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Any one tune for E85?

TX00SVT said:
If I weren't trying to sell my car, I'd definitely look into this. I'm assuming that the bump in compression from 2000 MY SVTs came from the heads, so my Hyrbid should be 11.5:1 compression in theory. If I need 30% more fuel, but my tune is already 11.2 AFR, all I'd really need to do is bump up the timing and add maybe a tiny bit of fuel. I've already got a 255 lph FSVT fuel pump and 42# Terminator injectors. Makes me wish that I had the PRP for my XCAL.
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Negative... RBT and LBT (Rich and Lean Best Torque) points of E85 are different from gasoline.

You tell the computer that your injectors are 30% smaller than they are and tune to gasoline equivalint AFR's in the tables in the ECU. Or you can use lambda if that's an available option for you.
 
Still haven't heard of any failures personally and I doubt many of the pump companies will say OK to use with E85 for their own sake.
IMO pumps are relatively cheap so use a good standard 255lph pump and cross your fingers. If it actually does fail then look into more options.
-J
 
People have been using Walbro's on E85 WRX's for 2 or more years w/o failure.

Everything fuel related now has to be able to handle some ethanol since most gas is E10-E15 or whatever anyway.
 
Barge said:
People have been using Walbro's on E85 WRX's for 2 or more years w/o failure.

Everything fuel related now has to be able to handle some ethanol since most gas is E10-E15 or whatever anyway.
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Yeah, I was just hoping to find something 'known' to work reliably. From what I understand, E85 related pump failures are due to semi-disolved sediment in the tank getting picked up.

I'm sure the 255 lph pump will do fine, apart from possible sediment issues.
 
I was actually discussing this with a friend of mine the other day. I am upgrading to the gt-40 fuel pump, and was wondering about converting to E85. In theory all i should need is a higher flow pump, larger injectors, and a tune right? Would I even need larger injectors, or could the tune take care of it?

Has anyone looked any further into this? I like to tinker around witht things like this and saw them do it on hptv the other day which got me thinking. About $1.50 a gal for E85 if I could find it, plus added horsepower. I think the contour's compression is high enough stock to handle the octane
 
One thing to consider with E85 is that valves and seats, if not designed specifically to be compatible with E85 can wear out extremely fast. IIRC, the Duratec valves are nitrided, which is good for E85, but I do not know what the seats are made from. They might wear out very quickly, or they might be fine.
 
Well none of the turbo guys I know tune their own car, and joey's not done E85... hence the lack of E85.

I don't believe you'd see much benefit on a standard compression NA duratec engine.
 
I never really did any kind of dyno comparison.

But apparently it was enough of a gain for my clutch to decide it had had enough. So i'm currently just DD'ing it out of the boost for the most part until I decide what I wanna do with the trans... swap.. build... etc.
 
RawBurt said:
Thats a good point.

How are you liking the e85, what kinda of gains did you see? I love this stuff
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I have seen upwards of +45 WHP and +45 WTQ on my WRX. Pretty remarkable if you ask me.

I made the switch from meth injection because I was having a hell of a time tuning it. Not only that, its much more corrosive than E85.
 
Barge said:
Well none of the turbo guys I know tune their own car, and joey's not done E85... hence the lack of E85.

I don't believe you'd see much benefit on a standard compression NA duratec engine.
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As soon as my gasoline tune is dialed in (Joey's waiting on my datalogs) Joey will begin working on an E85 tune. This experiment is for my '00 SE, if all goes well i will apply it to my SVT.

So far I have done the following mods:
- SVT UIM/TB
- KKM / Pud heatshield
- '01 Cougar LIM - Gutted/IMRC Delete (got fed up after 3 IMRC repairs)
- 24# EV1 style injector conversion, with alternative fuel o-rings (including fuel rail o-ring)
- MSDS headers/y-pipe and Stock SVT cat-back
- Nautilus Gasoline tune (Xcal3+dual wideband O2)

The project has slowed a bit because I'm getting close to closing on the house I'm building, but I plan to pick it back up as soon as I get moved in to the new place.

So hopefully there is a benifit to all this, and at very least Joey will get to dabble in E85 tuning.

Oh yeah, I plan on getting a flip-chip so the gasoline and E85 tunes are redily available. This should make it easier to travel around areas with short e85 supply.

As soon as the tunes are 'complete', I will try to get to a dyno to see if there are any noticable gains/losses to weigh out the cost/benifit ratio.
 
j0stev01 said:
In theory all i should need is a higher flow pump, larger injectors, and a tune right? Would I even need larger injectors, or could the tune take care of it?

Has anyone looked any further into this? I like to tinker around witht things like this and saw them do it on hptv the other day which got me thinking. About $1.50 a gal for E85 if I could find it, plus added horsepower. I think the contour's compression is high enough stock to handle the octane
Click to expand...

I dont think the pump needs replaced for NA, but I also haven't crunched the numbers yet to see how much headroom the stock pump has. :eek:

I am sure new injectors are needed, E85 is a significant increase in fuel demand. I also would recommend replacing the injector/fuel rail o-rings with the alternative fuel ones, they're cheap and easy to do while swapping injectors.

I don't expect much for NA horsepower, Like you, I just like to tinker. This is mainly a reliability test for myself before I scale up and add boost.
 
E85 requires about 30% more fuel than gas. So unless a car has grossly oversized injectors you will need to upgrade if you're trying to make good power.
 
The stock pump with flow enough for e85 on a N/A 2.5 or even 3L. The stock injectors, however, will not. I've considered this for my next hybrid 3L build. I don't feel like trying to tune for it on my turbo 3L cause she runs so pretty as she sits. I don't like to mess with that which isn't broken. :)
 
E85 tuning

E85 tuning

Methyl Alcohol stoich A/F is 6.5:1
Ethyl Alcohol stoich A/F is 9:1
Gasoline mix stoich A/F is 14.64:1

Take the relative proportions of each fuel and then combine for the new air fuel ratio. Then tune with a wideband to this point.

The import crowd is making big use of E85 now that it has become commercially available at a cheap price and it provides a tremendous increase in knock resistance at the expense of requiring more fuel. The 240sx crowd has made huge power numbers on E85 with people locally finding it safer just to mix the tank of E85 and gasoline to get higher knock resistance.

Check out this wikipedia article suggesting A/F or lambda ratios guidelines if you use e85.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E85_in_standard_engines

Most modern fuel systems have no issues with the e85 since oxygenated fuels became common in the mid 90s.
BTW, The original 98 SVT had a recall for the fuel tank flapper valve becoming stuck when switching to oxygenated fuels. You'd know if you had it because the swelled seal would lock the valve mostly closed and it would take you 10-15min (for REAL!) to fill your tank.
 
So what's the status on this? I might consider doing this conversion on my car for my turbo/3L build.
 
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