Flex Fuel Vehicle Owners

Les

Les

Forum Member
I now have a vehicle that is Flex Fuel compatible. Leased an Impala about a month ago....

I have filled up with E85 a couple of times and I have noticed that I don't get nearly the gas mileage as I do with regular fuel, but it costs me about $12-$15 less to fill my tank.... it's hard to argue with paying $3.18 a gallon....

Has anyone done the math on the price per gallon vs. mileage?

I'm not lazy, just really bad at math....
 
If you guys actually tested the fuel you might be only seeing something like E70 on top of mixing it with gasoline already in the tank. Maybe that's why you're getting good gas mileage.
 
cjmatt said:
i need the price to be 20% cheaper in order to breakeven
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Ditto. E85 has never been cheap enough for me to consider the purchase. With new mandates requiring up to 10% ethanol, I've lost 2 MPG's. The olny benefit has been the eimination of the little bit of spark knock I had under full throttle ('01 Ford Ranger w/3.0L V6).
 
If gas get's down to $3.00 and E85 is $2.50, then you are really close to the break - even point. You are losing money at thing higher.

-Geoff
 
If you had a tune on your car it would be a benfit. I use to run E85 in my F-150 with the Diablo on the max HP tune. The e85 was nice because I got it cheaper than premium<worked out to be about the same after mileage> and I could put a degree or two in the tune because of the octane boost.

Oh and the mental factor. Yeah I had to fill up sooner, but I was buying it cheaper. :lol:
 
Car and Driver had a whole formula worked out awhile back. Not sure exactly what it is, but gas has to be at or below $3.00 to even start making a difference.
 
It also makes a difference how close you are to an E85 pump. The closest E85 pump is 50 miles away from me. I'd go through three gallons before I got home.
 
91trunk said:
If you had a tune on your car it would be a benfit. I use to run E85 in my F-150 with the Diablo on the max HP tune. The e85 was nice because I got it cheaper than premium<worked out to be about the same after mileage> and I could put a degree or two in the tune because of the octane boost.

Oh and the mental factor. Yeah I had to fill up sooner, but I was buying it cheaper. :lol:
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It was the mental part for me at first - I loved that I could fill up for so much cheaper, once I realized how quickly I burned through it, reality set in and I really started to think about it.

I really noticed a difference on the expressway - 32mpg on regular fuel - about 23mpg on the E85.

I didn't buy the vehicle for the flex fuel - I thought it was a neat feature, but it was by no means a selling point.
 
LT1Pat said:
If you guys actually tested the fuel you might be only seeing something like E70 on top of mixing it with gasoline already in the tank. Maybe that's why you're getting good gas mileage.
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I try not to mix - i know you can and it won't hurt anything - but its my own neurosis I guess.

I drive til I'm almost empty and then fuel up.
 
There is a station @ woodward and square lake that is usually 25% cheaper on e85 then regular. I think e85 was 2.94/gal today...
 
e85, has an octane rating some were around 100 105 octane i think, its really popular with the import guys because they can run alot of boost, but due to the fact it contains alcohol, it takes more fuel to get the same power as gasoline.
 
Or you can bump the timing because the engine will run cooler on alcohol. Flex fuel vehicles do this with the computer.
 
91trunk said:
If you had a tune on your car it would be a benfit. I use to run E85 in my F-150 with the Diablo on the max HP tune. The e85 was nice because I got it cheaper than premium<worked out to be about the same after mileage> and I could put a degree or two in the tune because of the octane boost.

Oh and the mental factor. Yeah I had to fill up sooner, but I was buying it cheaper. :lol:
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Driving Trunk's truck and pulling the mustang = 65.00 in E85 to go from Hamburg to Fowlerville and back to Ann Arbor.

But totally worth the kindness of loaning me his truck and trailer last year.
 
my8950 said:
I am running it in my Mustang now that I've got it running and am driving it. Simply for the fact that the octane is that high, mileage is not really an option when driving something like that. I'm working on the tune, so hopefully it will increase a little as I get it dialed in, but when driving for fun, I'm not really looking at the mileage as breaking the deal...
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Is your car set up for this? The alcohol will cause corrosion in the fuel system and cause a failure. This is more than a ECU reprograming. Flex fuel vehicles have stainless fuel system components. Without this, your fuel system will be eaten from the inside out.
 
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