I wish I could get 93 octane gas but only 91 octane is available in my area of California. I have frequently thought of adding 104 to a half tank of gas for an Auto-X event with the idea that might get the octane up to 93 so I would get full power out of the car. Does that make sense? Anyone experimented with 104 with the thought of just getting from 91 to 93 octane?
Whoa there, its my understanding that E85 has to have a specific system to run and trying to run it in our cars would be quite catastrophic. I seem to recall something about E85 messing with the fuel systems of cars designed to run on it. I may be misinformed, but I don't think I would even risk that stuff in my mini.
Have Fun with E85 but its not worth it in the end. You need larger Fuel injectors and a better fuel pump. I have Meth and it easy as the Aqua Mist system does everything for you and it runs off the duty cycle of the injectors which in my car are 450 cc. I can run any fuel I want and its always available everywhere at every gas station so I don't have to find and overpay for E85.
Just go to any speed shop and buy a 5 gallon can of VP race fuel and add it to your tank and that will give you a REAL boost in octane. 104 and other additives really do nothing and are a waste of money.
Cause you get less BTU'S per gallon....it is a less energy dense fuel... So not only do you need to pump more, but the PER MILE COST (you get less miles out of a gallon) is HIGHER than straight gasoline...true for everything i have read/seen....it must be priced around 35% less...so about $1 less per gallon to break even!!! On a flex fuel car, you can buy either... But a MINI, must be tuned and modified to run e85...and you must reflash to go back to e-10....can not really do a random mix either....computer cannot do it...but if you have 2 gallons of e85 left and add 10 or so e10, car should do OK on the e15(ish) mix..... So when you find you cannot get your e85 on a roadtrip (even the masspike, out usual e85 supplier in mass can be out for DAYS at a time), you would have to get your tank near empty...fill you tank, then reflash at the pump...:crazy: when I lived out in Joplin, I knew of one or two chains that sold e85...but get out of the farmbelt...it gets rare and MORE $$$. So let's say you get 340 between fillups with a regular mini...you MIGHT get 250 miles between fillups with e85...kinda sucks... Guess for a track only car kinda OK...but no long road trips unless you want to find ultra rare (in my area)e85....
This is untrue to my experience on my suzuki after I turbod it and ran pump on the built motor I made around 210whp on 6psi and averaged 26 mpg hwy, then when I got the 900cc injectors I had it tuned again for e85 and made just 304whp running only 13psi but my mileage sky rocketed. I got about 28 city hard driving I always romped on it driving it like I stole it and hwy trips to St louis well I got about 36mpg. With several pulls and averaging about 4k rpm in 5th at 85mph. I don't know how the mini responds to the e85 but my suzuki loved it and I also loved spending 10$ less a fill up and driving 100 miles more a tank.
Also I didn't know you were out in the Ozark area. Joplin is only 45 minutes from my work and about an hour and 20 minutes from my home.
E85 and MINIs is a bad mix... Been there done that! For one the 550cc injectors will peak out over 100% IDC in the upper RPMs. The stock ECU cant run any bigger than the 550cc injectors either. The stock fuel pump will also reach its supply limits. (Pre regulator pressure will drop from the 63psi a healthy stock pump puts out, down to mid 50psi) Not to mention all the inconsistencies with the fuel itself... Not many people use E85, and it absorbs water. So you might be filling up with E70+15% water. You would really need to wire up a FlexFuel sensor to your new stand alone ECU you need to run proper injectors. Plus at that point you might as well reconfigure the stock "Dead head" fuel system, and route a real return line back to the tank. It just doesnt make much sense. Oh and on E85, I averaged 9MPG doing the math off of the odometer and calculator. Yup only being able to go a little over 100 miles on a tank SUCKS! Pump gas and meth gives just as much power, without all the negatives. And Methanol is pretty cheap too... I can find 55 gallon drums for less than $200! But it also sucks up water like a sponge, so 5 gallon cans are the way to go.
aaaannnnd Meth keeps everything inside very clean and cool inside without all that crappy fuel carbon build up.
Must be a mini sensitive thing because many of the tuners around here go e85 and love it. None of them have minis and I don't ever plan trying to make big power out of my mini. I just want it to be a healthy car and just drive it to and from work. I'll buy another car to make my fast car.
Youve got to figure, those are mostly turbo cars where they can also raise boost pressure or add CFM with a larger turbo. Not to mention they have more tuner friendly ECU's. Being an R53, the only way to raise the boost is to spin the S/C faster (smaller pulley) going smaller than a 17% reduction doesnt make much more boost, but a ton of heat. So that would be very counter effective. So you would spend probably $4K to get everything so it can be done right, but you would only probably gain 15-20 HP if you could get a good tune on it. Dave, E85 keeps the engine internals clean too, just because of the volume of fuel you would be using. You are right about meth keeping everything just as clean though, and meth keeps the manifolds clean too, not just the intake ports and combustion chambers.
I've used octane boost before. Not in my MINI. The super charger makes fixed boost base on rpms. You need a car that can use it, benefit from it and is tuned for it. I used it in my Talon and WRX. In the Talon I could raise the boost to use the advantage of the increased octane. No real CPU control for the boost on those cars. For the WRX I had a switchable tune to allow more boost. By itself octane boost won't do anything but waist money. Like people running premium gas in a car that doesn't request it. There are better octane boosters than 104+ also.