Reply With QuoteBeaumont Tescos John?
My daily motor is a Toyota Avensis and I always fill up at Tesco with E10 but I have noticed over the last couple of months my filler flap is looking pretty poor, is it the E10 causing this I wonder ? it dident look like this a couple of months back.
I use Shell E5 99 Octane in my MR2.
Beaumont Tescos John?
" According to the experts at Autocar, E10 petrol's higher bioethanol content is corrosive to rubber parts, gaskets, seals, metals and plastics, which causes engine damage. The site adds: “E10 could dislodge deposits in older engines and fuel systems, causing blockages "
I dont know if that is fully true or if all cars will be damaged but i try to avoid it just in case there is any truth in this.
Not directly related, but there have been a number of complaints in the marina where my boat is about E10.
Most boats use marine diesel, but outboards are generally petrol. A lot of boats sit a lot longer than cars with fuel primed and the mechanics are saying that the rubbers are breaking down.
Nearly all modern stuff is fine with E10 meaning 2012 onwards. In my TR6 I use BP Momentum which is E5 or less (usually below E5 or 0 ) so if in doubt use Momentum
^^^^^^or use Esso Synergy supreme which has zero ethanol content.
That`s what i`m using in my older motorcycles because they invariably remain unused in the garage for extended periods (ethanol absorbs water as well as degrading rubber).
E10 = the Devil's work.
I put one gallon into my Standard Companion and the driver's side sill fell off.
I've been using E10 for months on my 2009 Mazda 6 and my filler cap and surrounding area are fine.
I should add that I mostly put the nozzle firmly in the filler hole before activating the pump, and make sure I've released the trigger before I extract the nozzle. Some people might do it differently.
Some widely applicable advice there!Originally Posted by Onelasttime
I’ve also been advised to use E5 in my outboard due to the potential impact on rubber.
This is the exact advice which I am following.
I tested my local Synergy which does indeed seem ethanol free ATM (test a small sample by adding blue food colouring, if it remains a bead its ethanol free but if the sample goes blue, it has ethanol.
^^^^What happens if you use yellow food colouring?
Perhaps they knew even back then;
I’m intrigued by the reported problems with rubber and E10, I wouldn’t expect this percentage of ethanol to cause problems. As for picking up water, again I’m surprised, the ethanol will be dry when blended with petrol and once it gets diluted it isn’t going to behave like pure ethanol!
Might do some tests myself, it’ll be like going back to work, materials compatibility tests were part of the job when I had one.
My 1970 MGB will be using it next spring, even if that involves replacing flexible fuel lines and other bits. Back in the early noughties there was a scare about unleaded fuel being incompatible with some rubber parts in classic cars, Triumph TR6 fuel injection metering unit seals were reputedly affected. The issue had nothing to do with absence of tetraethyl lead lead, it was caused by MTBE (methyl tertiary butyl ether) being added to petrol.
I have no idea! Blue costs 90p in Sainsburys. I read about using blue in a magazine article. I had been in the habit of only using "super" type fuels in my bikes for years anyway due to their compression ratios (bmw r90s designed in the days of 5 star etc). R9T modern also requires super.I tested a few samples from other fuel makers and the blue test suggested they did have ethanol present.
In my experience, even E5 will damage rubber fuel lines and carb diaphragms etc (my R100gspd fecked over winter).
Oh, FFS. I did not know that. Thanks.
I did check that E10 was compatible with the bike engine in my kit car, no problems there.
What I clearly missed is that it will dissolve the fuel pipes! Bloody EU. When do we leave?
This is a widely known issue for boats (the fact they're used on the water exaggerates the effect).
M
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Hi Walkerwek, your point about the Ethanol being dry is valid, however Ethanol is Hydroscopic so it seeks out any moisture in the fuel system. A a classic bike owner I have been fighting E5 for about 5 years. Neoprene hoses stiffen and crack, multimetal components in the carb furr up and jam.
My solution on E5 when running seven bikes eg not all in regular use , was drain the fuel system. Some of the guys I know use Aspen, others brim the tanks and hope.
You cant beat being sat at the lights when a friendly motorist tells you you have a “ water” leak, only to see petrol pouring from a denatured fuel line and flowing over your hot exhaust to “ focus your mind”
Lots of vids on u tube for home de ethanol kits , showing say 5 lits of E5 , then add 0.5 lit of water containing food dye. Agitate then do the split, 0.5 lit in 1 lit out. So in many ways it is behaving like pure Ethyl Alcohol and combining with the water.
