Ethanol free gas for 2 weeks

Being the curious person that I am, I decided to test ethanol free gas in my Tacoma. Florida State Statute mandates that non-ethanol fuel can only be sold for use in Collector Vehicles, small engines, Off-Road vehicles, etc...Being the smart ass that I am, I filled up my TRD Off-Road with 90 octane Ethanol Free Gasoline. It is usually sold here in palm beach county at a high markup because of how hard it is to find. I paid $4.49/gal. Expensive as it may be, this was just for me to see if there would be a difference. At initial start up, I could feel, hear, and tell no difference. I was sad - I just threw like $14 down the drain. It wasn't until I was stopped at a red light about 5 miles away that I noticed a difference. It was the idle. While my truck is new, and does not idle rough, I could always tell that the engine was running. With the windows down, I could hear the "Tacoma Tick" of the injectors, or whatever it may be. While I was sitting at the light, the truck felt smoother. The RPM's were the same range they had always been, But the truck felt happier. There was no Ticking noise, just the pure sound of the exhaust.

I thought maybe it's a coincidence. Maybe I'm imagining it. Without saying anything, I had a friend with a 2005 Tacoma stand next to my truck while I started it. All I said to him was "Check this out. What do you notice?". Within about 15 seconds, after the RPM's came down from the cold sort, his response was "that's really quiet; how did you get rid of the tick?" I told him and he filled up with the same fuel. Same result...ticking noise is virtually gone. He feels like his truck has a bit more power, as do I. Being objective, that could be more a figment of our imagination and have more to do with the skinny pedal than anything.

Gas mileage was also better than usual, with 21.6mpg average for three fill ups across 51.389 gallons. A lot better than my 18mpg average (which to be fair does include towing and other low mpg scenarios)

This was just a little test that I did to see what the impact of ethanol actually was on my truck. I will be switching back to BP Ultimate @ $4.09/gal. The 40c/gal difference is just too much to make it worth while for me.

 

Yes, however the gas station is about 5miles out of the way for anything I would ever drive...the savings is not enough to warrant the drive for me. If it were closer, I would do it...I wish it were more readily available...

 

Don't you technically get more power out of ethanol?

 

Cool experiment. Haven't had my Tacoma long enough to try too many things, but I had the same results from using 93 octane rather than 87 in my 5.8L Bronco. Didn't check the mileage difference as it would have gone from really bad to bad, but it definitely ran better with 93. Probably got worse mpg's just because of my foot.

 

Sure, but you have to increase the air to fuel ratio (more fuel) in order for that to happen.

 

I think I might try this as well. Only a 13cent per gallon price difference here.

 

There is actually about 20% less energy per unit of fuel when comparing ethanol to gasoline. Check the mileage estimates of e85 vehicles running on gas vs e85 and you will see that e85 is significantly lower mpg's. Ethanol does have a higher octane level, however.

 

Where is the gas station?, Skees Road.

PK

 

Must be nice to have the option..I dont think any gas stations around me are ethanol free.

 

we have several E free stations in town. most cost about the same as the rest of the gas. There is a shell in town that has ethenol free gas but they are around .10c higher than anyone else...but thats just shell for you.

 

Not a single station in my area of chicagoland when I searched it a few months back.

P.S.
highest prices here too.

CROOK COUNTY FTW

 

I just found out recently that one of my local gas stations sells ethanol free gas , it's the same price as the other , ethanol included station

 

Yea, I know they do have lower mpg's, but heard it's better for power due to higher octane(if it's tuned properly I guess). Only mentioned it because the OP mentioned he felt he gained power with the non-ethanol.

 

$4.49/gal is expensive? LOL, it's what I pay regularly at the pump (91).

 

No Ethanol gas where I live.

 

has anyone tried something like the Sta-Bil ethanol neutralizer in their truck to see if it makes a difference?

The tractor I bought last year had a paper in the manual that said ethanol free gas or use of a neutralizer was required for proper performance and engine life.

 

Less.

Ethanol has only about 75% of the BTU content of gasoline.

Racing engines can draw more power from ethanol because the base octane level is 118, so they can run extremely high compression levels without getting into detonation.

On our engines, and "flex fuel" engines, the compression doesn't change (beyond cylinder pressure changes afforded via VV-Ti technology), so no... ethanol-laden fuel gets worse MPG and lower economy.

Ethanol is stoich at about 9:1, gasoline at 14.7:1
So for a gasoline engine tuned properly that gets 29.4mpg, that same engine, retuned to run ethanol, will get 18mpg.

 

Octane makes no difference on "power"
Octane is ONLY a measure of a fuel's resistance to detonation/preignition.

If your engine is not pinging, more octane will make no difference in power or economy UNLESS the engine advances the ignition timing to take advantage (as some claim the 4.0 does, but it will not advance enough to take advantage of octane levels above 91).

 

Exact same thing here. I only use 91E0 now.