EPA takes risky step to increase ethanol blend
 

just curious, anyone have any ideas on how this might affect older benz gassers?

http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/ngreene/epa_takes_risky_step_to_increa.html

It's not going to have a good ending for older vehicles.

Make sure you all pay attention at the pump, get E10 or pure gas. I would personally avoid E15 blends for my own cars.

E15 is supposed to be optional for everyone, it is to be sold alongside E10...

I'm not sure how this will be implimented, if at all. There's no way the EPA can force all fuel to be E85. That means stations will need to emplace additional tanks and pumps and that simply is not possible for many gas stations.

This is another attempt to remove older vehicles from the roadways. Unless you have the money and knowledge to modify your older vehicle in order to run this crap through its piping, you're reduced to finding places that will sell 10% or less gas.

We aren't Europe, China, or Russia. We need to see who votes for this crap, or endorses it, then vote them out of office...or vote out of office those that push these people to come up with these rules.

F**K Ethanol,Corn based or otherwise.
 

See Above.

I'd rather eat corn than put it in my Benz. :D

Ethanol is one of the biggest scams ever forced on the American people. What a load of crap.

Marvel Mystery Oil in the gasoline (according to the manufacturer) helps negate the harmful effects of ethanol.

So they say.

X2 SQUARED

X3 Cubed :)

x1k cubed

Know any manufacturer that tells you "The product I am selling is crap"?

According to them it helps lubricity issues. Guess what! A test done proved it made it worse.

I have no faith in these snake oils. As far as I am concerned, all the are there to do is to fleece the customer. I would never use it unless they have tests done at an accredited lab using standard test procedures. But there is a reason they don't and rely on testimonials by customers.

X1K ^ 4

The Marvel M. Oil is a good light lube for sewing machines and other precision machinery of that type.

I think this is just something to take the stress off of pipeline companies that market blended gasoline.

It works like this....

A tanker pulls up to the loading rack and punches in his order. After grounding the tanker he fills the compartments just like you would fill your tank. The E is added in at the terminal and sloshes around in the tank on the way to the retail gas pump. By the time it gets there it is mixed to a blend of E 10.

Or at least it had better be. If the delivery driver runs a little too much E and winds up with a blend of E 11 or E 12 there can be a serious fine to pay, so some drivers cut the blend to E 8 or so just in case there is a bit of overrun when loading the E.

E 15 is allowed, but there is no law it must be provided like there was with unleaded gas.

This will take a lot of stress off of everyone concerned with retailing gasoline and I don't think there will be a big rush to provide E 15 unless it is a smog area like LA or Houston.

This finding will also allow the EPA to spend less on enforcement of the E 10 rule.

I don't think any pipeline company is going to rush out and build new tanks to put this into effect. I remember when unleaded gas was introduced in the mid 70's. We spent millions upon millions to make this work and so did all the other oil companies. No one wants to do that again.

And... Unleaded gas was a Nixon/Ford thing, so please don't go into any anti-lib rants over something Republicans did 35 years ago.

Wrong again Pooka...a Democratic Congress did it 35 years ago. Nixon/Ford signed off on it...thus the EPA moved forward... :rolleyes:

Nixon created the EPA in 1970, I seem to recall it was in June or July. He was the one that thought this up and it was created by Executive Order. Congress was not involved.

I think this had some weird name like Executive Directive to Redo Number 3, but everybody called it EPA from the beginning. I also seem to remember a lot of different agency were already doing most of what the EPA does now and Nixon just wanted to put them all under one roof.

I was there at the beginning of this and was involved in much of the infrastructure our company had to develop.

It cost a lot to put everything into place, but if you visit a refinery here and one in say, Russia, you would never want to go back to the way it was.

X^99999!

ha...

I too am concerned how my M104 will take this crap

Another illusion shattered???!!
 

:eek::eek::eek:

The owner's manual for my new Grand Marquis says what a wonderful thing E85 ethanol is and that the car can run great on it all the time.

So, are all the FoMoCo execs a big bunch of piñatas full of lies?


Can I trade the car in on one that runs on "Stupid"?

87, 89, 91, E85 or STUPID your choice. brought to you by the "do-gooders". 'cuz we've got to save the corn growers even if it means screwing our cars straight into the ground.

An EO is just that...but in order for ANY EO to live beyond the wildest dreams of the dreamer...the thing has to have teeth and with teeth comes the need to FEED THE BEAST. CONGRESS FEEDS THE BEAST OR STARVES THE BEAST.

