "Wes Parrish Math" you got 27% less fuel efficiency while using the ethanol gas. :D
Or we could say you did 38% better using 100% gas. ;)

Stik, don't doubt your numbers for a second, but there SHOULDN'T have been THAT MUCH difference. Possibly had a tailwind going up and was driving into a headwind coming back?

that's what the truck's computer said. it's not MY numbers. averaged 22 mpg going, 16 mpg coming. now the E85 is 85% ethanol NOT 10%. maybe that's the difference.

 

[Kirk]

Ethanol has less BTUs per volume than Gasoline. The less pure gasoline that is present the lower the BTUs per gallon when mixed with ethanol. E85 would have far less BTUs than the same amount of pure gasoline:

From a Consumer Reports study

After putting a 2007 Chevrolet Tahoe FFV through an array of fuel economy, acceleration, and emissions tests, and interviewing more than 50 experts on ethanol fuel, CR determined that E85 will cost consumers more money than gasoline and that there are concerns about whether the government's support of FFVs is really helping the U.S. achieve energy independence. Among our findings:


The fuel economy of the Tahoe dropped 27 percent when running on E85 compared with gasoline, from an already low 14 mpg overall to 10 mpg (rounded to the nearest mpg). This is the lowest fuel mileage we've gotten from any vehicle in recent years.

When we calculated the Tahoe's driving range, we found that it decreased to about 300 miles on a full tank of E85 compared with about 440 on gasoline. So you have to fill up more often with E85.

 

[Deerhunter]

Ive been using Sta-bil marine with ethanol treatment in my boat and 4-wheeler. Seems fine so far.

 

[MFBAB]

http://pure-gas.org/index.jsp?stateprov=TN

 

[7mm08]

another thing on the ethanol gas milage. we rented a 2010 flex-fuel dodge truck for a trip to southern illinois. ran pure gas on the way up and got 22 mpg. filled up with E85 for the trip home and got 16 mpg.

i get the same results with my '04 Flex Fuel Tahoe....about 25-30% less per gallon rregarding mileage, so it's mostly a wash other than you are sticking it to some country that considers us infidels. Plus the farmers out there like us to use and they deserve a little more ching!

Found the Conoco across from Bearden and filled up with "100%" this weekend, however, I still use Stabil with Ethanol treatment as suggested by a good friend in SC in the boating business.

 

[JimFromTN]

Ive been using Sta-bil marine with ethanol treatment in my boat and 4-wheeler. Seems fine so far.

Thats what I use.

 

[stik]

bimbo's in lenoir city is no longer pure gas :mad: