Hello all.

I was recently in Western Kansas, and regular gasoline was selling at $2.949 and E10 (10% ethanol) was selling at $2.849 and E85 (85% ethanol) was selling for $1.999.

At nearly a dollar spread for the ethanol, I knew this would be financially to my advantage on a cost per mile basis, even though MPG would drop.

My tank was not empty. I already had E10 in the car, and I could only pump in 9.1 gallons of E85 on top of what was already there. I have done many ethanol tests in my 2005 FEH, so I knew in advance this was not going to "ruin" anything.

The FEH from years 2005-2008 have fuel injectors that can adjust the fuel flow +/- 30% from "nominal" conditions. This is called fuel trim.
The technical manual lists you may get a MIL or "malfunction indicator light" on dash if the fuel injectors exceed +/- 28%. But the car will still run.

Much to my surprize, on this blend of about 6 gallons gas, and 9.1 gallons E85 ethanol, I'm averaging 30.6 MPG on this tank for 400 miles in WINTER DRIVING conditions. My tank has been about 80% highway at 70 MPH and 20% city in stop and go with lots of stoplights.

6 gallons x $2.849 = $17.09
9.1 galns x $1.999 = $18.19

Cost for the mixture was $2.33 per gallon.
Cost per mile was 7.6 cents at 30.6 MPG.

Do the math for yourself.
Are you driving for more, or less than 7.6 cents per mile in 20-40 degree weather?

For the purist out there, my miles per gallon of GAS (ie foriegn oil) was nearly 60 MPG since half of the miles came from Kansas corn, not foreign oil!

 

John, would you estimate the mix you had in your tank to be ~55% Ethanol?

That's about what I got going off the numbers you provided but I could have missed something in my quick calculations.

 

It's a shame how ethanol effects the '05 -'08 FEH. The '09 is much heavier but my last tank was better than I got at the '07 Hybridfest MPG Challenge with a warmed-up engine in 26 miles. With all the cold starts during a month, I'm exceeding the record with the '09 FEH on E10 here on flat roads in Florida.

I just logged a 63.4mpg tank on 13.6 gallons of E10 with 862 miles. I'm sure I would have gone over 1,000 miles on straight gas with 13.6 gallons of gas at over 80mpg. I would have bought far less foreign oil by not mixing ethanol in my gas. Ethanol is a scam that helps spend more money on foreign oil and damages our vehicles and two stroke engines.

GaryG

 

35.4 mpg says it all.

 

$1.99 is a nice summer E85 price... very nice for winter.

E85 prices are closer to $2.50 at all but one station here. E20/E30 is generally regarded as the best bang for the buck for many newer vehicles. I can't speak for older, narrow band O2 sensors, but my wife's '09 MM (V6) gets better mileage on E30 than E10.

 

Well, E85 can legally be anywhere between 70% and 85%.
And E10 can vary somewhat also.
So everything is approximate.

My fuel trim on the ScanGauge was at +21 to 22% so it was pretty heavy on ethanol. E10 = +3.5% fuel trim. So maybe I had less gas in there than I thought.

In case you wonder, in the modern ( post year 2000 ) ethanol manufactuing plants, ( which comprises the vast majority of them ) 14,000 btu of fossil fuel* goes into the manufacture of each 76,000 btu gallon of ethanol.
I agree with GaryG that the newest cars out there are doing better, getting better fuel economy with ethanol.

I also see awesome results in my 2005 FEH with 26-30% ethanol.
Higher blends of ethanol improved towing ability also.
One thing I notice over and over is... without towing, the FEH does not rev the engine on hills with higher blends. I can run cruise control at 70 MPH in the rolling hills of KS, SD, NE, and Eastern CO (4-5% grades) and the RPM stays right there in the sweet spot at about 2400 RPM. With plain ol' gas, and I'm sure you agree, the cruise control revs the engine at every little hill. On the 6-7% grades the engine revs, but not as high as expected. I see this effect with 50% ethanol and greater.

P.S. In addtion to Colby, KS, I found E85 for $1.999 in Colorado this week also. I think the farmer co-ops price it lower, and the big chains are about $2.35 to $2.45 out here. E10 in some Colorado areas was $2.569 this week, so an 11 to 21 cent spread makes no sense to the consumer.

*I work for an engineering firm that conducts audits of ethanol plants. The ethanol plants pay us a fee to make recommendations for improvements.

 

I recommend they drop their prices to $1.99.

 

I kept an eye out this weekend and in one area with several gas stations, I had the following options and prices:

E85/?oct - $2.69/gal
E10/87oct - $2.79/gal
E0/87oct - $2.99/gal

I got the E0/87oct and the NAVI is reporting 36MPG on the 100% hwy (near freezing, rain/sleet mix)tank so far.

My most recent tank was E0/89oct and got 36.2MPG on a 85% highway tank.

The previous tank was E0/93oct and was in the 34mpg range and the tank before that was E10 and in the low 30's as best I recall. I've moved to actively searching out stations that sell E0/87oct (the closest only have E0/93oct and one that has E0/89oct) and try to fill up there even if I don't need a full tank's worth.

My '08 FEH just doesn't seem to like E10 and I'm going to hold out until after the warranty has expired before I try going past E10. Maybe by then the local E85 pumps will come down to that more reasonable $1.99/gal range you were seeing.

 

E10 is not a good mix.

Try a couple tanks of E20 or E30 before you condemn ethanol.

Sorry, didn't see this until after I posted... "I'm going to hold out until after the warranty has expired before I try going past E10."

(BTW, those aren't great prices.) For prices and locations of blender pumps, try e85prices.com