Joe, I wondered if anyone would pick up on the possible time difference. Maybe Vick will respond when. Also, took me a little while to catch Stickman's first comment was a 1985 incident. Shorton's comment is interesting too in that he can see different layers etc.----when I look at the fuel I use in a jar, it is always crystal clear and the whole jar looks the same, so far.

What we DO know is that 100 LL is the same now as it was then, so the sure bet is to use it. That works for some, and others don't like that path. So be it. Go forth cautiously and conservatively, and make your own judgement.

I tend to agree with that. The thing that bugs me is that I've made the judgment that the safest option for my Franklin (for many reasons) is to run clean, fresh, ethanol free mogas. However, the politicians have made that option very difficult for me, perhaps soon to be impossible.

And as soon as the EPA has their way with 100LL, we'll be in real trouble.

RDU wrote

And as soon as the EPA has their way with 100LL, we'll be in real trouble.

I'd think you would be in 7th heaven with no lead avgas.

I'd think you would be in 7th heaven with no lead avgas.

I'm not sure I'll be thrilled with the price, but otherwise you're exactly right. It would be great if they had made sure the 100LL replacement was made available BEFORE killing the only alternative presently available to me (ethanol free mogas).

Well, I was definitely not trying to start a battle between little yellow emoticons with tiny baseball bats... They've obviously had too much ethanol in their little livers for sure!

I actually just wanted to make a clear public statement that (as promised) I'd check the ethanol issue with someone who was far more highly educated than most of us here - and that his answer shocked me and changed the way I will fly.

Speaking only for myself, I'll use car gas if there is no other good readily available option, but I would use 100LL as a first choice by far.

Well, I was definitely not trying to start a battle between little yellow emoticons with tiny baseball bats...

Well, it doesn't take much to set those little buggers off. I thought they were going to kill each other when I made my views on LORAN known a few months ago...

Oh, one more thing on basic economics. Old tech, if you would quit buying US gallons that would leave more in the market for us and the price would go down. Just buy the Canadian ones.[/quote]

Yeah. Canadians are the worlds best walking converters, we use every measurement system. Actually Avgas is $1.35 a litre in Canadian money which is worth somewhere between $.93 and 1.00 U.S, depending what day it is.

180Marty wrote:Maybe Vick will respond when.

Well my Dad just passed away in January and he was coherent more or less to the end. I flew two of our planes on mogas about three weeks beforehand and his opinion hadn't changed up to that point. I only reference his passing because I unfortunately can't call him up, tell him that a bunch of hangar jockeys are debating stuff they really don't know much about, and ask him to e-mail me a scientifically sound explanation.

EZ - Your friend's comment seem more to address the variation in quality that can be found in mogas, less so the differences in composition between the two fuels. My father's point was that ethanol-free mogas is chemically better suited for combustion in a low compression engine - we don't need the octane and we don't need the lead. Add ethanol and it all goes out the window given its hydrophilic qualities, there's no way to determine the energy content if you don't know how much water has been absorbed. The fact that mogas currently costs less is just a bonus.

Quality assurance is up to you. I've bought gas from a station before that my car ran like crap on and I didn't buy any more from them. Might have been that it had been sitting there a while or maybe their tank was getting low and crud was getting sucked up off the bottom, either way I just steered clear of them after that. When I was using pump gas in my plane I had one station that I used routinely - I routinely tested for ethanol and if the fuel had looked sketchy I would have gone looking for a new source. In all the fuel I used from them I never had a fuel related issue.

Honestly mogas is a pain in the ass - it stinks, there are logistical hurdles with gas cans and trailers, and the lingering fear that I'm going to blow myself up from some errant static charge. I hope they do get the new lower-lead/lower-octane avgas rolled out, it would be great to have a universally available, stable, more suitable fuel. Yeah it'll cost more, but I don't have any illusions that GA is going to ever get any cheaper.

Marty, if burning ethanol in your 180 works for you knock yourself out, but it's simply not legal under the current STCs. Instead of trying to convince us of its virtues try getting the STC holders on board. If they get it certified then the debate would be over.

Vick wrote

try getting the STC holders on board.

