Wondering if anyone knows of any aftermarket or experimental or Subaru OEM conversions to make the standard 2.5L Outback (non-turbo) engine run on E-85 blend of 85% ethanol and
In other words, has anyone successfully modified a standard Subaru 2.5 or 3.0 Engine for Flex-Fuel service?
Try this article for starters:
I did read where someone did that. Search around at
Carl
This months Consumer Reports has a great article on E-85, particularly fuel mileage and costs. It appears it may not be as good an alternative fuel as it seems (depending on the vehicle). It may be worth the investment to read about their research. Read here:
Why would you want to convert it? You'll get lower mileage, and unless you live in Iowa, E85 isn't price competitive with gasoline.
Ethanol mixed fuels are a dumb idea, in spite of what the tree-huggers and politicians would have us believe. Engineers have known since the early
1900s that a given quantity of alcohol will yield only about 50% the amount of energy as the same amount of gasoline. What that means, of course, is that you have to burn more of it to go the same distance.Alcohol fuels are used in some race engines mainly because they run cooler, not because they produce good mileage or power. Those engines run main jets with holes the size of your thumb in order to get enough fuel into the engine to give the performance the builders are looking for.
It takes more energy to produce the alcohol than the stuff yields, so the best that can be said for it is that E85 and similar fuel programmes may be disguised subsidy systems for farmers. They are not the answer to our fuel problem.
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