Converting gas tractors to straight ethanol

---Ben, north Idaho

Ethanol is a cleaner, it will flush out all the varnish & crud in your old tank & plug up the carb & filters. This does not mean ethanol is bad for your system, it just cleans it out. None the less, you might have to do a carb cleaning....

Ethanol is not corosive. Not at all. It does eat some certain rubber compunds used in the '70s. I'm thinking most old tractors did not use that type, but if so, you would need to convert to a couple different O ring seals.

Ethanol does contain less BTU's per gallon, so you will burn more gallons for the same power. Ethanol is more stable, & burns with a simpler flash in the cylinder, so it is a bit more efficient in converting BTUs to hp, but still & all you will use more gallons.

You do not need to modify a gasoline engine to run on straight ethanol. Likely if you were designing it for such, you could tweek compression & such to make use of the 110 octaine rating, but they would run extremely close to the same configuration. For the conversion you need to reset the carb, and in cold climates you need a water jacket or a hot air intake to prevent carb icing, as the carb uses a _lot_ more heat to vaporize the fuel.

All the racing engines you mention use METHanol, and that is some corrosive, very low BTU, hazzardous stuff. You are right on that.

Ethanol is something completely different from what you describe. You have it totally, 95% WRONG.

I'm on a tight time line this evening so gotta go, I attended a few seminars & demonstrations of on-farm production & use of straight ETHanol on farms back in the '80s. Pretty good stuff. If you feed livestock, you can make a go of it. They had several tractors running on straight ethanol, and the carb adjustment & anti-icing was about all it took. Oil changes could be extended, because the stuff burns so clean.

You are aware most pickups & similar SUV vehicles sold in the USA in the past 5 years are designed to run on multi-fuels, which specifically means E-85??? That is a blend of 15% gasoline, and 85% ethanol. Just pull up to the pump & pump in the E-85. Good to go.

Nearly all (95%?) gasoline sold in Minnesota, and other states, is already ethanol enhanced. It is 90% gasoline, 10% ethanol.

So you are, or should be, already using some ethanol in your vehicles.

There are over 500 retail gas stations in Minnesota selling E-85. I can find a pump 5 miles from my house, and about every 20 - 50 miles I see a station selling it.

It is _NOT_ corrosive.

Sorry for getting on my soap box, but as a corn farmer living in a state with more ethanol production than any other, I get kinda upset with all the mis-information the oil company puts out on this product.

Again, you are about as confused and wrong on this product as one can be.....

--->Paul

I don't think it's quite true that "most pickups" sold in the last few years are designed to run E85. GM, for example, only sells one E85-capable engine, the 5.3L V8 in the 2005 model year. (This is directly from the GM web site, see link below.) Also, I think you can still buy the non-E85 version of the 5.3, or at least you could last year. (They used to have a an E85 four banger, but that's been discontinued with the introduction of the new Colorado/Canyon pickups.)

I notice that you say you have several station near you selling E85, but you don't mention that you actually buy the stuff. Could this be because E85 costs a buck a gallon more that regular?

The main reason most gasoline contains some ethanol is that MTBE is now considered too hazardous to use as a gasoline additive. (The main concern is groundwater contamination.)

For what it's worth, my job requires me to occasionally run E85 in evaluation vehicles. I have found that the E85-capable trucks run equally well on E85 and regular, with a slight decrease in mileage with E85. But anyone who thinks E85 is going to replace gasoline anytime soon is mistaken; without heavy government subsidies, ethanol is significantly more expensive than petroleum fuel.

• GM E85 Pickups

?????

Cennex station on the west side of highways 14/15 in New Ulm, gasoline was $1.83, E-85 was $1.69 a gallon last night. Ever since gasoline topped $1.40, E-85 has been at least a dime cheaper. I pass that pump nearly every day. E-85 has always been cheaper. Same thing for the other pumps I see that sell it.

Since mileage is a bit lower, it has to be a bit cheaper...

I don't use it because I'm a cheap guy - my 2 pickups are '92 & '95 models - before the modifications. ;) Some folks use it in their 'unapproved' engines, but I don't think I would reccomend that...

That MTBE is made from methanol I believe, the bad alcohol. I don't understand why California and a few other places are fighting to _keep_ it! Ethanol is a far better product.