Vick, thanks for responding on the time line of your father's thoughts. I know the feeling of wanting Dad's advice and not being able to get it. I have tried the two STC holders with no success. I am certain that with a little education,pilots could make the STC work. I have accepted that the bureaucracy in this country stifles some things that can work. I have first hand knowledge of another ethanol related process that is being stifled----blender pumps. I feel I came up with the idea in early 2003 when I saw them in Arkansas and Louisiana dispensing low,mid, and high octane gasoline out of one hose and two underground storage tanks,one with high octane and one with low octane. The mid blend was a combination from both tanks. I thought, what a great way to get E85 everywhere and not even have to break cement for another underground tank---one unleaded and one E98 directly from the ethanol plant. I called the E85 organization and was referred to a guy in Texas certifying a single product Gilbarco pump and skid tank. He thought my idea was good but would never be needed. We communicated for several months and then he referred me to one of the main guys at Dresser Wayne pump. Two different times he assured me that in a couple of months Underwriters Lab would grant the certification. I had another pump outfit in Omaha tell me you can't dispense 90/10 or 85/15 out of these pumps. I gave up but when I went to Oshkosh in 2005 the ethanol plant just west of the airport had just put up their first station direct marketing 10,20, and 85% ethanol from an illegal blender pump. The state of Wisconsin looked the other way when it came to the legality of using these pumps. I have stayed in contact with the guy in charge of these pumps in WI and they are basically trouble free. UL still has not blessed them for 85% but has decided up to 25% is OK. I feel that the oil companies are leaning on UL to be as slow as possible because if they ever get certified, the oil companies lose the control they have over ethanol. There are more and more blenders being installed but since they aren't UL approved a lot of fire marshals won't allow them. UL does acknowledge that they haven't heard of any blender pump failures in the field.

shorton wrote:The thing that has always scared me about car gas is that if you put it in a nice clean glass jar and swirl it around and look through the gas at the sunlight. You will see all sorts of layers and textures swirling around in the gas. It looks sort of like a really weak version of a lava lamp .............

Never seen this in the car gas I use- I routinely (likke every load) pour some out into a measuring cup in the process of verifying E-zero and it always looks OK. No layers,debris,funny colors, pollywogs, or anything else. Been running car gas for many hours over many years -- no problems attributable to it. O-rings, seals etc have always looked just fine. It might be that the example cited used hardware store o-rings which weren't up to prolonged contact with gasoline (either car gas or 100LL).
But if someone else is happier running 100LL, home-washed cargas, E85, or whatever-- more power to them.

180Marty wrote:Vick wrote
> ... I feel that the oil companies are leaning on UL to be as slow as possible because if they ever get certified, the oil companies lose the control they have over ethanol. ...

Marty - Do you drink the product of your ethanol plant? How does big bad oil have control over ethanol? They clearly have no control over ethanol. They got it rammed down their throat by big corn through the federal RFS mandate in EISA 2007. They must blend more and more ethanol into gasoline each year through 2022. They have no choice. The EPA gives each major gasoline producer an ever increasing quota of ethanol each year and they blend, or they buy RINS or they get fined, big time.

UL is a non profit safety certification organization. They are beholding to nobody except maybe the insurance companies. When they put their label on a product, they are certifying that it is safe to use within the guidelines of their testing and meet good engineering standards. State and local fire marshals rely on their certification and thus the insurance companies do too in order to determine insurance liability. To say that UL is in the pocket of big oil or big ethanol or big swamp gas is ludicrous.

The only thing that certified blender pumps will do is possibly make RIN accounting a nightmare since the gasoline producers have the quotas, not the service station chains with the blender pumps. This is a big problem for the EPA to figure out since they are in charge of implementing the ludicrous ethanol mandates in EISA 2007 that were supposed to be used to make E85.

N1593Y, What was this all about?

Date Posted: October 31, 2006

Sioux Falls, SD �- In the face of confusion over Underwriters Laboratories� (UL) recent decision to rescind its earlier approval of some E85 pump components, the American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) Oct. 31 sought to help clarify what the ruling actually means.

The real world use of that first blender in WI for 5 years should be better than UL's testing. That pump still works good but it would be too simple for UL to tear it apart and see how it's holding up.
Also, are the majority of gas stations owned by ethanol or oil. Basically ethanol is relying on the enemy to sell it's product. Did you see where the South Carolina convenience store owners had to sue to get straight unleaded from oil so they could pocket the blenders credit. At least they won. Ever since 1973 when I sat in line to get gas, I haven't liked the oil companies.

N1593Y wrote:

180Marty wrote:Vick wrote
> ... I feel that the oil companies are leaning on UL to be as slow as possible because if they ever get certified, the oil companies lose the control they have over ethanol. ...

How does big bad oil have control over ethanol? They clearly have no control over ethanol.

I can answer the question above. Oil companies, through their pricing to suppliers turned the screws down at least in this state, home of the nations first blender pumps and now home to the nations first state backed program to install more of them. The following is a short excerpt of part of the history of why they came to be. It was nearly all big oil.

