Anyone using E85 ethanol in your vehicle?

[powernoodle]

I drive a 2009 "Flex Fuel" 4x4 Suburban that will feed on E85 (85% ethanol) as well as gasoline. I have never tried E85 until today, but figured it was worth a shot at $2.89 a gallon. I recognize that I probably won't get the gas mileage I was getting with petrol (around 15 - 16 mpg in the city if I drive like granny), but thought I would do a little experiment with the cost vs. mpg. I notice no difference in performance.

So are any of you dudes or chicks using E85? Whats your experience? Thanks.

 

[Gollnick]

My Supercharged Mercedes LOVES E85. Wow.

But, my gas mileage literally drops by about 33%.... measured.

So, while the stuff I'm burning is 15% less gasoline, I'm burning 33% more of it... hence the noritcable performance increase. Somehow, I don't think that that was the intended outcome.

 

[Burke]

85% ethanol is not 15% less gasoline....it's 85% less (actually probably more like 75% - "normal" gasoline can have up to 10% ethanol).

 

[powernoodle]

Yeah, I'm looking forward to checking the mpg with E85. Right now my tank is 25% gas and 75% E85, and I don't want to get out my calculator, so my next tank will be pretty close to 100% E85.

 

[Ernie1980]

Just some advice from someone who tried it
Ease into using e85, don't just switch suddenly so your engine doesn't get "shocked"
Measure your fuel economy carefully, I got similar results to Gollnick with a huge drop in fuel economy

 

[Monofletch]

A mechanic on my mail route said E85 will dry out your gaskets and is horrible for any engine. Anyone else hear of this? I think he's nuts.

I am afraid to run it in my new F150

 

[78LilRed]

It gets run in 90% of the modified vehicles I work on. The mpg goes down but torque and cleaner/cooler burn will happen. Change your oil a bit more often if you do run it regularly.

 

[powernoodle]

I need to collect more data, but I'm basically looking at this in my '09 Suburban:

- regular gas is currently $3.79 per gallon where I live, and if I take it easy I can get 15.0 mpg.

- E85 is currently $2.79 per gallon, and I got 11.6 mpg.

So that comes about to about $ 0.25 per mile with gas, and $0.24 per mile with E85. Pretty much the same, at least at these prices and miles per gallon. I'm a little leery about running E85 consistently over time, but I figure that Chevy wouldn't slap a "FlexFuel" badge on the back of my Suburban if they didn't mean it.

I'll observe whether the price of E85 drops and rises in tandem with gas, or not. If gas drops to $3.40 or something and E85 stays at $2.79, gas will start looking a little better. Of course, if gas cranks up to $4.20, then E85 starts looking pretty tasty. I've never really paid any attention to E85 prices.

So I'm going to stick with it a while and see how it goes.

 

[Mongo]

Also got to think of the availability of the E-85. I can only think of maybe one or two places that offer it near me, and I'm in the Chicago burbs.... we have everything here. (just costs more...)