Anyone running FBO + tune on e85 in N/A form???

[MikeeM3]

Me and my buddy were talking about this all weekend and he asked me to inquire to see if theres some people on this forum that are tuned with e85 on their all-motor full bolt on set-up??? Curious to see if theres a good gain to be made and your overall appreciation etc???

Thanks

[MFL]

I'm tuned for 30% ethanol.

I don't think the fuel system can support full e85 in stock form. You can throw 3-4 gallons of e85 in your tank and fill the rest up with 91 and notice some gains.

Car rips, I'm dynoing it again here in the next few weekends.

[MikeeM3]

Originally Posted by MFL

I'm tuned for 30% ethanol.

I don't think the fuel system can support full e85 in stock form. You can throw 3-4 gallons of e85 in your tank and fill the rest up with 91 and notice some gains.

Car rips, I'm dynoing it again here in the next few weekends.

Nice !! I dont know if a "flex fuel" system can help out the OEM ecu to manage the e85 and 91oct fuel better??

A friend of mine run's his FRS with a FBO set-up on e85 and the OEM ecu adapt itself to the level of ethanol he has in the fuel tank !!! I assume that our computer is smart enough to manage this ?

[M.Hagen]

There is no true flex-fuel support for the S65 DME.... yet

The DME will adapt the fuel trims based on the lambda value measured in the exhaust. Therefore, the fuel volume adaptation is already built in using conventional closed-loop lambda control.

What is not possible yet, is the adaptation of ignition trim to the measured lambda value (or ethanol %). Ignition timing is where power is made using E85 blends.

The knock system will pull back timing using 91 octane, this is known. So adding a few gallons of E85 will allow for the full baseline ignition potential.

[MikeeM3]

why no flex fuel for our cars? too old maybe...

[MFL]

Because flex fuel is used by OEM's to improve fuel economy/decrease fuel cost. They don't use it for performance tuning as it's an inconsistent blend (thus far)

[Longboarder]

Not NA but I've been running e20-e25 for thousands of miles on my S/C M3 and it loves it. Power doesn't drop off as significantly when IATs rise, like it use to with non-ethanol gasoline.

[WickedE93]

Originally Posted by Longboarder

Not NA but I've been running e20-e25 for thousands of miles on my S/C M3 and it loves it. Power doesn't drop off as significantly when IATs rise, like it use to with non-ethanol gasoline.

Did you do any special tuning to run this blend or does the canned tune have enough play in it to adapt on it's own?

[Longboarder]

Originally Posted by WickedE93

Did you do any special tuning to run this blend or does the canned tune have enough play in it to adapt on it's own?

I have much larger injectors and the AFR's on the dyno test looked good. The did get higher than normal which initially was cause for concern, however it was higher throughout the entire powerband, which is typical for ethanol-blends AFR results. So my AFRs increased but not as a result of running out of fuel, but rather from the ethanol blend of gas.

Tune is standard ESS 650.

[MFL]

Go throw 4 gallons of E85 and fill the rest of the tank up. Your exhaust tone will change after a few more miles and you'll feel a bit more up top.

[AlpineE92M3]

Originally Posted by MFL

Go throw 4 gallons of E85 and fill the rest of the tank up. Your exhaust tone will change after a few more miles and you'll feel a bit more up top.

I.was gonna throw 5 gallons e-85 and fill the rest up with either 93. Does any one know what the final octane rating would be if I do this? I'm guessing around 98octane. But just worried about that extra ethanol would pull timing, thus have a reverse effect.

[Shredicus]

Originally Posted by MFL

Go throw 4 gallons of E85 and fill the rest of the tank up. Your exhaust tone will change after a few more miles and you'll feel a bit more up top.

This has been my experience. Slightly mellower exhaust tone/smell and pulls harder at high revs

[MFL]

Originally Posted by AlpineE92M3

I.was gonna throw 5 gallons e-85 and fill the rest up with either 93. Does any one know what the final octane rating would be if I do this? I'm guessing around 98octane. But just worried about that extra ethanol would pull timing, thus have a reverse effect.

Start lower than 5 gallons man.

Start with 3-4. Part of the problem with E85 at the pump is that there is a variance that's impossible to tell unless you have an ethanol tester in your fuel lines measuring the ethanol content.

