31 replies to this topic

[nev_payne]

2 fuels that are not only cheaper but cleaner. I have checked out an automatic quote system on a particular gas conversion companys site and it appears all MPIs and SPIs (that was pretty much the search criteria) can be converted. The spare wheel would be kicked out in place of a 5 gallon tank wheel shaped.

At a cost of just under £2000 inc VAT for conversion, the cost of fuel would effectively be halved, taking about 1 year to pay off the initial costing from money saved. Has anyone else looked into this conversion? Any thoughts?


Then theres the recenty inroduced E85 Ethanol/Petrol mix - E85 is an 85% Ethanol, 15% Petrol mix. Sadly ethanol is essentially acid - corroding numerous engine components - essentially rusting that even an a-series engine would scream at. Conersion has been estimated at a minimum cost of £20 to replace components that would be at risk of corrosion in any fuel injected car.

Its safe to say that hydrogen is somthing that would be a later development...maybe. Hydrogens impact on the current system of transport is far far too expensive to introduce - even if the final outlay would be free of charge.

Discuss? Opinions?

[Grayedout]

E85 attacks soft metals eg. Aluminium, bronze, brass etc

Will give you the posssibility of more power due to the 102 octane but expect a 30% drop in fuel economy !

[Guess-Works.com]

Was watching the touring cars at the weekend and one of the teams, can't remeber which, is now running this bio-ehtanol stuff, I'm intrigued

[Grayedout]

As said if tuned for it then can produce a lot more horses !!

The Saab 95 runs 150bhp on unleaded and 180bhp on E85 !!!

Only trouble you will have in this country is finding some !!! There are about 3 Morrissons in Norfolk selling it so far !!!

[Guess-Works.com]

Just been having a read, and sounds like a carbed mini is not going to be that difficult to convert...

The basics are ( as I understand ), because E85 is corrosive you need to check all the parts on the fuels path for reaction, this being things like petrol pipes, fuel pumps/filters, and obviously the carb internals, the most likely to be affected being rubbers, seals and plastics...

The next is a change in the mixture, which seems to be an increase of 7% ish ( based on calorific values ), because the E85 is a high octane fuel (102) then high compression, something us mini boys are not unfamiliar with, and then timing changes ( which seems to be a more suck and see sort of figure )

the only stumbling block I can see is the cost of E85, it only a few pence cheaper than unleaded so what's the chuffing point of going through all that...

If the government woke up took their head out of their arses, surely a strong tax benefit on such a fuel would progress a conversion to a Bio fuel ( made from renewable, environmentally friendly resources )

my tuppence

Read fr yourself, just one of the many sites I hit when looking for E85 ( that's not E45 - that's a cream )
http://running_on_al...d.com/id26.html

Edited by GuessWorks, 05 September 2006 - 10:53 PM.

[Silicon Skum]

Forget about running E85 with a simple carb "twiddle" for mixture. The main problem for E85 is the corrosion of metal parts, Alumnium being the worst - and guess what the SU carb body is made out of....... Ethanol has much less energy content than petrol, and also requires the carb jet size to be increased 40 - 50% to allow more fuel into the inlet charge, so it reduces milage per tank, in effect you end up with a smaller tank.

If you wanted to convert a carbed mini to run E85, it could be done fairy easy by replacing all the fuel pipes to E85 grade, replace the fuel pump with a one suitable for E85 use, and finally replace the carb to one that not react with the fuel, and modify the jet to increase fuel flow. You would also REALLY need the right hand tank fitted just to cover the same milage as you get with petrol, unless you increase the compression ratio, which for Ethanol is up to 16:1 (about 14.5:1 should be enough to get similar power as petrol).
Im not saying it can't be done, just that it would mean a bit of a redesign of the fuel system to make it work, and LAST more than a couple of years. 10% ethanol is as high as can be used safely in a standard mini, but even then I think rover advised against long term use.

The only suitable alcohol based fuel for use in a fairly standard spec mini is BUTANOL, it is MUCH more similar to petrol than ethy or meths, both in energy content and combustion requirements, and also it is far less corrosive to the fuel system than ethanol. Stoichometric (A/F Ratio) for butanol is 11.2 (Standard petrol is about 14.7, ethanol is 9.) which allows butanol to, just about, function in a standard engine. In effect butanol has about 90% of the energy of petrol, it can be mixed with petrol in any ratio in unmodified engines, up to 100%, unlike ethanol which can only be used up to 85% (E85) in specially modified engines. A slight increase in compression ratio will bring the power up to that of petrol, it also has a RON of about 96. Also it would only cost a 10% net loss in milage in an unmodified engine, as compared to petrol, if used as the primary fuel. Ethanol only has slightly more than half the energy content of petrol.

