The right fuels to use. Don't be foolish

bid_time wrote:

JaxDad wrote:

Ethanol is capable holding more than 20 times the water that straight gasoline can.

Even more problematic is an effect called 'phase separation', this when the water in suspension in a gas / ethanol blend reaches the saturation point of the gasoline part of the mixture. At that point the ethanol, which aggressively absorbs and holds onto water, starts to drop out of the gasoline.

When this happens you end up with a tank of mostly gasoline with a layer of very water-laden ethanol at the bottom.

Well that's kind of off the wall. Gasoline with no ethanol in it can't hold water, so you could say it can hold 1 billion times more water and still be technically correct. But the fact is, gasoline with 10% ethanol in it (E10) can hold 0.05% water at 60 degrees (1 gal of water for every 2,000 gals of gas (E10)). After that it goes into Phase Separation and the gasoline now has 0% ethanol in it and 0% water in it.

While I applaud your enthusiasm, your science and Googling skills are a little lacking.

First, yes, gasoline CAN absorb and hold water in suspension, albeit not a lot.

Secondly, a 90% gas and 10% ethanol blend can hold 0.5% water at 60 deg. NOT 0.05% which is ten times less. BTW, 1 gallon of water in 2,000 gallons of gas would be 0.0005%, 100 times less than 0.5%.

Thirdly, while you're comments on phase separation are close to accurate, you're failing to realize it seems where that ethanol and water go. They settle to the bottom of the tank, be it your vehicle tank or the gas stations tank. Guess where it goes when you fill up your vehicle when the station is nearly run empty, or your vehicle has? Yup, your engine.