Wednesday, May 21, 2008

Things I learned at Miejer this morning.

The pump at Meijer has a little sign above it that I never noticed before. It said that E85 has 105 octane. Also says "for flex fuel vehicles only".

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

I can't remember if Meijer also has the warning label that E85 isn't gasoline. It might be on the square tag on the top of the fuel nozzle.

I've never looked closely at E85 itself -- I wonder if it is dyed?

Anonymous said...

E85 is not dyed. Put a little in a clean glass jar- if it is very light yellow then the yellow coloration will be coming from the sulfur content of the gas added in. If it is perfectly water clear then the 15% hydrocarbon portion is either ultra low sulfur denaturant or a ultra low sulfur gasoline. E98 (denatured ethanol) is water clear- always.

Alcohol

Anonymous said...

Straight denatured ethanol (E98) is 113 octane due not to a pure rating of isooctane but due to the cooling effect of it's burn. What gets blended into it and at what % will determine the final E85 octane. Thus E70 winter version can be as low as 100 to 103 octane and E85 summer version will be from 105 to 109 octane.

Alcohol