My B1 572 Dyno on E85 VS Sonoco Maximal

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I finally got my new 572 B1 motor on the dyno. Made several pulls on 116 Maximal,(5) to 7600, and it made 1034HP at 7200RPM, and 810FP at 6200RPM. Then we put the E85 APD on and made 1 pull, made 75 less HP, and killed the rings. My combo is 4.500x4.500, B1 original heads, 16-1 compression, cam is [Email]286@50Int[/Email] [Email]296@50Ex[/Email], 112 lobe center, 1150 APD dominator gas, 1250 dominator E85. I mix Sonoco 112 with Sonoco Maximal 116 50/50 and add that 10% to 90% pure Ethonol. A/F on E85 was 9.6-1, and gas was 14.50-1.
Any ideas? Engine builder sited excessive detonation.

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I don't know what AFR the E85 wants so it won't detonate but the race gas AFR are way to lean for that kind of compression, IMO. Did you fatten the jetting up at all on the first 5 pulls on gasoline? I have seen AFR sensors read goofy on a engine dyno that had a lot of race fuel as well as pure methanol ran on them, my last motor was reading lean AFR on race gas but lost power when we fatten the jets up two sizes. It regained the lost power when we jetted it back down I switch intakes and carbs(single 9375-2 Dominator on a 440-2 intake with a tapered two inch adapter and a one inch phenolic spacer(AFR read 14.2to 14.3) to a pair of early 9375 non HP carbs on a Indy tunnel ram, AFR read 10.2 on the first pulls and the motor lost a bunch of power so we ended up jetting it down 12 jet sizes and stopped testing due to running out of time on the dyno. That jetting ended up making around 30 more HP than the first set up did, we did not jet the tunnel ram carbs down enough to loose power when we quit so it may need leaner jets jet on the tunnel ram combination. I am going to test it agagin soon and see if one or both of the tunnel ram carbs has a stuck or leaking needle and seat. I'm sorry you hurt your motor, it sounds like it is a good one, let us know how bad it is hurt and what it takes to fix it Are you going to retest it after it is back together? I hope so I have seen a loss of power on a 452 C.I. motor that had 14.7 to 1 comp. ratio going from VP C114+ to VP C12, around 30 HP on a 640 HP reading going down to 612 HP with no jetting or timing changes

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I don't have a lot to offer, but have been doing a lot of reading on E85 as I am thinking of switchcing since I have an extra 1050. Off of the www.raceone85.com site :

Q: How much compression can I run with E85 fuel just the way it comes out of the pump at my local station?
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16:1 on E85 is a bunch. How big is the cam? (just to get an idea of cylinder pressure)


Both 14.5:1 and 9.6-1 A/F seem really lean too.

I've heard that mixing higher octane race gas with E85 is ineffective in bringing up the octane rating because the chemicals used to bring up octane in gas don't work in ethanol?

The highest Ethanol motor I know of is Darren's Hemi motor, but it's 15.5:1 and on E100.

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With that engine, I would forget the E-85 and run Alky? They are both cheap, and Fuel consumption would be similar. What is the reason for even considering E-85 with that much Compression?

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I can't speak as why or what he saw, but he has it apart, and builds alot of motors around here that run well. He said it burnt the chrome moly off the top rings, so he is going to a gapless top ring.

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I've been running E-85(right out of the pump, summer
blend) with 14.1:1 for a couple years.... its all in
the cam for what compression you can get away with,
wide LSA so the valve closes later for less low end
compression

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I don't know how much another 5 percent would have made of a differance but they suposedly run 15 percent gasoline minimum to give it some lube and keep from hurting rings...

Also remember that lead clogs up AF meters in the exhaust and other types just arn't as acurate.

The 105 octane rateing on the e-85 is kinda a As for if it was detonation I would think it could have happened during the gasoline run and not showed a problem till you switched to the E-85.misleading way of judging it's usefullness since it cools so much when it goes in the engine it kinda artificially increases it's octane even more.

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I mix Sonoco 112 with Sonoco Maximal 116 50/50 and add that 10% to 90% pure Ethonol. A/F on E85 was 9.6-1, and gas was 14.50-1.

the dyno owner operator said the A/F on his machine, should be 14.5 to one.

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With that engine, I would forget the E-85 and run Alky? They are both cheap, and Fuel consumption would be similar.