Butanol is also a renewable fuel, as it can be produced from ethanol, so it's a fairly simple process to produce from any sugar or starch containing "waste" from crops such as the husks etc.
As Butanol has not passed officially as a fuel source (yet), ethanol is the only available alcohol fuel on sale, methanol is no good as it is more corrosive / reactive than ethanol.

SS

[Grayedout]

BP are planning on selling Butanol next year.

The reason for the 85% mix is cold starting as pure Ethanol or Butanol will not start up in cold weather. In fact in winter in Sweden E85 actually turns into E70 to enable better cold starting.

[AlexM]

This is interesting stuff.....

So would you say that butanol could be the fuel of the future?

[Silicon Skum]

The reason for the 85% mix is cold starting as pure Ethanol or Butanol will not start up in cold weather. In fact in winter in Sweden E85 actually turns into E70 to enable better cold starting.

BP are going to sell Butanol? wiked!! I want to give that a go in my Cooper mainstream (it responded VERY well to a test with 10% methanol), Sadly up here in the north, we'll be waiting a while for it to reach us.

Yes, alcohols require more heat to vaprise efficiently, so cold starting can be a real problem, but thats not the only reason behind the 85% max limit, alcohol burns very cleanly with an almost invisible flame, so petrol is used in the mix for road vehicles to enable the flames to be seen in the event of a crash. Also the average car engine will not be able to cope with straight ethanol for a number of reasons, but if the engine is specifically designed as an "alky fueler" then pure ethanol can be used (but too many down sides to this to be a practical solution). As the latent heat of vaporization of butanol is less than half of that of ethanol, an engine running on butanol should be easier to start in cold weather than one running on ethanol, but add a little bit of petrol and even the coldest winter start should be no more of a problem than normal.

Butanol is still far from the perfect petrol replacement fuel, and will still require a few minor modifications, but it is a far better alternative to ethanol.

SS

[AlexM]

What sort of modifications would be required to run a mini carb or injection on butanol?

[nev_payne]

This is interesting stuff.....

So would you say that butanol could be the fuel of the future?

At the moment the next 10 years is looking at the term "Flex-Fuel" in other words, engine that can use both E85 and normal vanilla petrol. Its currently a scale of economy that prevents a lot of alternative fuels getting into the system that we are so familiar with. Ethanol has been produced as a fuel for 1000's of years...the egyptians certaily didn't pump oil and refine it for oil lamps now did they Ethanol production methods have been greatly improved in the last 5 years alone and based on current research, it is now viable to allow for E85 across the board without affecting food crop supply (this was originally a concern). Butanol may well be the "Super Unleaded" that we all know and well..not exactly shout about - at the moments its all guns Ethanol but who knows.

I would say this is certainly a "start". Its a repsonce to the fact we have now hit or at least passed the break point where by oil production has peaked on a global scale. In order to prevent a global meltdown of transport and economics when oil will enevitably hit danger levels in reserves, ethanol is being implemented to allow for a stretched use of oil reserves - increasing the deadline when oil runs out from 40 years to a considerable ammount more - if Ethanol in an E85 or and E** form is taken on in major petrol-swigging countries.

The future would hopefully see a push for far less petrol mix as time rolls on - this alows ofcourse for the obsoletness of older cars and the introduction of newer Ethanol compatible engines.

What sort of modifications would be required to run a mini carb or injection on butanol?

Its the removal and protection of soft metals and parts that would be in danger of corroding. In a mini theres quite a few areas:

- Cork seals are a nono - ethanols acidic properties - especially with E85 being 85% mix, would rip through those like I eat bacon sarnies.

- All internal engine areas would either have to be protected using a sprayed on layer - I believe its a plastic based liquid - to protect the metals from corrosion. There are also acid-neutralising oils that have been "prototpyed and tested" to allow cars to function with having to coat the entire engine.

- Fuel lines would have to be internally plastic coated, and petrol tanks if of a considerable age would have to be replaced or cleaned. There is also talk of having stop-valves along to fuel line in case of back flow or an engine fire, however I havent read up further on that area.

- Carb models of minis are simple to modify in case of allowing E85 into the engine - just pull out the choke a little more. Injection models require I belive its a 25%-30% bigger inlet on the jets.

Edited by nev_payne, 06 September 2006 - 02:15 PM.

