The Lotus Grand Tourers

Just though it would be worthwhile starting a sticky thread to share news & options re the imminent arrival of E10 fuels in Europe.

I asked the factory what they thought about it for 900 series engines & fuel systems - here's the reply

Neil Turner wrote: Dear Mr Marshall,

Thank you for your e-mail.

Unfortunately, when the 900-series Lotus engines were developed, they were not designed (nor was the fuel system) for E10 fuel. Unfortunately, the short answer is that we would advise against using E10 fuel on our 900-series engined (or Rover engined) products, as it may cause damage to the fuel system and/or engine and cause driveability issues.

I am sorry if this is not the answer you had wished for, but thank you for contacting us.

Yours sincerely,


Neil E. S. Turner
Customer Services, Warranty
& Technical Manager
LOTUS CARS LIMITED

Now, the issues that I've heard about are - possible damage to rubber, resulting in leaks, possible reduced lubrication on moving parts (e.g. fuel pumps), possible accelerated wear & corrosion on some metals (e.g. carburettors). There's also an increased tendency for the fuel to separate if kept for prolonged periods and for water to build up in it too (simple solution to that, use the car more! - or add a fuel stabiliser)

I don't know if Nikasil is affected, yet.

So - the questions is, do any of our resident chemists have any thoughts and do any of our more worldly (Australia ? California ? South America ? ) members have experience of high ethanol content fuels which they can share with us ?

Meanwhile, I'll ask pertinent questions of some other experts in the industry and see if we can collate a near definitive guide on how to survive alcohol poisoning of the car (anything you do to yourself will remain your own problem).

I did a ethanol project a year ago. I'll see if I can find some information which I'll be allowed to place on a public forum.

I have not seen any papers or research on the effect on Nikasil.

Jim

Thanks Jim - look forward to seeing anything you can post.

Meanwhile - Teflon is safe, so the fuel lines running into the carbs should be ok (unless they've been replaced with lesser material

Edit to add link to FBHVC page about biofuels : http://fbhvc.co.uk/bio-fuels/

Dec. 2017 update- the link above is dead, but this one provides more information: http://fbhvc.co.uk/legislation-and-fuel ... formation/

I have seen a paper which looks at the potential issues with running pre 2000 cars on Ethanol blends. I'll see if I can find it and if its a non confidential one.

Jim

Thanks for this info Angus.
The must be thousands of people with many different makes of car affected by this.

Hope this report helps answer a few questions! Its from the Department of Transport and is an open access document so I can't get in trouble!

http://assets.dft.gov.uk/publications/q ... report.pdf

I'll have another scout around and see what I can find. I have an excellent report on the effect of E10 on classic car fuel systems which is an SAE report from Kettering University MI. If anyone wants to try and track it down its called "The Effect of Using Ethanol-blended Gasoline on the Performance and Durability of Fuel Delivery Systems in Classic Automobiles" and its report no. is: SAE 2010-01-2135. I cannot place the document on here.

Jim

Dec. 2017 - above link is dead, but this is a copy of the doc. : http://www.realclassic.co.uk/techfiles/ ... _study.pdf

Just a word of warning when reading up on Ethanol fuels. There is a lot of information from US sources which has been funded by groups who have a conflict of interest, such as Ethanol lobbiests (both for and against) so check the data source as it could be a bit wafty!

Jim

Another useful looking study from the USA (govt agency produced) covering effects on various materials, including common plastics, rubbers and metals: http://info.ornl.gov/sites/publications ... b27766.pdf

Now for some good news

The man from Dell'Orto wrote: Hi Angus

I've been told by Dell'Orto that E10 fuels won't affect anything inside the carb. It would probably be a good idea to drain the carbs. though if leaving for more than 3 months as the diaphragm will probably get eaten. Starting the engine every week would probably stop this happening.

Please contact me again if you require further details.

Best regards

Matt Cooper
eurocarb ltd.

www.dellorto.com

Hello Angus,
The responce from Dell'Orto ties in with the report performed by Kettering University MI.

I'll extract the main points from it in the next few days. I think I'll be ok to quote pieces from it as long as I reference the report and chap who wrote it as its from the Society of Automotive Engineers.

Personally I don't think I would want to leave a vehicle with an ethonal blend of fuel standing for long periods.

Jim

Sounds very interesting Jim.

The USA report that I've referenced above gives me some hope - their tests seem to show that the effects are not as bad as suggested by some of the UK "information" that's floating around.

Interesting this, was reading an article in the paper on Saturday, this could spell the end to lots of classics

If the carbs can cope with E10 and the engine cannot we are technically fecked!

Richy B wrote:Interesting this, was reading an article in the paper on Saturday, this could spell the end to lots of classics

If the carbs can cope with E10 and the engine cannot we are technically fecked!

I'm starting to think that the articles in the British press are scaremongering, or at least based on poor science.

But let's not get into a debate about the journalistic articles here, please - let's see if we can do some

All fuel you can get in Sweden is mixed with 5 % E, as i know of .
I haven't heard anybody having any problems with this (Yet). But what i do myself is putting in some 2stroke oil in the fuel (aprox 1 deciliter per tankfull) This is a thing i leaned from a taxi owner. But when i go for the yearly chechup of the car, i have to have a clean tank, so my exhaustvalues don't get skyrocket. So far so good.

Well E 85 is also sold, but that is out of the quesion for all cars unless they were made for it from the begining

This subject has sort of crept up on me unawares; can someone explain why is Ethanol being introduced to fuel in the first place, there must be a benefit to someone?

Around the late 70s Lotus cars even had little red labels on the fuel caps saying "Do not use fuel containing ethanol". I don't suppose they did this because the stickers looked pretty. Presumably the problems than were the same as now.

On Youtube some boating enthusiasts show how quickly the fuel absorbs water, you can literally see it forming in an open vessel. After spending 3 days clearing a bucketful of rust and water out of the Eclats fuel tank (and rusted solid sender/filter/fuel lines) I'd say anyone using their car sparingly should fit a drain tap and a filter king.