"Prior to the blender pump, most retailers had been limited to buying E10 at the rack and accepting whatever
price the supplier wanted to charge for the pre-blended product. In some markets, oil companies were selling
rack E10 as a midgrade, pricing it 4 to 7 cents higher than straight unleaded gasoline. Meanwhile, retailers
could obtain pricing information on ethanol and unleaded, and when they blended the product prices together
on paper, they found out that the oil companies’ pre-blended E10 prices didn’t add up.
Taking a pencil to rack prices for gasoline and ethanol and calculating the cost of E10 had many marketers
fuming. In some markets, 10 to 12 cents per gallon could be saved on E10 if a marketer obtained gasoline
and ethanol separately. Since a gallon of E10 contains only a tenth of a gallon of ethanol, that 10 to 12 cent
markup on the finished product translates to a markup of over a dollar on the ethanol portion of the mix.
There had to be better way for station owners to share in the opportunity ethanol provides at the pump.
Enter the blender pump. " American Coalition for Ethanol, Sioux Falls South Dakota.

180Marty wrote:N1593Y, What was this all about? Date Posted: October 31, 2006

Sioux Falls, SD �- In the face of confusion over Underwriters Laboratories� (UL) recent decision to rescind its earlier approval of some E85 pump components, the American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) Oct. 31 sought to help clarify what the ruling actually means.

They pulled UL approval for dispensing E85 from an approved E10 pump: http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/ngree ... pumps.html

The real world use of that first blender in WI for 5 years should be better than UL's testing. That pump still works good but it would be too simple for UL to tear it apart and see how it's holding up.

So you believe that UL should certify pumps by tearing apart one pump? If you were an insurance company would you rely on such a certification based on one pump?

Also, are the majority of gas stations owned by ethanol or oil. Basically ethanol is relying on the enemy to sell it's product.

You apparently didn't read my response above. Ethanol does not rely on "the enemy" to sell its product. It relies on the government mandating that each gasoline producer blend ever increasing amounts of ethanol into their product. THEY HAVE NO CHOICE! They blend more every year, or they buy RINS or they face stiff fines by the EPA. There I have said it twice. Are you getting it yet? And we have no choice but to buy it because by 2013 the amount of ethanol blended will be more than enough to take all of the gasoline produced E10 in the entire country, and in my state Oregon, the state has done ethanol's bidding, not the evil enemy, big oil. It is mandatory that all gasoline in the state be E10. We have no choice for our cars.

Did you see where the South Carolina convenience store owners had to sue to get straight unleaded from oil so they could pocket the blenders credit. At least they won.

Yes I did. And apparently you didn't understand what I wrote in my previous comment. So let me restate it: "The only thing that certified blender pumps will do is possibly make RIN accounting a nightmare since the gasoline producers have the quotas, not the service station chains with the blender pumps. This is a big problem for the EPA to figure out since they are in charge of implementing the ludicrous ethanol mandates in EISA 2007 ..." Here it is restated in a media report when the lawsuit was filed in 2008: "The lawsuit, filed by American Petroleum Institute and BP Products North America Inc., argues the law would prevent refiners from complying with federal law that requires annual increases in ethanol use from 9 billion gallons by the end of this year to 36 billion gallons by 2022." Actually there are more than RIN accounting problems. What the gasoline companies are going to have to supply is NOT clear unleaded gasoline, it is going to have to be BOB, which cannot be sold as gasoline. The blender pump is going to have to make E10 to EXX. The gasoline dealers are not going to be selling E0.

This is what blenders can do. Renew has many stations in WI using blender pumps direct marketing their ethanol. The first pump I mentioned is over 5 years old and they have quite a few installed shortly after so there are many that could be inspected by UL.

dirtstrip wrote:
"Oil companies, through their pricing to suppliers turned the screws down at least in this state, home of the nations first blender pumps and now home to the nations first state backed program to install more of them."

While SD governor Mike Rounds has signed a bill directing incoming stimulus money to stations that install blender pumps at the rate of $10,000 per install and thereby creating the first state backed program for financing expanded use of blender pumps, I must correct my statement that South Dakota has the nations first blender pump. Credit has often been given in midwestern publications such as Ethanol Producer and many newspapers to two stations in South Dakota for installing the first blenders, but 180 Marty has clearly shown to me that one existed within 20 miles of Oshkosh fully a year before the South Dakota pumps were operational. It is important to me to set the record straight on this.

Today the final component holding up UL approval of blender pumps is certified. Now if N1593Y can get his friends at the refinery to make 87 octane unleaded, we can have our cake and eat it. Two tanks, one with straight unleaded and one with straight E98 ethanol, so everybody can be happy with several blends between E0 to E85.

