Just for debate...

If the pipeline materials can be updated, they could use the pipe lines to pipe the ethanol to corn-free areas, lessening the "energy defecit".

All the pipelines are full, and more are being built, to transport petroleum and natural gas. More pipelines on top of that, if suitable materials are available, would be needed for ethanol. Petroleum itself is corrisive enough on steel, just ask BP about the Alaska Pipeline.

For the sake of arguement...

If the US spent the military budget for one year (~$463B) on developing better methods to refine the bitumen in the Athabasca Oil Fields and the shale deposits in Colorado, they wouldn't be importing any oil from the middle east thereby increasing their energy independance.

Cheers,

That'* a hard question to answer. Whatever energy source we used to get to this point would be the baseline. When it actually happened in history we were using coal, wood, and animal power to run our civilization. Animal hides, bones, and flesh were used for everything from clothing to buttons and "boning" in corsets, holsters and collar stays. Historical reports of "black snow" due to coal air pollution were common. In large cities, the sheer volume of animal manure and urine (calculated in tons produced per day) falling into the streets made the smoky, smelly cars of the day seem an improvement.

Of course, if cold fusion had been invented by James Watt, instead of a practical steam engine, all we would need for refineries would be a few lube oil plants to keep our bearings cool and we wouldn't consider burning the stuff to scoot around town.

How shall we proceed as the oil runs out? Well, as the price rises we will become more frugal with it and develop new technologies that will become economically feasible as easy to reach sources are depleted (e.g. shale oil as mentioned). If it were to run out suddenly, the wealthy countries would shift to nuclear, coal, and synthetic diesel technologies.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...0414014526.htm

And yes Virginia, diesels can fly:

http://www.diamond-air.at/da40tdi0+M52087573ab0.html

The poor countries will continue to burn manure and whatever wood they can scrape together as long as they have bad governments just like they do now. The only folks to really feel the pain would be the "nuevo rich" of the oil producing countries that would be thrown back into whatever age they started with about 70 years ago, when western oil companies developed oil fields and made countries with names nobody knew rich; for some countries that would be a return to the stone age.

When that day arrives some company with a 3-letter name will be selling bright blue 12oz bottles of a substance called "gasoline" (MSRP $20.00 with Techroline) that we will be told to pour into whatever our fuel tanks look like to improve performance.

I love the comments on the oil companies, here is a new one. Tell a drug dealer to give up his business and go straight because it'* bad for society. He'll come back with the supply and demand speech right before he shoots ya.. Ultimately we are all hooked and for 10 billion in quarterly profits Exxon alone could fund the move to hydrogen or bio fuels if they wanted. But that'* not who'* leading the way, where is Nancy Reagan yelling just say no? She is now a laid back spliff smoking rich guy with grey hair, beard, and the title of Sir. Follow the money on alt fuels research and you won't find big US oil companies that'* for sure. They have a niche market they think they control and are not looking to get out of it any time soon. When the supply gets lower that 10 billion will just become 20 billion because we need our fix and will sell the kids to get it.

Back to showing the speed freaks you can go fast without funding our demise. I see some have been doing more research while I was enjoying some island funshine, so back to the fundamentals of fuels. The goal here is to raise the compression up to a level of 13:1 or higher under WOT conditions. This is the level we need to reach to start taking advantage of the properties of alcohol to make good power. The same could be accomplished by changing the pistons or shaving the heads, but you can’t lower the compression on the fly if you want.

Once we get the compression up to a level unfriendly to gasoline but in peak range for alcohol we can dump in the required extra fuel and advance the timing correct the slower burn. Now before someone says you can’t advance the timing with the higher compression or boost, look at those octane numbers again. As a professor best explained it to me in college some 20 years ago, octane is best described as the anti-detonation level of a fuel. If you recall in a carbureted engine if you ran cheap gas you would hear a ping, knock, rattle under WOT. Anyone notice you seldom hear that on an EFI engine, why? Simply the computer picks it up before your ear and pulls the timing back till it quits.

Back in the early 90’* I constantly ran into problems with knock sensors picking up valve train or wrist pin noise on race prepped engines. I often had to insolate them to a point where you could hear the detonation by ear again. Once I figured out that was killing my power on the top end, I dropped a 3600 lb T/A with a SB and cast iron heads into the mid 10’* from low 11’* in less than 24 hours by using some Teflon tape. Just for kicks we often raced it with the AC on. I’d been focused on the O2 sensors output and playing with the fuel curve when it was the computer pulling and extra 15 - 20 degrees off the timing at high rpm due to bad data. I’ll bet someone has logged similar retard results here when looking at 87 vs 93 fuels. Octane makes power, if not we would all run 87 and save the $$. Now let’* look the other way, 93 vs 115 octane, you need to advance the timing curve and raise compression to a point where detonation starts or you’ll gain nothing in power from the alcohol fuel alone. Once you reach this point, I bet the dyno shows some impressive numbers vs same engine on gas.

The key to making extra power on alcohol is higher compression, more fuel and advanced timing. This is why I called it Free Horsepower, ultimately it’* not free but is cheaper to achieve with forced induction vs naturally aspirated. Also I’m looking at primarily running E100 or straight Ethanol vs E85. I have a kick *** still setup and at .75 cent a gallon ya can’t go wrong going green.. Only reason E85 is the highest mix you’ll find in a US pump is alcohol fueled engines have issues starting in cold weather, and the added gas keeps the masses from drinking up our fuel supply. You can flood an alchy engine very quickly if it doesn’t fire right off so most racers use a shot of gas to get them fired up when cold. Plus you could just as easy top off your Mountain Dew with some 198 proof to round up to that next dollar. The only difference between moonshine and Ethanol is moonshine is the lower grade at about 125 proof double run.. My still does 195 frist pass. lol

Now that I’m back from vacation I’ll start working out the details and gathering a parts list. Please IM me with suggestions or questions and I’ll post results as I get some data.

Please do NOT IM or PM questions. That defeats the whole purpose of a Forum. Those questions should be posted here.

I personally wouldn't modify any engine to run E85 or any other alternative fuel until it was more readily available and was a feasible long-term solution.

Considering we have yet to see any E85 in Oregon or Washington, it doesn't look like you'll be travelling much with that setup. Not all states have it, and not all states are even planning on it.

I think you answered yourself well.

Cheers,