2 classic bikes here. I've been avoiding E5 for years but it's becoming hard to find any fuel with no Ethanol at all since the introduction of E10. What I have been doing is putting shots of stabilizer in the tanks after filling up. my thoughts are that even if it's got no Ethanol content, the fuel is sat for long periods anyway. I'm seriously thinking of using Aspen too as the miles I do are next to nothing. It's expensive though.
Ethanol destroys rubber, from memory it somehow produces formic acid which has a go at all the other components, when we drag raced bikes in the 80's we once forgot to drain the fuel system before storage, it destroyed a set of carbs in two weeks. unless it is a deliberate attempt to remove old cars from the road I cant see the logic of sticking it in fuel, all seals and O rings need to be Neoprene or Viton
Will produce ethanoic (acetic) acid if anything.
I'd seen a marked drop in mpg in a 3.0 turbocharged V6. I'd worked out that the additional cost of premium outweighed the drop in consumption.
I've noticed that too. I have a new 1.5 Yaris and noticed a drop in mpg. Using E5 now and the mpg is back up.
Saw a tweet from someone with a 992 Porsche who'd worked out that E5 petrol is 7.6% more expensive at their local garage but they got 14.9% better fuel economy than E10.
Quite apart from the economy boost, E5 (specifically Vpower) totally transforms the performance of my daft little Panda 4x4. And I used to be a premium petrol sceptic. I’ve used nothing else for most of the last year. When I was off-piste in darkest Krankiestan and had no choice other than E10 it was a wretched business.
I read somewhere recently that modern small turbo engines (mine is a two cylinder “Twinair” turbo) benefit disproportionately from E5.
https://www.hindawi.com/journals/jfu/2014/429608/
After reading this I definitely wouldn't advocate neoprene rubber!
As for the formic of formic acid, that looks impossible to me and as previously stated acetic acid would be formed from ethanol, but not under the conditions prevailing.
Avoid E10 for garden machinery too
In my TR6 all the seals in the Metering Unit and fuel system have been changed to Viton
I did say it was a long time ago,
Interesting though, it still amazes me that they would approve something that can do so much damage, unless of course its deliberate policy to ruin older vehicles.
Definitely would NOT advocate this for several reasons! Fire risk is one of them, static discharge amongst other ignition sources can easily set petrol vapour alight. When I worked in laboratories I would do similar activities in a contained fume chamber, never an open bench. Indeed, I used to do safety demonstrations to show how flammable vapours creep and flash back when meeting an ignition source, there's no way I'd be swishing petrol about in my garage, kitchen or garden for that matter, I treat it with respect!
What do these budding alchemists do to remove water emulsified or entrained in the fuel? If they're not careful they'll create more problems than they solve.
I haven`t seen any carefully conducted corrosion trials with metal components in E5 or E10, I`ll try to dig some out. Possibly some of the issues are due to storage and evaporation issues, I remain unconvinced that 10% ethanol in a hydrocarbon solvent can constitute a corrosive solution. Accepting that this fuel will be more hydroscopic, where is the water coming from in a sealed fuel tank? OK, the airspace will refresh as the tank empties, being replenished with wet air, but that's an issue with any fuel. Prior to E5 or E10 any water condensing on the walls of the tank would end up as a separate phase in the bottom of the tank, there's now more potential for the ethanol-containing fuel to absorb moisture and remain as a single phase until a saturation point is reached and an azeotropic mixture of ethanol and water will precipitate as a separate phase in the bottom of the tank, but that doesn`t tally with reports of corroded carbs etc. It could be argued that the increased hydroscopic nature is an advantage because it provides some safeguard against formation of an aqueous phase. Again, if anyone can find some proper peer-reviewed studies I`d like to read them, I don`t dispute the anecdotal evidence that E5 and E10 fuels have been associated with problems (particularly with classic vehicles used occasionally) but I`d prefer to get a true understanding of the issues.
The stories regarding reduced MPG are interesting, I thought the calorific value and density of the fuel was virtually unchanged? I guess there are other factors that will affect how it performs, particularly in older cars, but again it would be nice to see some hard evidence from controlled studies.
Over the years fuel composition has changed several times and its not easy to get a clear story. Around 2004 my Triumph TR6 suffered mild pinking/pre-ignition problems on 95 octane unleaded, the problem completely went away the following summer despite nothing on the car being touched or adjusted!