E-85 is .10 - .20 cheaper than regular gasoline, not a buck more. At least all over 'here'.

--->Paul

Here in Michigan, E85 is significantly higher than even 93 octane premium. Which tells me that Minnesota must have higher subsidies for E85 than Michigan. And you can confirm that by googling on "highest state subsidy e85". (Try the link below.)

So, even if you don't use E85 yourself, you're helping to pick up the tab for those that do, not to mention helping out Archer Daniels Midland, the largest US ethanol producer. (I assume you're a Minnesota taxpayer.)

I luv Big Government!

• Google

We still have a pretty good livestock industry, and can make good use of the distiller's dried grains.

In fact, that is the way most farmers are in the ethanol coops - they sell their grain, buy the feedstock back, & own the plant, getting a dividend at the end of the year.

I don't know if it changes your mind any that the subsidy goes to local farmers for the most part _here_, or if the lower corn price & better demand for feed actually makes our ethanol more viable than wherever you are.....

In the one line you seem to be linking me to on the Google link - it only makes good sense for Minnesota???? The subsidies get recycled back to Minnesota people, rather than all the susidies & funds the petro chemical industry gets. You are aware of how much California gives to the perto industries they have in subsidies & funds, for example? Seems like a win situation for all of Minnesota? Now if you don't grow a good sugar crop in your state & don't have a use for the feed & fizz byproducts, then no - such a program would not be so good for you.

Whatever it is like 'there', please consider that it must be far different 'here'. :)

And, if you don't care for the ecconomics of it, or if they don't work where you live - that's ok. I don't want to make that my point. Maybe it makes ecconomic sense, maybe it doesn't. That wasn't the start of this thread, & not what I want to get into.

Ethanol is a good clean fuel that works well in gasoline engines with just a little bit of tweeking. It is safer for the environment on spills & the like than gasoline & methanol. It burns more predictably & cleaner that gasoline. It does have less power than gasoline, but a lot more than methanol. It does have more issues with starting in cold weather when it is burned straight - these take a bit more extensive tweeking to make a reliable vehicle.

Just wanted mostly to address those issues that others have brought up, and seem to have blurred or confused.

Thanks for the comments.

--->Paul

I guess what made me curious, is a potato grower I knew dropped me off a gallon one time of what he called potato shine. It was not made from culls. I do know it would burn in a tin can, in a lighter. I will not comment further.

But, I suppose 2 problems: One is political - the corn farming groups have worked pretty hard on this issue, and kinda try to keep the bigger piece of pie for themselves.

And, these overflows & culls & such would be seasonal, and not a steady solid source for a dedicated ethanol plant. They work on small margins, I supose it would be hard to run on a feast or famine raw material supply.....

Would be interesting for the home hobbiest tho. Like corn, the potato starch needs to be turned into sugar. Beets would be even more interesting....

My uncle, way way back in perhaps the 40's, experimented with a wood smoke engine on the, probably Ford car that was a junker? He & a friend got it running in a fashion. from his own stories.

--->Paul

We still have a pretty good livestock industry, and can make good use of the distiller's dried grains.

In fact, that is the way most farmers are in the ethanol coops - they sell their grain, buy the feedstock back, & own the plant, getting a dividend at the end of the year.

I don't know if it changes your mind any that the subsidy goes to local farmers for the most part _here_, or if the lower corn price & better demand for feed actually makes our ethanol more viable than wherever you are.....

In the one line you seem to be linking me to on the Google link - it only makes good sense for Minnesota???? The subsidies get recycled back to Minnesota people, rather than all the susidies & funds the petro chemical industry gets. You are aware of how much California gives to the perto industries they have in subsidies & funds, for example? Seems like a win situation for all of Minnesota? Now if you don't grow a good sugar crop in your state & don't have a use for the feed & fizz byproducts, then no - such a program would not be so good for you.

Whatever it is like 'there', please consider that it must be far different 'here'. :)

And, if you don't care for the ecconomics of it, or if they don't work where you live - that's ok. I don't want to make that my point. Maybe it makes ecconomic sense, maybe it doesn't. That wasn't the start of this thread, & not what I want to get into.