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I mix Sonoco 112 with Sonoco Maximal 116 50/50 and add that 10% to 90% pure Ethonol. A/F on E85 was 9.6-1, and gas was 14.50-1.

the dyno owner operator said the A/F on his machine, should be 14.5 to one.

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It is tough to say, but the engine builder that tore it apart thinks it was detonation, but maybe it was lean and burned them up (incorrect material for build). That does seem like a lot of CR for even a performance brewed E85, but judging by what they told you about A/F ratio, I can't even guess what the real A/F was and too lean could have detonated it. Especially on an engine dyno, some combos will make good power on the lean side, but that is pushing detonation, "lean is mean"

Is the dyno "14.5" based on an oxygen sensor or air and fuel flow measurements? He obviously doesn't care what the real A/F is and from his experience (on gas?) 14.5 was working for him. So when you ran E85 at "9.6" what does he think the actual A/F ratio was?
What I am getting at is that when people talk A/F on fuels other than gasoline (stoich 14.7), some people using oxygen sensors quote A/F on the gasoline scale rather than the actual scale of the fuel used.

E85 stoich is about 9.7 and E90 would be slightly higher
100% Ethanol 9.0
Methanol 6.4

I use an oxygen sensor, which by design indicates the ratio of A/F to stoich (called Lambda), so a stoich mixture is Lambda=1.0 and a typical power setting Lambda=0.85 (which is 0.85x14.7=12.5 actual A/F on gas). My engine is 13.5 CR and I have tried my E85 tune from 0.78 to 0.90 which is an actual A/F ratio of 7.6 to 8.7 (but on the gas scale it would read 11.5 to 13.2). So if your dyno run on E85 was an actual A/F of 9.6 that is way lean, basically stoich (ie from air and fuel flow measurements).

You obviously have had success with E85 for a couple years in your other motor with slightly less CR. Was it the E85 carb from that combo (ie known "good" E85 carb)?

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I did have one correction, with E90 the stoich A/F would be slightly lower than E85. A rough check:
Stoich Ethanol 9.0
Stoich Gasoline 14.7

E85: 0.85(9.0) + 0.15(14.7) = 7.65 + 2.21 = 9.8
E90: 0.90(9.0) + 0.10(14.7) = 8.10 + 1.47 = 9.6

Published numbers for E85 I have seen were 9.76. And I don't know if the stoich for the Maximal is different than 14.7 (maybe 14.5).

So, for max (safe) power, I would want to see richer than stoich, in the range I mentioned. And perhaps the dyno operator just has seen max power close to stoich on gas (but I would want to be richer to be safe). Use the cooling effect of the ethanol and put more fuel to it. But that may only be a secondary issue with the rings, not the prime cause.

Good luck.

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I may have too much cylinder pressure as a result of the cam having 112 lobe center. I am staying away from the ethanol on this engine, and staying with race gas to be safe. But on my next build, I think I'll try to build one specifically for the E85 and match the camshaft specs to that combo. Do you have any idea about what effect mixing leaded race gas with ethanol has? Some people on this thread say it doesn't raise the octane level like you would expect, and that would account for the detonation.

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I copied this from a thread on Innocate's forum:

“You guys need to know that the metallic additives used to raise the octane of gasoline lower the octane of the alcohols. TEL, TML, and MMT are pro-knock in behavior with methanol and ethanol and probably the other alcohols as well. I don’t know for a fact, but I strongly suspect, that MMT is significantly pro-knock in alcohols. I’ve seen and been told of engine wrecks that I know had methanol and MMT involved (and TEL in one).

In Obert’s book he shows the R/M octane numbers of methanol as 106/92 and ethanol as 107/89. The addition of 3ml TEL per gallon of ethanol lowers the 107 to 102. You decide what this means to you when you mix leaded race fuel with alcohol.

The octane behavior of alcohols, like any fuel except pure isooctane, is affected by the AFR. Leaner AFR = lower octane behavior. Good race fuels have well over 100-octane behavior at the worst possible AFR conditions for knock. The alcohols obviously have very low octane behavior at lean AFR’s”


One man's point of view on mixing leaded fuel with Ethanol. Hope this might help explain or get you pointed in the right direction.

Disclaimer: I found this on the internet, so take it with a grain of salt!!

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I am staying away from the ethanol on this engine

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Have you tried richer mixtures in the carb on your other "E85" engine?

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