Unfortunately I think we're stuck with E10 in the future, higher octane/lower ethanol fuel might be available for some years but I expect it to become more expensive and harder to source. I`ll see how I get on next spring when my MGB comes out of winter hibernation but I`d like to see some more credible studies to better understand what's going on. It ain't rocket science!
Do you seriously believe that?
Unfortunately owners of older vehicles have to adapt and find solutions, that's how it is and how it's always been. I`m more concerned with the poor quality of replacement parts, that's the biggest problem for classic vehicle owners, one way or another we'll deal with the fuel changes.
That was the way forward in the early noughties, unleaded fuel coincided with the addition of MTBE and I believe that's what caused problems with the metering unit seals. Another factor was the age of the parts, sometimes failure of rubber parts can occur when the solvent they're subjected to changes even though the rubber should be OK with the new environment.
I think Viton should be OK with E5, probably OK with E10 too, but I found conflicting evidence regarding Viton and pure ethanol. Possibly there are different grades of Viton?
Only using BP Momentum which BP say can contain up to 5% but normally they say it’s between 0 and 3% which after 4 years of using said fuel, on inspection last April, every seal and rubber was fine. So as long as the Momentum stays that way, happy days
ESSO worth a look too
What’s in our Synergy Supreme+ 99 premium petrol
Our Synergy Supreme+ 99 petrol has more cleaning power than our regular petrol – and includes molecules whose job it is to reduce the friction in your engine helping the moving parts work more efficiently.*
Although our pumps have E5 labels on them, our Synergy Supreme+ 99 is actually ethanol free (except, due to technical supply reasons, in Devon, Cornwall, North Wales, North England and Scotland). Legislation requires us to place these E5 labels on pumps that dispense unleaded petrol with ‘up to 5% ethanol’, including those that contain no ethanol, which is why we display them on our Synergy Supreme+ 99 pumps.
There’s currently no requirement for renewable fuel, like ethanol, to be present in super unleaded petrol although this could change in the future, in which case we would comply with any new legislation
Fuel density varies by season, with summer fuel being heavier than winter. The theory being that the lighter parts would evaporate faster in the summer. Not sure if that is done int he UK, my source was an american book on forced induction.
I don't know how the calorific value of E10 compares to 'proper' petrol.
I do know that there isn't a difference in calorific value between 95RON and 97 RON fuel. The differnece is knock resistance, measured as "octane". Octane isn't about calorific value, it's about the resistance to ignition by compression.
In the compresion stroke of a petrol engine, the fuel must be ignited by the spark plug before it self ignites under compression. Self ignition is known as knock or detonation, it's bad and will make holes in pistons. You want a controlled burn, not an explosion. This means the fuel in the cylinder must be ignited before the piston reaches the top of the compression stroke. This is known as ignition advance, hopefully it's clear why.
Sadly, igniting the fuel before the piston reaches top dead centre pushes against the piston as it's trying to compress the fuel and energy is wasted.
With a higher octane fuel, the resistance to detonation is greater, so less ignition advance is needed. Less fuel is burnt in the compression stroke & more in the expansion stroke. Power and fuel economy are improved...
But only if your engine has a knock sensor and adapts it's ignition timing to be just on the safe side of detonation. If the ignition map is fixed, then it is probably set to cope with 95RON (or worse) fuel and in that case shoving a higher octane fuel in will make no difference to economy or power.
As a Yoof my father got me a two week work experience in Burmah Oil Ellesmere Port. They blended petrol there and had knock testers to determine the quantity of Tetra Ethyl Lead (TEL) and a product called ISO Octane to be added.
The machines were large single cylinder IC engines with a large flywheel. The sample of fuel was fed through a small 1/2 pint fuel store. The engines were started , then the clever bit, there was a lever you turned which squished down the head. So you might start at 9:1 ( remember this was in the days of 5* fuel. Then progressively crank down the head until it knocked or pinked. Once the baseline was noted the amount of TEL / ISO Octane was advised to the blending crew. From memory I think the TEL was added at tanker filling eg just prior to delivery.
Happy days !
Ps Mike you were right in the winter more Butane or light “ends” were added to the fuel to aid vapourising in the carb.
Im sure GOAT on here is a bit of a specialist on fuel blending.
Steve
Last edited by higham5; 5th January 2022 at 16:45.
Thanks Steve, I couldn't remember the reason for putting the lighter stuff back in in the colder months. The bookshelf is only 10ft away, but...