Ethanol is a good clean fuel that works well in gasoline engines with just a little bit of tweeking. It is safer for the environment on spills & the like than gasoline & methanol. It burns more predictably & cleaner that gasoline. It does have less power than gasoline, but a lot more than methanol. It does have more issues with starting in cold weather when it is burned straight - these take a bit more extensive tweeking to make a reliable vehicle.

Just wanted mostly to address those issues that others have brought up, and seem to have blurred or confused.

Thanks for the comments.

--->Paul

You need pure straight ethanol to mix with gasoline - it won't mix as well if water is in the ethanol. For burning straight ethanol, you only need 180 - 190 proof. Works fine, water stays mixed in the ethanol. Helps a nice even cumbustion.

Again, do not confuse methanol with ethanol. They are completely different. Seems you sill have that idea....

--->Paul

I've seen several old gas tractors converted to run off of home-produced ethanol, and they were running in winter in Minnesota. The conversion was not terribly difficult. It was a vo-tech & other project, and fairly well thought out for some time., and they checked out engine wear, etc.

Seemed to work well, which is what the original person was asking about. Certainly not for everyone, but it would be a fun project if you had the time & desire.

I'm disappointed this fellow was so put down on the idea - with bad info to boot. It actually works well as a home do it yourself project - if you are into that sorth of thing. I would like to encourage him to try it.

--->Paul

What's good for the goose is good for the gander I've always heard.

I suppose it's different if no plants are in your area and you see your money go far away, but doesn't that happen with buying only fossil fuel? I am grateful for the jobs the plants withing 15 miles (2 and more within a 60 mile radius) of me are creating. The value added feed going back into mine and my neighbors livestock feed. Plus the dividends coming right back into my local communities. Plus the RE taxes these plants are adding to the county ledger, the reduced transportation costs for moving the grain, etc. It at least gives us added value for our grain (higher prices).

I suppose one could lightly compare the ethanol industry close to Paul and myself as being a benefit to our bottom line, same as a 8-5/40 hr a week worker liking the union to ups his wages. Doesn't do much for the rest of us in higher prices but good for your bottom line. Ethanol is good for the environment and keeps the money in the US.

At least it's a another way to have my spent monies staying closer to home than going back over seas.

If you burn grain directly, so may save labor, alright. but if you make a mash to make alcohol, you can still feed the grain to livestock, don't forget. And burning grain is crazy; crop residue, maybe...pelletized straw or stalks, maybe, but the grain itself...? It's a factor of at least 8-to-1 to produce the grain.

The farmer-owned coop ethanol plants around here are constantly changining their systems. in the past 5 years they have learned how to produce 15% more ethanol using 20% less energy from each bu of corn in just the past 5 years. Be sure you have very current info when you try to make claims on the ecconomies of it all. old data isn't worth anything on this.

So, we can get $110 a ton for the DDGS - now, how much fuel does it take to distill this amount of mash - in 2004?

If you don't know, then you don't have much of a claim. Earlier, you made some off-the-cuff remark about trying to put the mash into a fuel tank & running an engine. I assume you were trying to be funny, but you seem to actually be pretty loose with any type of facts on any of this? The mash is only a couple % alcohol and full of the grain & all - not a real bright thing to try to put in your fuel tank.

Not that ecconomics are all that important in this thread, but since you keep bringing it up.:)

Do you work for a petro company? We see your type of negativity from them all the time, but not from many other placs? Canadian studies have reciently figured a 10% blend would lower their overal fuel costs - without subsidies - in their ecconomic environment.

You need to keep up with the times. :)

--->Paul

Wish they could figure out a way to handle the waste from the fission process. Industry & govt doesn't have a good track record of handling these types of issues in other industries - lots of petro & coal spills, etc. There is no such thing as a 'little' nuc spill. Figure out a way to transport & store. I think the plants themselves they have pretty good. It's the long-term waste that I wonder about. Every product & process has risks. Just that nuc is forever....

--->Paul

For me the issue is the waste - it's going to be concentrated, it needs to be transported, & it needs to be stored _really_ well or deactivated somehow. I don't think we have crossed that hurtle yet - and been using the stuf for some decages now.

For petro fuels, we dispurse the watses into the air, & let it dispurse on the wind currents. Not sure that was a wise choice, but there it is. Seems if we stop using the stuff it will break down & go away in 100 years or so.....