As soon as Nixon was history, Congress COULD have dropped the EPA like a hot coal from the Webber, but...it fed the thing...and now, we enjoy CornPorn for our autos...E85 and worse.

THROW THE BUMS OUT AND ROLL THE CLOCK BACK. At least, get rid the subsidies of inefficient technologies and those that back this crap.

I don't remember where I saw the numbers but if I'm remembering it somewhat correctly, wasn't the cost to produce $1.00 worth of ethanol more than $1.75. This doesn't take into account the additional costs of added taxes, transportation, storage, distribution and the retail markup in order to sell the crap?

And the best part of all this?

The people that think this crap up and devise ways to feed it to us under the illusion that they know better than we do what's good for us, are the very same folks that also handle and direct our economy. :eek: :rolleyes:

We're living in a f***ing Petri-dish and we're thought of as the germs or viruses.

I want to infect the idiots... :rolleyes:

(X1K^4)^5

Well, if FoMoCo says it, I guess it must be true. Remember the ignition issue they had? They said it was great till...... And the fact that it helps lower their emissions so they can fit in has nothing to do with it. Sure.

I ran a truck designed to run on E85. Was miserable because the mileage sucked and the power sucked. Soon as we ran that tank low, we couldn't wait to fill up with the real stuff.

A political solution to a non-existant problem.

I disagree. There is a problem. When my opponent has something to give the voters and I don't, there is a problem. The solution is to give them more. Kinda like I'll see your $20 and raise you $20.

I don't keep up with the E thing so I don't know what it cost. I do know it cost more than MTBE.

I also know that MTBE is water solvent, so it will not stratify like oil. Once it is blended with gasoline it is in there for good, and if the gasoline is released it will mix in with the groundwater while gasoline will rise to the surface.

By the way... Refined products are never 'leaked' from a pipeline. They are 'released'. I don't know who thought that up, but it is the term everyone in the industry uses.

E will also combine with water which is a good thing when it comes to getting water out of your gas tank.

The thing I don't like about E is the BTU content. I bought some E-85 in Kansas, where they grow a lot of corn, for $1.99 a gallon a few months ago and my mpg dropped by about 15%. It was fun to fill up at that price, but when you look at how many miles you get for your $1.99 you begin to see that it is not that great of a deal.

I have a STRONG inclanation that MONSANTO is the main culprit pulling the strings behind this one.

193!^99999^100!

can you say.. overflow?

Monsanto is the devil.

[193!^99999^100!]^2 :D

I always thought the gasoline pumped from the stations today already had E10 and we never felt any drop in performance on our gas MB's.

But if the blend goes up... :mad:

Was the primary reason for adding ethanol, for vehicle emissions?

You can't INCREASE corn-seed sales without (a) willing buyer(s). Or, in the case of a "shortage of seed" - you can't increase the cost of the seed ACROSS THE BOARD without being able to use the addage "Supply vs. Demand" and have some "external force" guiding the demand.

"Government steps in...it again."

Not possible?

Many thought it was "not possible" to force stations to provide unleaded fuel.

The small independent stations in California blanch every time CARB opens its maw. Vapor recovery systems originated in CA and closed many independents. Then they changed the standards for recovery systems and forced the closure of more, simply because they coudn't afford to refit their stations again.

We may elect the people in congress, but they delegate their power through committees and establish federal agencies (like the EPA) to determine what is possible...whether it really is or not.

No, this is not Europe...yet. But it seems every generation here moves closer to a socialistic democracy in which the politicians simply decide what is good for us (and without any pretense of being our "representatives"). Someday in the not-too-distant future, if you want to drive a "classic" you'll probably have to live in a major metro area even to find a station that still sells "plain gas", and you can believe there will be a significant levy on it as well, and it's likely you'll also have to pay a hefty "carbon tax" in order just to own it. That assumes, of course, that they don't simply outlaw the use of conventional gasoline engines.

We may be facing a new world, but with all due respect to Mr. Huxley, I'm not sure how brave it will be.

SOTP dyno is pretty inaccurate. I think some marinas are saying boats have problems with the crap

I need the farmer's votes.

Yup, not possible. When lead free gas became mandated, the repair shop I worked for quit selling gas because they had no room to install additional tanks. Or do you think some sort of emminent domain might apply?