[FogCityM3]

I have logged E25 / 100 oct gas with the more aggressive BPM "Dev Tune" using BT and got the highest bhp rating ever on the car on a cold day (the ECU calculates "actual moment" which is TQ, which you can then convert to bhp). Came out to 460+ calculated bhp at 8500 rpm vs 435-440+ with 100 oct race gas and 425-435 with 91 typically, adjusting for temp and logging at sea level flat open road. All timing targets were hit (no knock control parameters were set off) and the E25 seemed to "fool" the ECU that the mass air flow was significantly higher (that parameter was off the charts in comparison to other times I logged at same air pressure and temperature), which may account for the calculated bhp being higher vs 100 octane race gas. At any rate, it certainly felt that more power was produced and there were no knock control adjustments (which you can see if you log those parameters). Personally would not be surprised E25/100 race gas dynos really well.

[MFL]

What are you using to measure HP?

[8k3]

Hmm I'm dying here in Idaho supercharged and only 91 octane. Can this really be a safe option to raise octane?

[MFL]

Work your way up man, Try adding 2 gallons and go from there.

Just know that you're probably running 10% Ethanol presently.

[8k3]

Originally Posted by MFL

Work your way up man, Try adding 2 gallons and go from there.

Just know that you're probably running 10% Ethanol presently.

True, however, interestingly they have plenty of gas stations selling ethanol free 91 out here for about $0.80 to $1.00 more than regular 91. Wonder if it's worth it

[FogCityM3]

It's calculated HP directly from the ECU given all ambient conditions, mass air flow, pressure, temperature, a/f, timing etc, and I use the Bavarian Technic tool, where you an log all these parameters plus Actual Moment (TQ in NM) which can be easily converted to bhp produced at each RPM. Unless a tuner changes the minimum torque tables (some do this and this causes distortion), it should be a relatively accurate estimate as all these inputs are used by the car to deliver actual power. With E25, I'm not sure how accurate it is given the ECU believes there's a lot more air coming into the engine (mass flow rate is derived from temp, pressure, load, etc as there is no MAF sensor), but as you and others have stated all timing targets are hit, there is no knock and the car feels faster. Would be very curious to see if E25 dynos better to the wheels.

Originally Posted by MFL

What are you using to measure HP?

[MikeeM3]

i doubt that if i put 50% ethanol and 50% 93oct in my tank that i will feel a difference... the ecu will adapt itself to ru only with the 93oct so it would be a waste of e-85 right?

[regular guy]

Originally Posted by FogCityM3

It's calculated HP directly from the ECU given all ambient conditions, mass air flow, pressure, temperature, a/f, timing etc, and I use the Bavarian Technic tool, where you an log all these parameters plus Actual Moment (TQ in NM) which can be easily converted to bhp produced at each RPM. Unless a tuner changes the minimum torque tables (some do this and this causes distortion), it should be a relatively accurate estimate as all these inputs are used by the car to deliver actual power. With E25, I'm not sure how accurate it is given the ECU believes there's a lot more air coming into the engine (mass flow rate is derived from temp, pressure, load, etc as there is no MAF sensor), but as you and others have stated all timing targets are hit, there is no knock and the car feels faster. Would be very curious to see if E25 dynos better to the wheels.

I know you already know this, but I'm saying it for the other's benefit.

I had a different experience with the Virtual Dyno technique. I'm the guy who developed this technique back in 2009 and wrote a spreadsheet with Visual Basic software that people could download and use to calculate their own "Virtual Dyno" charts. I eventually abandoned this technique after I became convinced it wasn't accurate and depended on tables pre-programmed into the ECU instead of live calculations. I made this discovery on my own car after developing the software. I had a stroker motor without a stroker tune. The Virtual Dyno reported the same HP as if I had a stock engine. I still have these data logs in case anybody wants to see for themselves. That was the hint that told me "Actual Moment" was programmed in lookup tables in the ECU, not coming from live calculations. All the things FogCity mentioned might be true about the data used to find the lookup table entry, but at the end of the day, all the evidence indicated the use of a lookup table, not live calculations. So for stock engines and stock ECU's, it's probably pretty good. But for non-stock, and ECU tuned, I found it unreliable for me and I had to abandon the development.

To prove the point and really drive it home, I did this following test on the dyno. Blue and Red are the values seen on the dyno; violet and green are how the ECU saw the same thing. Notice a ~130 whp difference between the two.



That was my mileage with this, your mileage may vary.

[MFL]

When you put it like that...