[Silicon Skum]

Ethanol has been produced as a fuel for 1000's of years...the egyptians certaily didn't pump oil and refine it for oil lamps now did they

Eerrrrrrmmmm, NOPE! but they didn't use ethanol in OIL lamps either, they used Tallow (animal fat), plant oils or natural oil that had seeped to the surface (tar pits). The only "fuel" ethanol has been widely used for in the last thousand years, is beer drinkers. It *may* have been used in oil lamps (mixed with poor grade lamp oil as a thinner or to make it burn cleaner) in the last 200 hundred years or so, but it was too expensive to use as a fuel. Only the wealthy could afford to burn it, the poor just drank it.

Ethanol WAS however the first fuel choise of Henry Ford who also desgined the model T to run on both ethanol and petrol, and many other vehicles that could use ethanol. It was also used as a primary fuel through out much of the 19th and early 20th centuraries. the only reason it lost favour was due to natural oil products being cheaper to produce from an abundant feed stock.

The future would hopefully see a push for far less petrol mix as time rolls on - this alows ofcourse for the obsoletness of older cars and the introduction of newer Ethanol compatible engines.

What sort of modifications would be required to run a mini carb or injection on butanol?

Its the removal and protection of soft metals and parts that would be in danger of corroding. In a mini theres quite a few areas:

- Cork seals are a nono - ethanols acidic properties - especially with E85 being 85% mix, would rip through those like I eat bacon sarnies.

- All internal engine areas would either have to be protected using a sprayed on layer - I believe its a plastic based liquid - to protect the metals from corrosion. There are also acid-neutralising oils that have been "prototpyed and tested" to allow cars to function with having to coat the entire engine.

- Fuel lines would have to be internally plastic coated, and petrol tanks if of a considerable age would have to be replaced or cleaned. There is also talk of having stop-valves along to fuel line in case of back flow or an engine fire, however I havent read up further on that area.

While that is more or less correct for ETHANOL, Butanol does not require such changes as it is not so corrosive. Ethanol is not acidic either, it is just reactive to some metals, plastics and rubbers. The reason it's corrosive is due to the high ammount of O2 (oxygen) in the molecule, this causes it to oxidise what ever it is in contact with. Thats why Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2) is a better bleaching agent than water (H20).

The changes that Butanol will need are quite simple, it is said to run in an unmodified vehicle, but certain changes would be a good idea, such as:

Upgrade fuel lines to those desgined for alcohol use (butanol IS an alcohol afterall).

A suitable alcohol tolerant fuel pump or replacement seals and membrane rubbers for standard mini fuel pumps would be a good idea (not sure how the normal fuel pump materials on a mini would react, though it might be fine as it is).

*Possibly* the carb jet may need to be slightly increased in size, depending on the fuel mix, but reports suggest that it might not be needed. The energy content of butanol is 92% of that of petrol.

Mixture (A/F ratio) will need to be increases slightly, no different than a tune up (injection will need ECU changes, Lambda sensor may have problems due to increased O2 in the fuel).

The viscosity of butanol is higher than for petrol or ethanol, more similar to high grade diesel, so some slight adjustment of the fuel delivery system might be needed for higher concentrations of butanol to petrol mix.

Thats about it realy, only the A/F mix adjustment is NEEDED to run, the other things might not be needed, more so if it's just a mix of petrol and butanol, rather than straight butanol.

- Carb models of minis are simple to modify in case of allowing E85 into the engine - just pull out the choke a little more. Injection models require I belive its a 25%-30% bigger inlet on the jets.

Totally wrong! For ethanol use, the carb MUST be re-jetted, increased by about 40%, similar for injectors. Also the Stociometric ratio for ethanol is abot 8.5 - 9 :1 as compared with about 14.5 :1 for petrol so the air / fuel mixture MUST be adjusted or the car will run VERY LEAN!
Injection engines will also require a re-write / modification of the ECU, the fueling map and O2 senosor will be WAY off, due to the fact that alcohols are "oxygenated" fuels, meaning they have a larger amount of oxygen in their make up. This will give false reading to the ECU as the lambda sensor will detect too much O2 in the exhaust and try to over-fuel the engine.

I've done quite a bit of research into this for the last 2 years, So I have a fair idea of what is needed to run a mini on an alternative fuel. I've also experimented with a 6Hp 4 stroke lawnmower engine, and got some interesting results. Also ran the mower engine on Hydrogen gas (and also on Brown's Gas) from electrolysis of a water based electroyte, so I do have *some* knowledge of what I' talking about.

SS

[Dan]

With all this talk of re-jetting, you are remembering how SUs work right? Surely you can get enough with a new needle (the same principle as re-jetting a fixed choke carb), or rather hopefully you can as larger jets aren't exactly available for most SU carbs. And they're brass, as are the needles which I believe is one of the affected metals.

Surely the only component inside the all iron A series which would need coating would be the piston crown? Or is even cast iron not tough enough?