Most newer boats have fiber glass re-enforced plastic/polyester fuel tanks and the ethanol attacks the plastic/polyester.

A lot more people in the world might go hungry as the arable land that now grows food crops starts being diverted to feeding cars rather than to feeding people... :(

That is the key phrase. There are lots of older boats out there. Just like there are lots of older cars out there.

Older boats tend to have metal fuel tanks that are not affected by ethanol in any quantity. Cars are just the opposite. The older cars have fuel systems that were never intended to deal with ethanol in even small amounts.

Indeed. My first 2 or 3 years in the Navy, I stuck with driving my old 65 Mustang, as unleaded fuel still wasn't all that common in the areas I had to travel. Even when I bought my first new car, a 79 Mustang, I remember checking the station signs for "unleaded" before pulling into one for fuel.

Besides ethanol, there's the engine oil specs as well - SM rating that came out in 2003, and the CJ-4 spec for diesels in 2007. Both specs did the same thing - drastically lowered the amount of ZDDP, or zinc and phosphorous, in the oil - and for the same reason - to allow the use of emissions hardware mandated by the EPA.

For gas vehicles, the EPA mandated a major increase in the service life of catalytic converters. Since the zinc and phosphorous in the blow-by oil that gets sucked into the intake and burnt in the engine was one of the main causes of cats eventually "plugging up", the easiest thing for the OEM's and oil industry to do was simply come up with the SM spec that removed most of the zinc and phosphorous from the oil.

ZDDP has been used for decades as a hardening agent and film lubricant for high load areas in an engine - ie, keeping the chrome from wearing off your camshaft. If you have a newer type engine with roller lifters, not too big of a deal. But if you have an older "classic" with a flat tappet engine, you'd eventually end up trashing the engine if you don't have sufficient levels of ZDDP in the oil to protect these high load areas.

Same with the CJ-4 diesel spec. The levels of ZDDP were significantly lowered to allow the use of particulate filters (DPF's) in the exhaust on 2007 and newer diesels. Even the description of the spec on the API's website lists the primary function of CJ-4 as being "protecting the emissions hardware on 2007 and newer diesel vehicles". Yeah, screw the engine, gotta protect that particulate filter.:mad:

We've even ran into this situation at work. Since 1986 they've been using Mobilgard 450 oil in the 4500 HP dual fuel generator they have. Unbeknownst to them, over the years Mobil changed the oil to a "zinc free" low ash "railroad engine" formulation - which the tech manual specifically states you are NOT to use a zinc free oil in this engine, and specifies minimum levels of zinc/phosphorous/sulfated ash needed in the oil. A couple months back the engine suffered a geartrain casualty which has entailed a nearly complete rebuild of the engine. The managers and owners of the engine (UTSA) were quite surprised and rather embarrassed, to be told by the company contracted to rebuild the engine, that they'd been using the wrong engine oil for nearly 15 years (ie, since Mobil changed the formulation)!!!:eek: And I got a major "I told you so" because I had pointed this out and questioned the use of this type oil well over a year ago.:D

When the district manager called up Mobil and tried to get specs on what was in the oil and which type to use, he ended up getting the runaround, told that was "proprietary" information. We ended up going with the contractor's recommendation as to which type oil to use.

End result, in addition to having to do a complete geartrain replacement, they're going to have to replace ALL of the crankshaft and conn rod bearings as they're worn down to minimum spec. My bet is they're going to have to pull the pistons as well and replace the rings, liners, etc - in other words, a complete overhaul and upgrade. UTSA is already making noise they want to talk to the contractor about doing an overhaul and upgrade, since the deeper they dig into the engine, the more items they find that need to be corrected, and we've already got it torn apart to this extent - if for no other reason, to help comply with future emissions regulations. Guess the campus police better get hot and start handing out a bunch more $100 parking tickets.:rolleyes:

Not sure about boats since I don't work on them but I do know there is some grumbling about the fuel and the fuel system. Exactly what part I don't know but there is grumbling. I suspect for the inboard engines it might be the case but outboards probably had a significant amount of rubber lines. Could be the carburetors or whatever. Would need a marine guy to chime in

Ethanol is nothing but problems on the water, it separates and soaks up moisture very quickly.

Luckily some marinas offer ethanol free gas, although not nearly enough. If they keep upping ethanol this is whats going to have to happen in the future.

retmil46....

That is handy info to have.