Tuning for E85

[SixGracing]

So I found a station close to my house today that sells E85 Ethanol. I promptly made my way there with laptop in tow and made sure my Camaro was about out of 91 Octane gas. I filled up with E85 and started my VCM scanner. As I drove along I noticed that the car slowly started to drive and sound a little weird which meant the E85 was working its way into the engine. My fuel trims started climbing and once the car sounded pretty weird I pulled over and changed the tune.

I started by reducing the injector size by 20% allowing for a longer spray of fuel. I also started with 3 degrees of timing advance on both the high and low octane tables. I loaded the file and started the car. Immediately the car seemed to repsond better. I did a couple part throttle take-offs and observed no KR. I increased the timing another 2 degrees across the board on both high and low octane tables again. The car felt even smoother and seemed to be running really good. I did a few more part throttle take offs and I could already feel the car pulling harder. I went ahead and did a WOT run and had zero KR and my A/F at WOT was around 12.5.

The car pulls incredibly hard. It already ran really good with the mods I've done but I'm here to tell you the E85 makes a noticeable difference. Tomorrow I'm going to add another degree or two of timing and see if I can squeeze a little more out of it before seeing KR. Can't wait to try the car out on the track and see what happens with my times. I've also just upgraded from the stock 3.23 gears and installed 3.45's. If Forgestar would ever get my wheels done I could put those on too and add the Nitto drag radials. I'm going to get this car in the high 11's before I SC this fall.

If anyone has an E85 station around, you should give it a shot. It makes a HUGE difference. Easy to tune also.

Thanks to Sam Smith in Las Vegas for his valuable advice on the tune. Great to have a guy that can talk me through these tunes via text. When things get hairy I just run a scan log file and send to him for evaluation.

[jonathanmoguel]

so did u change all 8 injectors, or did you tune the injectors to shoot a longer fuel spray?

[JLE58]

I'm thinking about using it on my build which will be done soon. The only problem with E85 is on a build you have to over size everything 30 % so the pumps have to output 30% more and well as the injectors. The cooling Effects or E85 are awesome and its as good as most any race gas on the market. IF you run E85 it keeps you from having the change your tune back in forth from pump gas to race gas also.

[Rhino79]

Why alter injector data instead of tuning the ve and maf? I have been kicking around the idea myself of running some e85.

[Ryne @ CMS]

Originally Posted by SixGracing

So I found a station close to my house today that sells E85 Ethanol. I promptly made my way there with laptop in tow and made sure my Camaro was about out of 91 Octane gas. I filled up with E85 and started my VCM scanner. As I drove along I noticed that the car slowly started to drive and sound a little weird which meant the E85 was working its way into the engine. My fuel trims started climbing and once the car sounded pretty weird I pulled over and changed the tune.

I started by reducing the injector size by 20% allowing for a longer spray of fuel. I also started with 3 degrees of timing advance on both the high and low octane tables. I loaded the file and started the car. Immediately the car seemed to repsond better. I did a couple part throttle take-offs and observed no KR. I increased the timing another 2 degrees across the board on both high and low octane tables again. The car felt even smoother and seemed to be running really good. I did a few more part throttle take offs and I could already feel the car pulling harder. I went ahead and did a WOT run and had zero KR and my A/F at WOT was around 12.5.

The car pulls incredibly hard. It already ran really good with the mods I've done but I'm here to tell you the E85 makes a noticeable difference. Tomorrow I'm going to add another degree or two of timing and see if I can squeeze a little more out of it before seeing KR. Can't wait to try the car out on the track and see what happens with my times. I've also just upgraded from the stock 3.23 gears and installed 3.45's. If Forgestar would ever get my wheels done I could put those on too and add the Nitto drag radials. I'm going to get this car in the high 11's before I SC this fall.

If anyone has an E85 station around, you should give it a shot. It makes a HUGE difference. Easy to tune also.

Thanks to Sam Smith in Las Vegas for his valuable advice on the tune. Great to have a guy that can talk me through these tunes via text. When things get hairy I just run a scan log file and send to him for evaluation.

being that these cars are not flex fuel, why didnt you just go into the stoich table and lower the whole table until the first cell on the left side 9.7:1 (non flex fuel e38 cars run use that cell only), then trim the MAF and VE slightly to get cleanup trims and desired WOT AF.. this is what i do, and i have quite a few e85 cars

[Nessal]

how is the MPG on E85?

[se7en]

[se7en]

What fuel pump will you be using with the E85

[hapisok]

Have you changed out anything on your fuel system to allow prolonged E85 use? If so, do you know what needs to be changed with part numbers?