All very interesting though, alternative fuels are very worthwhile. I know of a couple of Minis running on lpg, and one which is exclusively lpg with no petrol system at all. Ultimately I think hydrgoen has to be the way of the future, but not in some nasty fuel cell!

[Silicon Skum]

With all this talk of re-jetting, you are remembering how SUs work right? Surely you can get enough with a new needle (the same principle as re-jetting a fixed choke carb), or rather hopefully you can as larger jets aren't exactly available for most SU carbs. And they're brass, as are the needles which I believe is one of the affected metals.

I wasn't just talking about SU carbs, I meant in general, though it still applies.
As I understand it (and I'm NOT a carb guru by any length of the imagination), if you just swaped the needle, you would have a similar effect to running a 998 carb on a 1275 - it just couldn't get the fuel (intake charge volume) into the bores at the rate required even IF the Air / fuel mix was correct stociometric value for the fuel. It doesn't just need a richer mixture, it pysically needs about 40% MORE fuel flow per intake charge (yes I know thats the definition of "richer" but I can't think how else to explain it) with a correct needle profile for the larger jet, a standard jet does not have a high enough flow rate. A 35 - 45% larger jet wouldn't be a standard size anyhow, so the only way to do it is to drill out the jet to a larger diameter (rebore it) and fit a new needle.

And YES, the jet and needle are brass and would be attacked by ethanol. So idealy you would need to change this material to something more suitable, but as the SU body is an aluminium one, this is a moot point.
What you need to do is use another carb type that is compatable (must be something e85 compatable that will fit the mini out there somwhere!).

Surely the only component inside the all iron A series which would need coating would be the piston crown? Or is even cast iron not tough enough?

Nope, the block, head and piston castings would all be fine, only the bronze / brass or aluminium parts in the head that are exposed to the fuel directly, would need to be thought about. Valve guides would be one area to think about.

All very interesting though, alternative fuels are very worthwhile. I know of a couple of Minis running on lpg, and one which is exclusively lpg with no petrol system at all. Ultimately I think hydrgoen has to be the way of the future, but not in some nasty fuel cell!

Agreed, Hydrogen is the way forward, but liquid fuels have a long life in them yet, simply because the work so well.

OK, slightly off topic, BUT.....:
Don't rule out powering a car on water either! I know the jokes and urban myths have been around since the car was invented, but it IS possible to use water as a "fuel". Well, not water directly as this is actually a waste product of combustion, but rather the Hydrogen and oxygen stored in it via electrolysis.
Water could be used in a tank in a car, fed into a electrolytic cell and split into the constituent parts as the vehicle drives along, powered in part by a generator connected to the engine.

Ok, somebody out there is about to compare this to a perpetual motion machine and quote the laws of thermodynamics, Entropy, how electrolysis requires more energy input than is produced by the hydrogen, and a whole load of other stuff as to WHY it can't work. Don't bother, I know this stuff already. I'm not a mad scientist, I'm just very ANGRY!
Notice I said "powered in part" The majority of the power will be drawn from a storage battery that is charged up else where (solar, wind, whatever green generation type thing, etc.) all the generator is used for is to recoup a little of the wasted energy, Ok, I've simplified it a bit, but basically the storage battery tops off the energey needed to keep the engine running, so conversion losses are accounted for, and not a perpetual motion machine or anything over unity is in sight. Einstein would be happy.

So in theory you could build an hydrogen powered car from an normal internal combustion engine and use water as the feed stock for an onboard hydrogen plant........Oh, wait you can!

Ok, this is a link to an interesting news story from about 1992 (please don't say "well if it worked why hasn't this guy published results and released this engine..." etc., simple reason is that he's DEAD! Died of a "heart attack" ):

http://www.metacafe....er_powered_car/

This guy isn't dead (though "heart attack" is expected soon ) :



http://www.youtube.c...M...ted&search=

And to be fair heres a report from an "expert" why it wont work (she sounds soooo convincing though.....)

http://www.youtube.c...Y...ted&search=

She *might* be a little biased though, she is on the end of a government grant......

I'm not one of the "free energy" nutters, but I can't see why a water powered car is such a hard thing to grasp, water is'nt realy the fuel, it's just a carrier or battery, electrical power is the real fuel that splits the water into hydrogen + oxygen or Brown's gas (sometimes refered to as HHO) which runs the engine. It's not perfect but it's better than a fuel cell and can be done.
I've researched this, and there are some interesting ideas floating about, it's certainly worth a try if nothing else.

Anyways, this is a little too off topic of alternative fuels for a mini.

SS

Edited by Silicon Skum, 07 September 2006 - 07:39 AM.

[nev_payne]

heh man I stand corrected! You've been into this a lot longer than me it seems.