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randy · Guest

Are they and regulations (epa or otherwise) against using e20? How about engine performance?

specialgreen · Posted: Tue Apr 12, 2005 10:20 am Post subject:

There are regulations against modifying your fuel system. And regulations against burning non-motor-fuel when driving on public roads (mostly because the feds want their fuel excise tax!). But if you (for example) mix 1 gallon of E-85 for every 6 or 7 gallons of gasoline (10% ethanol in Minnesota) to get E-20, then you're burning taxed fuels in an unmodified vehicle. So you should be good as far as the law goes.

As far as EPA is concerned, I'd expect your emissions to be cleaner with 20% ethanol (for the pollutants which are measured by EPA). In fact, I've heard of people adding 10% ethanol to their gas in order to pass a smog test in other states! (this would be especially useful for people who drive motorcycles or street-rods, which are often modified to run very "rich" on fuel, to give better performance).

I would expect engine performance to be only a little affected with 20% ethanol. The big negative change would be potentially harder starting in winter, and a slower warm-up to temp. Mileage per gallon should go down slightly with E-20 (for example, from 30mpg to maybe 29.3mpg). If you drive many short trips in winter, then you would probably see a larger decline.

The positive difference would be that the engine won't knock or ping under load as easily. This will be detected by the knock sensor, and it will not need to enrichen the mixture under load the way it would with gasoline. So if you are towing a heavy trailer, or driving in the mountains, then a car may run smoother and may even get better MPG on E-20 than it did with gasoline.