Did you know that the chap who discovered that putting lead in petrol increases knock resistance also invented Chloro-Flouro-Carbons. Thomas Midgely Jr. if memory serves. He has single handedly done more damage to the planet than any other human in history! All unintnetionally of course.
Edit:
My two week stint was with BBC Radio Solent. I didn't learn much, but we did go on a number of jollies with the outside broadcast bunch. I think that the engineers there learnt more than we did. For example, it was a mistake to give a 15 year old me a silver platter and ask him to be a wine waiter.
Hic.
Last edited by mikeveal; 5th January 2022 at 17:08.
Interesting to hear from folks with some experience in the industry. Typical of my generation of car enthusiasts, I was dead against the change from 97 octane leaded fuel to 95 octane unleaded, but in hindsight it was totally wrong to continue with leaded fuel. My expertise is limited but I know the composition of fuel has changed significantly over the years, in my experience the current 95 octane petrol doesn’t cause the same knocking issues as late 70s 3 star (95 octane). Despite running a compression ratio of 9.75 : 1 my MGB happily runs on 95 octane unleaded without retarding the ignition, the TR6 I owned from 2001-2010 was the same, albeit better from ca 2005 onwards.
Just been out walking and I mulled the E10 concept around in my head. Maybe I’m missing something, but I can’t see why we’re making this change! We’re growing crops to ferment into ethanol as an alternative to oil-sourced hydrocarbons, but we’re being told that growing crops to feed animals to eat isn’t really a good idea and we have to start moving away from this if the world is to be fed. What am I missing?
Can someone clarify the reasons for adding more ethanol into petrol in 2022........or even any ethanol?
Back in the days when I carried out corrosion tests of rubbers and metals in chemical reaction masses (to safeguard against wrecking chemical reactors) it was always deemed necessary to partially expose a test piece in the solution to simulate the so- called ‘wind and weather’ effect. This is the point at which the material is wetted with solution but also exposed to air. This sometimes produced accelerated corrosion for reasons that weren’t always predictable. When applying this approach to vehicle fuel components its clear that the system we’re studying potentially involves the metal in contact with a thin evaporating layer of fuel in an atmosphere of air, especially when looking at the storage regime for most old cars and bikes where they’re left over winter without getting used.
As for test results, perhaps the most challenging medium to consider is E10 fuel that’s saturated with water to a point where the system is still single phase and clear, but just on the verge of going hazy, that would be an interesting set of trials. Furthermore, it’s worth adding water to E10 to a point where an ethanol/ water separate phase forms, then carrying out corrosion trials using that phase. These tests are very easy to do and would produce definitive results in approx 6 weeks, that was our standard testing time back in the day.
I think I can trump that Mike, on my last day , probably last hour I managed to ride the laboratory bicycle ( bit like a bakers bike eg basket on the front) smack into the side of a works mini van. I didnt hear or see a think just remember flying through the air. He was in the right using the works roads I was just tearing back so I wouldnt miss my bus!We met at a works road junction, probably 5 seconds earlier and it would have been more serious!
What an auspicious end to my work experience.
I can relate to that tale! I started work aged 16 for ICI at the Huddersfield site which covered over 1 square mile. Bicycles were used to get around and I enjoyed this, having never been allowed a bike as a kid I took every chance to have a ride around. I happily volunteered to fetch stuff from the main stores and always took a circuitous route if the weather was nice. I didn’t collide with anything but had a spectacular ‘off’ whilst trying to negotiate a gravel- strewn corner too quickly like a speedway rider! My supervisor wasn’t impressed, we had a fireside chat, and my subsequent bike rides were carried out more cautiously. One colleague of the same age and temperament had a similar incident when his trousers ( 70s Oxford bags) got caught in the chain!
Happy days!
Thanks for that. When out and about and need some fuel I will find it out.
I am sticking with E5 as my engine has been known to be problematic with E10, despite what Nissan say. It is a 3.5l v6 inside a Nissan Elgrand, and the increased fuel cost is offset by the retention of mpg - a 10% loss has been mooted on E10 on this engine.
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I put E10 in my Honda lawn mower and it stopped within two minutes and I have yet to get it going again!
This is for race cars but gives a good indication of how the manufacturers of modern cars can make the cars automatically adjust for different percentages of alcohol in the fuel and how they can get better performance using it.
https://racecal.co.uk/blogs/news/rac...l-what-why-how
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