Nuc wastes will be around a lot longer. Need a better plan that we have with other stuff.

I can accept risks that go away in 4-5 generations - we can recover from those, we can clean those up. When they start talking about 100,000 years, then I want a pretty fool-proof plan....

And we need better info that the average Joe seems to get these days....

--->Paul

The Russian disaster doesn't bother me, whole different game they were playing.

Three Mile Island is what killed Nuc in the USA. It was clearly operator error - but, showed it can happen here no matter the safeguards & redundancy.

The Minnesota plant keeps asking for more & more storage area.... That doesn't help. We were supposed to have that mountain ready about 20 years ago for storage out west, right? Still in the planning stages, I recall the Dem candidate saying he wouldn't support it to gain votes in that area. Lost my vote tho, someone needs to stand up & clear this issue up. It' been flip-flopped enough from the '70s....

--->Paul

--->Paul

It's real advantage is the cooling effect of the fuel for air cooled and supercharged engines.

Ethanol is a good fuel that works well in a gas engine with: the right material for gaskets; carb adjustments; supplimental heat to the carb in cold climates; a _clean_ fuel system to start with, as it will fluch out all the varnish in your old tank....

There is the problem of ecconomy of scale in prducing it yourself. Like with any manufaturing plant. Mobil Co can produce a gallon of gasoline for $1.40 a gallon because they make a gazzilion gallons a day.... You can get pretty close tho.... There are 23 ethanol plants in Minnesota producing over 20 million gallons each per year, and another 5 are preposed or in being constructed. E-85 is available at many, many fuel stations in my state. E-10 is mandated for use by everyone.

Starting next year, diesel fuel will need 2% soy oil, and that should ramp up to near 10% as time goes on.

How come your state isn't on the ball & using home-grown fuel?????

--->Paul

I thank you for the counter to the other claims that alcohol isn't feasible. It seems wierd to me that so many of us are confused about ethanol vs, methanol, etc. at this late date, when for the past 30 years we've all been told not to worry, we'll run everything on home-grown fuels. Why no more info being disseminated long before now? I did think it was strange that if alcohol was such a corrosive fuel, needed higher compression pistons, etc...why then did IHC offer an alcohol conversion kit as an option for engines that were otherwise identical to their other hit & miss engines of the time? (circa WWI era). Wendel's book. Shows a special mixer, that's about it. It WAS designed to start on gasoline, and switch to alcohol. Paul, my state is Idaho. I just read today that the Farm Bureau is trying to get the Legislature to mandate 10% "biofuels" (I guess that blanket-covers making biodiesel, too). To answer your question; if that initiative succeeds, then we're following Minnesota's lead. I don't care, personally, about whether ethanol is higher at the pump than gasoline is at the moment. That may change, and anyway, I plan on making it myself from barley, probably. Then feed out the mash to sheep, cattle, poultry, and our 24 drafters. You've given me some hope for being able to run my two old Cases on the "real" mountain dew...now if I can just get the right non-alcohol-corrodible seals, gaskets, etc. into the old girls...I'll get to see just how good the parts guys are at NAPA..:-) That leaves me two other oldies to convert to biodiesel...though I hear that takes even less monkeying around with, if the biodiesel is well-made. One JD 70D, and a JD 720D...too bad they're both ES, won't need to play with starting ponies on ethanol. Well, I dunno, that might be a good thing, eh? (Makes me wonder, though...if things get really wierd later on, even if I could make good ethanol and biodiesel, could I make quality batteries? And...back to steel wheels? Maybe my draft horses will rule the roost around here, with NO competition...but they won't like turning athresher very long with a power.) Anyway, the old two-cylinder Deeres were built to handle a lower cetane value than modern tractors, so I think they'll make good candidates. One last thing, basically on topic...the early tractors burned kerosene more often than gasoline. How to start 'em? (Before there were "All-Fuels" that started first on gas, then switched. They built a fire under 'em to warm 'em, literally....usually under, at a safe distance. Sometimes that fire was a little coffee can of alcohol.

And lastly, a URL for ya, Paul & everyone...go to www.revenoor.com and tell me what you think of their schpiel. (I hope it still works...I haven't visited that site for better than a year).