unleaded fuel in Australia

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skuzzy

New Member
Jul 19, 2009
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Australia
I thought to make this a topic for Australian motorised bike users, as there is a government movement to remove 91 octane fuel from gas stations in Australia.

The Government has decided to add 10% Ethanol to unleaded fuel. Calling it E10. And they are removing 91 octane from the market.

Some cars can't use E10, any engine that has rubber gaskets will die.

most 2 strokes can't use E10. I can't use E10!!! i have a starfire GenIIA 2 stroke motorised bike.

I have a dellorto performance carby with rubber gaskets. E10 is going to slowly kill my carby.

Does anyone know what we can use now? 95 octane?

???auflg.fly
 

katoomer

New Member
Jul 15, 2010
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Rose City MI
We have 10% Ethanol over here all over in the US. There were reports it would damage carbs. But the damage must be very long term. I run it all the time in my 1978 two stroke motorcycle and all my bike motors. I've never heard of a rubber gasket in a carburater ! I heard over here eventually they will go higher than 10%
 

Kevlarr

New Member
Jul 22, 2009
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Mi
Just to let you know, we've had to use 10% ethanol gas here in the states for the past 20 years and our 2 strokes run just fine on it. It's once you get past the 10% is where you start having problems.
 

Dougan

New Member
Apr 5, 2010
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wisconsin
Just to let you know, we've had to use 10% ethanol gas here in the states for the past 20 years and our 2 strokes run just fine on it. It's once you get past the 10% is where you start having problems.
Correct, I've done a lot of research on this. The bottom line is that the effect on cars is minimal to none. In fact, there is pretty good evidence that E20 doesn't have a noticeable effect either. They proposed it to be upped to E15 but that proposal was for January 2010 and it looked promising, so I assume it has been delayed.

Every variation in fuel does have effects, considering that a car will have thousands of gallons of it pass through in its lifetime. And I can't really say the ethanol has zero negative effects, because it probably does have -some-. But, the bottom line is that it's pretty established now in the U.S. without problems. And when it started to pick up here in Wisconsin, I heard a -lot- of the "It's going to ruin your car" rumors and they just aren't true. I can't speak on something like a 1950's vintage car-- but if you've got a modern (90's or newer probably) car, you're never going to notice the E10. Ever.

If you google around, you will find a lot of people running E85 fuel through cars that weren't designed to run on ethanol at all. Many people do this without problems. I wouldn't do this, but, worth pointing out that if someone is running E85 fine, you're probably going to be fine with E10. My car was designed to run on E85, and I use it all the time. The only difference I notice is the gas mileage drop (2/3 gas mileage, ~2/3 price).

I really don't know if it will affect 2 stroke motors inherently differently. My 2 stroke knowledge comes from outboards, and I can say that E10 does have a negative effect on outboards. Alcohol bonds with water, and since the outboard is in a wet environment, this happens much more severely than with other applications. I've seen outboards thrashed (supposedly) by alcohol fuel. Don't put this fuel in your boat if you can avoid it. As far as non-outboards... I'd bet that the majority of us here put E10 in our bikes. It simply isn't that big of a deal. I put premium gas (ethanol-free) in mine because I'm conditioned from outboard lessons. But I don't think it matters. I read threads awhiel back about people running their bikes on E85. No problems reported, except for carb adjustments, which wouldn't be needed at 10%.

At this point in the U.S. different states have different ethanol regulations, but in the ones that have ethanol fuel well-established, the debate is no longer about the effect on the cars-- the debate is now more about whether using ethanol is worth it or not-- we're finding it's difficult to make, and probably easier to get oil. Not to start a threadjacking, but I'm fine with working harder and paying a bit more from something that comes out of an American farm field instead of a middle eastern oil well. I suppose we -do- have non-middle-eastern oil drilling operations in the Gulf... :-/
 
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Dougan

New Member
Apr 5, 2010
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wisconsin
katoomer said:
We have 10% Ethanol over here all over in the US. There were reports it would damage carbs. But the damage must be very long term. I run it all the time in my 1978 two stroke motorcycle and all my bike motors. I've never heard of a rubber gasket in a carburater ! I heard over here eventually they will go higher than 10%
Outboards do have rubber gaskets in their carbs. I see them all the time. If you don't believe me, go look at outboard carb rebuild kits.
 

skuzzy

New Member
Jul 19, 2009
36
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0
Australia
Cool, .. I don't have to worry about my engine, except my carby, because I don't have a standard kit carby. I have a dellorto carby.
However, in Australia... My father just had to replace a rubber engine gasket in his car yesterday because it was destroyed by ethanol...
So in Australia, some early 98 & pre 1998 model cars are not designed to run any ethanol at all because the engine gaskets and carbs rubber seals are not ethanol resistant. However, many pre 98's will run fine.
 

Fossil

New Member
Mar 15, 2008
228
2
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Guthriesville Pa
The only bad thing I noticed about 10% ethanol is about a 10% decrease in gas mileage in my pickup truck. It works well in my Whizzer and my HF Q-Matic build. It works in my brothers Grubee's as well.

Jim
 

skuzzy

New Member
Jul 19, 2009
36
0
0
Australia
The only bad thing I noticed about 10% ethanol is about a 10% decrease in gas mileage in my pickup truck. It works well in my Whizzer and my HF Q-Matic build. It works in my brothers Grubee's as well.

Jim
.shft.

Intriguing, yes ethanol burns quicker than fuel, which makes distance shorter.

I don't think there would be any ethanol in the engine after it burns off, unless the engine is being over fed with fuel..

auflg
 

Fossil

New Member
Mar 15, 2008
228
2
0
Guthriesville Pa
.shft.

Intriguing, yes ethanol burns quicker than fuel, which makes distance shorter.

I don't think there would be any ethanol in the engine after it burns off, unless the engine is being over fed with fuel..

auflg
The point I was trying to make is the ethanol does not produce as much power as the same amount of gas. The one good thing about ethanol is it will not detonate under high compression. That is why racers use it. They can force more ethanol into a race engine than gasoline so they end up with more power even though ethanol does not make as much power as gas. In this case more is better.

Jim
 

skuzzy

New Member
Jul 19, 2009
36
0
0
Australia
The point I was trying to make is the ethanol does not produce as much power as the same amount of gas. The one good thing about ethanol is it will not detonate under high compression. That is why racers use it. They can force more ethanol into a race engine than gasoline so they end up with more power even though ethanol does not make as much power as gas. In this case more is better.

Jim
brnot

So your saying that ethanol doesn't burn quicker than petrol?

So it might be mixing with the oil residue?