E85 gas?

[novaderrik]

i asked this in the hot air forum, but so far, haven't gotten a response.
does anyone have an opinion on using E85 gas in a turbo Buick?
if you are unfamiliar with it, it is a gas blend that is 85% ethanol. it has 100+ octane, is sold at a growing number of gas stations (at elast in the midwest), and costs about 15-20% less than 87 octane regular gas.
would the ecm and injectors be able to supply enough fuel to make it run right?
how about half a tank of that stuff with half a tank of regular gas?
i have read about alcohol injection to curb detonation in non intercooled turbo cars, and this would seem to be an "always on" alky injection setup that is easily replenished 15 miles from my home base.

 

[jastrckl]

http://www.iowacorn.org/ethanol/ethanol_5a.html

 

[Silver 6]

I have been blending this with about a 50% mix of pump gas and my 87T seems to like it just fine. It puts the octane up over what my 93 street chip needs and cuts the cost of gas. But the mileage suffers a bit. The T is no longer my everyday car and that isn't such a problem. On the other side of the mileage issue is you could mix regular and E85 at 50/50 and get about 96 octane and end up with a fuel cost below the cost of regular. Costs less, doesn't go as far, but lets you run more boost.

I think someone running larger injectors could program a chip for straight E85 and be happy with the change. The information I picked up at the local gas station said E85 was about 105 octane. That is like street legal race fuel at the pump.

I do believe it smells a bit different out the tail pipes.

 

[Ormand]

Ethanol has just a little more than half the energy, per pound, than gasoline (iso-octane) but it burns much richer, so the net effect is more power per cfm of air flow. As mentioned above, to get the most out of it, you would have to run bigger injectors, and have the chip set up for it. The cost is a bonus, courtesy of the US government, and the senators from the corn belt. It is subsidized by the rest of us, but what else is new?