Study: Effects Of Ethanol On Small Gasoline Engines

The Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) has completed a study on the effects of various ethanol/gasoline blends on legacy vehicles and small non-road engines. It's rather lengthy. I have not read the whole thing yet, but the effects of running ethanol "enhanced" gasoline in air cooled power equipment include two noteworthy issues:

1. The engines run hotter. For those of us with equipment that already is marginal in the engine cooling department, this is not good news.

2. Some engines idle faster, sometimes to the point that centrifugal clutches engage at idle. Chainsaw owners take note.

3. Fuel consumption will be higher.

You can download a copy of the PDF version here.

I had carb problems with 10% ethanol 87 grade here about 3 years ago. My lawn tractor's mixture screw had to be adjusted every 1-1/2 hour of run time. I mentioned this to 2 local small engine shops. They said, "your running 87 aren't you".

I have been running 93 octane here that contains no ethanol on every small engine I have. I really think 87 octane is not what it use to be like 20 years ago (Period)

Dan