Growth Energy and Veyance Technologies, a manufacturer of liquid fuel dispenser hoses, announced today certification has been issued on the final component for an E85 and blender pump dispenser by Underwriters Laboratory (UL). Approval has been given to the Veyance Flexsteel® Futura liquid fuel dispenser hose for use with mid- and high-level blends of ethanol.

An October 2006 decision by UL rescinded previous certification for the hose and entire E85 dispenser. Late last year, financial assistance was provided by Growth Energy to Veyance to accelerate submission of the hose testing. This announcement concludes the final series of UL testing for the “hanging hardware” which is attached to the basic fuel dispenser.

“We have been pleased to work with Veyance on this project in order to facilitate the testing and certification of the hose needed to dispense mid- and high-level blends of ethanol in blender pumps,” said Growth Energy CEO, Tom Buis. “Veyance’s certification on their liquid fuel hose represents a significant step in acquiring the complete certification of a mid- and high-level blend dispenser.”

“Veyance is pleased to offer our customers a dispensing hose that is certified for all level blends of ethanol,” stated Keith Collett, industrial hose marketing manager for Veyance. “Within the next few weeks we’ll start production of the Futura Ethan-ALL hoses and are excited about the potential of mid- and high-level ethanol blends. We appreciate Growth Energy’s support, which was instrumental in advancing the timeline for certifying our hose.”

Certification of a complete E85 and blender pump by UL is expected soon.

180Marty wrote:Today the final component holding up UL approval of blender pumps is certified. Now if N1593Y can get his friends at the refinery to make 87 octane unleaded, we can have our cake and eat it. Two tanks, one with straight unleaded and one with straight E98 ethanol, so everybody can be happy with several blends between E0 to E85.

While you may know ethanol you clearly don't understand gasoline. You cannot make EXX from straight unleaded gasoline. There will never be a mixer pump that goes from E0 to E85. You cannot mix E0 with ethanol in most states and end up with a legal product because it won't meet the vapor pressure spec for sure, and it may not meet a couple of other specs. EXX is made with BOB (Blendstock for Oxygenated Blending) not clear gasoline. In fact you should have a different BOB for each different EXX, one BOB for E10, one BOB for E20, one for E30, etc. in order for the final product to meet spec. BOB for 87 AKI regular is about 84 AKI, so even if all other specs for the product were legal, i.e. vapor pressure and other additives for ethanol blending did not take it out of spec, it couldn't be sold as legal E0 in any state, even the mountain states where regular is 85 AKI. No state Department of Weights & Measures would allow it to be sold as E0. More than likely the blender pump users will put legal E10 in one tank and legal E85 in the other tank and give away "octane" in the middle blends and hope the other parameters like vapor pressure are legal when tested. The other thing that you ignore is RIN accounting and under RFS-2 as recently promulgated by the EPA it is a nightmare that no small business would touch.

At least with blender pumps, I think the market will decide, because they won't be cheap and the business is fraught with liability issues since for the time being the blends above E10 can only be put into flex-fuel vehicles so there is always the possibility of misfueling and what station wants the added liability of that? And yes Marty, I know you do it in your own cars, but it is against the law.

N1593Y, I am pretty sure that the only difference between our E0 87 octane and E10 89 octane is the addition of ethanol to the 87 octane raising the octane rating 2 points. I think 87 E0 is what comes up the pipeline and there must be some 91 octane E0 since a few but not many stations sell that also. Next time I see the truck unloading I'm going to ask if there is RBOB and 87 octane in separate tanks down at the terminal.

One more thing----Dirtstrip forwarded this to me from a friend of his that is big on blenders in South Dakota. I think the theory is that if you mix two different ASTM fuels, no matter what the different % ratio, you still have ASTM fuel---kinda like I leave Iowa driving my FFV on E85 and top up with straight E0 in Arkansas, the blend could be E any % and still legal.

In SD as we opened the blender pump door labeling E30 as 30% ethanol was a liability with regulators as E30 seldom contains E30.. We solved those issues by additional small print above the big E30 with small letters stating 40% E85... or the actual math is E32 summer to E28 in the winter as even E85 does not contain 85% ethanol...

Your label that says 'minimum 30% ethanol' is an invitation for regulators to fine retailers because it sets up a needless liability.



Indicating that the E30 blend is actually a blend of E85 and unleaded (two ASTM spec fuels that have designated tax rates and as there is no ASTM spec for E30 thus is misleading to say it exists) makes retailers much less likely to run into gas tax collection and/or regulator problems.

None of you guys are smart enough to make a good choice for yourself. That is why the government with the help with the lobbies is here to make those choices for you. BOHICA.

Tim