Your mileage may vary

[duaneage]

I just got 49.3 in mixed traffic and highway driving on my 650G.

Not bad I think, considering it's using ethanol. I got 4 more MPG on real gas.

[RevRoy]

Just curious, how does the bike run on ethenol? I've heard some negative things about it, mostly regarding fuel injection, which is not an issue on our classics. But I am wondering, does ethenol make it ping, belch, or do anything unbecoming to the breed?

[duaneage]

Just curious, how does the bike run on ethenol? I've heard some negative things about it, mostly regarding fuel injection, which is not an issue on our classics. But I am wondering, does ethenol make it ping, belch, or do anything unbecoming to the breed?

Mileage drops 5-8% because of lower caloric content. It also is a degreaser so if you have deposits in your tank they end up in the carbs and so forth. Costs more as well, non-ethanol gas goes for 10-20 cents a gallon less 2 counties over, and that is farther from the refineries. I did not trust it with the 25 year old seals in the carbs so I shlepped 30 gallons of gas at a time from the non-ethanol stations home until I had a chance to rebuild the carbs with new o rings last winter. Maybe it would not have mattered but I did not want to take a chance. I was concerned the inlet valve seals would leak under exposure, or the fuel tube rings would go.

I think it runs better on real gas. I have tried a tank of each back to back to back and real gas wins. Idle is better, mileage is definately better. I didn't do any drag racing so I can't say for sure if it"runs better" or not.
Alchohol attracts water, so when you store your bike for the winter, fill it completely and hope no moisture is in there.

You don't have a choice really, they sell it in your area that's all you get. Nice to have them make decisions for all of us, isn't it? Wait until E-85 gets mandated in some areas, cars get about half the mileage on that stuff with poorer performance.

MTBE was actually better in my opinion. Mileage was about the same and the cost was less. But this former darling of the clean air act was banned as a ground water contaminant, how convienient for ADM and the rest. What was once mandated by law is now banned by lawsuit. Congress refused to protect refiners from frivolous lawsuits over MTBE so they immediately stopped using it May of 2006.

I guess the environmental damage and impact of ethanol production does not count when farmers and ADM are making money from it. "It's renewable, not from the Middle East, and my favorite For The Children" The more you learn about alcohol in gas the less appealing it is.

[RevRoy]

It's great, isn't it, having all these "experts" decide what's best for all of us? We are fortunate here in the metro Kansas City area ... ethenol is practically non-existant. I bought some in Des Moines last year ... it was a dime cheaper than regular, and I was driving (my car) to Davenport and thinking that I'd just blow it out the tail pipe. It seemed to work okay, but it was only a one-time deal.

So, I'm still buying regular ($2.52 today) for my GS and dumping in several ounces of Seafoam, or Marvel's Mystery Oil if I run out of Seafoam.

[duaneage]

Here it's 20 cents more. They have to truck it in, I guess the transportation costs were not figured in , eh?