E10 fuel (10% ethanol)

I find it hard to believe that Toyota used different plastics based on Ethanol content of fuel in the country of registration.

My personal theory is that they used the same components no matter where the car was destined. The lack of trouble with US Prius in the last 15 years should be a hint that EU Prius with E10 will fare as well.

 

I think you will be safe with the 10%

I have not done any scientific studies (hehe) but the cost to upgrade in my neck of the woods to
pure gasoline is not worth it for mpg, and surely isnt worth it in preventive damage to my Prius.
Right now, 10% is $2.35 and pure is around $3 so a good 30% increase. makes no $en$e
EDIT: actually pure is around $3.39 !!

Now, I do use pure for my small engine gadgets, but that is mainly because I use a fuel stabil
and purchase once a year and also sometimes forget to run them empty before winter.

 

Fuels here have been like that sense 2011.
95 RON E10
98 RON E5

Prius works fine with E10 and does not really benefit from higher (than 95 RON) octane. So use 95e10 unless you really just want numerically (slightly) better fuel economy.

Toyotas really haven't had problems with E10 other than older direct injection gasoline ones.

Most of even older Toyotas that aren't said to work even with E10 work fine with even lot higher ethanol content.

 

A minor reduction in MPG (and thus range per tankful) are the only practical effects of E10 fuel in a Prius.

 

No. The Prius doesn't have a high compression engine, so it won't take advantage of the higher octane.

Instead, MPG will drop slightly because E10 simply has a lower energy density that E5 and E0.

 

Even if 98e5 is actually e0 and 95e10 is e10 energy content difference is less than 4% so 95e10 is still cheaper to run as Prius with its low actual compression doesn't really benefit from octane increase (from 95 RON).

But is 98e5 actually e0? And 95e10 actually e10? To me that just wouldn't make sense. If regulation, taxation, prizing etc. would cause it to be cheaper to use more ethanol then the fuel company would use maximum amount of ethanol on both of them. If it would cheaper to have less ethanol then they would both have minimum amount on both of them.

 

I'm living in Germany and using E10 since I've bought my 2008 Prius in summer 2013. Of course I asked Toyota first, and they confirmed the compatibility.
In this nearly seven years I drove about 108,000 km / 67,000 mi without any problems.

"E10" doesn't contain strictly 10% ethanol, but 5% to 10% ethanol. So the difference can differ. And "E5" contains up to 5% ethanol. In fact both fuels could have the same amount of ethanol added.

Depending of the way of drive the mileage with E10 can be better or worse.
ADAC (Europe's largest automobile association) and DEKRA (world's 3rd largest vehicle inspection company) both are independently speaking of additional 1.5% fuel consumption, due to the lower energy of ethanol.
DEKRA also is speaking of a possible better mileage, because of the higher octane rating of ethanol.
I would say it depends on the driving. I assume there is a lower consumption with E10 in idle and driving with low power. While driving with high power there should be a slightly higher fuel consumption with E10.

These days E10 is about 2.3% cheaper than E5. I'll continue to refill with E10!

BTW: Mostly I'm driving with about 4.5 l/100 km / 52 mpg.

SM-G950F ?

 

Yes, ethanol is cheaper. (At least in Europe or countries without oil.)


SM-G950F ?

 

Other than reallocating corn from food to fuel.
Here my calculation of the practical effect of E10:

 

Bit of a thread revival here but the UK have just got their E10 at the pumps and I put in my first tank last night. Since then, the car is fine at city driving but the moment I take the revs up and join a motorway, I get constant P0138 errors.

Will struggle through this tank and pop some premium in and see if the problem resolves, but it's a mighty coincidence

LYA-L09 ?

 

If your fuel distribution supply chain has not handled ethanol blends previously, then the first batches through are likely to flush out whatever water had accumulated at the bottom of the tanks and pipes, initially causing problems for some customers. This particular trouble path should diminish quickly with later refills.

 

Some might remember the old days when you added a bottle of metho to the tank of fuel to clean up the system, so even said it gave them better performance. Metho is a term used in Australia so no idea what term is used in the US.
Anyway, metho is 100% ethanol, but the same people who said metho in the tank was a great idea, reckoned ethanol would wreck you engine and cancel your birthdays etc ... but these same people are glued to the TV when the Bathurst 1000 is on .... and these race cars run 85% ethanol and don't blow up even though they are pushed well beyond any limits the guy on the street would push their car.
My 733,000 '08 Prius has run on E10 all its life, it isn't a happy camper when only regular fuel without the 10% ethanol is all that is available ....
Ethanol coped much the same beat up hysteria as electric vehicles are coping now, it does bite into the fuel companies profits after all .....

T1 Terry

 

All ethanol, not blended with methanol?

 

Apparently it just means "methylated spirits." Though the MSDS for Metho does list the ingredients as ethanol and methyl isobutyl ketone.

It says that ingestion of Metho:

...though on another page it says:

I'm not sure about that last one..

 

Metho is Aussie slang for methylated spirits (the NZ equivalent slang is meths). Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, and the United Kingdom also call it methylated spirits, but I believe it is known in the USA as denatured alcohol.

The reason it is called 'methylated' spirits is that, while it is mostly ethanol, it is mixed with ~10% methanol (hence methylated). In addition, it is 'denatured' by adding isopropyl also alcohol, acetone, and methyl isobutyl ketone to the mix.

These denaturing additives are primarily to discourage human consumption by making it bad-tasting, foul-smelling, and nauseating. Without these additives, the alcohol content could be as high as 99% and therefore cause blindness, brain damage, or be deadly if consumed.

In NZ and Australia purple dye is added to make it more readily identifiable, but other regions may add blue or pink dye for the same reason.


[burrito posted while I was typing up my post. LOL.]

 

Methanol does those too, from consuming significantly lower volumes than needed from ethanol.

 

Correct seeing as it is also an alcohol. (I have edited that sentence slightly to make the point clearer.)

 

If it is caused by E10 fuel it will probably be a indication that something was wrong to begin with.
The only engines that I have personally experienced issue with when running on E10 are downsized turbo engines like the Ford Ecoboost engines but those engines tend to run better on premium fuel anyway.