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240 Ethanol and K-Jet

I still remember the warning in the owner's manual from my previous 1984 VW Jetta. Never introduce fuels containing ethanol to this car. The water content in the fuel was said to eventually damage the k-Jet fuel distributor

Find a source of ethanol-free 90 Octane fuel. It is usually available from farm fuel outlets. Maybe also available at powersport equipment dealers. Fuel containing ethanol is even worse for powersports equipment.
 
http://pure-gas.org

Find the nearest E0 station and fill up there. Probably a good idea to fill up LH-Jet cars there as well. Back when we had the white 245, I noticed a bit of a hit, mileage-wise on E10. Around 3 mpg. On E0 gas, I could easily get 28-29 mpg out of the car if I drove sanely. Stock B230F with an Aw70 behind it.
 
I don't doubt that ethanol-free gas is a good thing. My own experience is driving K-jet cars continuously since around 1990 using whatever gas was in the pump and having no problems that I could blame on it. Dirty injectors plague me, but I cannot see any connection to alcohol.
 
The only issue I have had with the turbo is that some of the internal seals aren't made to handle the ethanol and they can eventually fail. If you get newer rebuilt stuff it is supposed to have safe seals. My control pressure regulator failed after after steady use of E10. But the next one seems fine so... That is the only issue I've had with a over 300k mile engine and system.

In my area of the east you're pretty much screwed and have to run the stuff. Maybe at the race shops as mentioned and farm outlets you can get E0 but not in most of this state.

I noticed the same mileage hit of about 3mpg. Paying more for less as we go down the road.
 
Dirty injectors can be contributed to by alcohol. The alcohol is a great solvent and sends more debris down the system. So it's a good idea to change the fuel filter a bit more often if you are using kjet imo.
 
Yeah, that has occurred to me, but after 100K mi. or more, don't you think it would be scoured out?

Also, for years I have run a Racor filter in series with the stock one, which seemed to extend injector life unless they were already used up.

:e-shrug:
 
Even better idea:

Volvo made in previous century, crush car. Buy something flexfuel, like what the government would like us to.

With respect to nary a problem with ethanol blends, I do remember when ethanol and other alcohol blends were first being used in the '90s, quite a few LH-Jet cars suffered failure of the #1 injector. A lot of the C4 Vette owners were complaining about it, since their cars were dropping like flies. Both of our original 240s failed in 1993 when the Seattle area started using the stuff. The '84 GL while we owned it, and the '85 DL while the original owners had it. My father's second '84 245GL was an Oregon car at the time, so it never really saw much of the 1993-96 batches of winter ethanol blend. Therefore, it still had its original yellowtop injectors installed when we got it in 2007. His third '84 245GL, however, was like the first one, on its second #1 injector when it came into our possession. Another local Seattle car.

In any case, even with non-Volvo vehicles, I've noticed a hit, mileage-wise under E10. We have a 1999 Ferd Exploder with the 4.0 overhead cam engine that has about 313,000 miles on it currently. Original engine and transmission. If I run E10 on a roadtrip, I'm lucky to see 21 mpg. If I run E0, I average about 23-24 mpg.
 
The main issue with Ethanol & Kjet is letting a Kjet car sit for a period of time - corrosion sets in and that is often the demise of Kjet & components. Otherwise I haven't noted any problems with a Kjet kept in running condition running Ethanol enriched mystery fuel, or any sort of garbage fuel for that matter (on a NA car anyway). But a B21FT is a beast you want good fuel in of course especially if you are after good boostages.
 
Alcohol has less heat energy hence less mpg and it brings some oxygen in with it to effectively lean out the mixture and reduce pollution.... Er fill the corn farmers pockets with loot I mean.
 
:lol: So true. Hey be happy. In our area back in the 90s. When they needed the 'oxygenator' in the fuels. They poisoned our water table with the MTBE crap. When too many people that worked at gas stations were getting sick and people also started complaining about what a horrible pollutant the stuff was. They changed over to alcohol.

However, now MTBE is one of the chemicals in our water table and they test for it cause 'now they know better'. Douche bags.
 
:lol: So true. Hey be happy. In our area back in the 90s. When they needed the 'oxygenator' in the fuels. They poisoned our water table with the MTBE crap. When too many people that worked at gas stations were getting sick and people also started complaining about what a horrible pollutant the stuff was. They changed over to alcohol.

However, now MTBE is one of the chemicals in our water table and they test for it cause 'now they know better'. Douche bags.
Yeah I lived in Jersey during the mtbe thing, there's a southern states gas station about 30mins from my old shop that sells E0, it really makes a difference in performance in my Matrix, according to the butt Dyno.
 
We are robbed of our Benzene!

Actually I'd really like it if i had a bigger gas tank and just ran all alcohol fuel. Because we can brew that stuff with better sources than corn and have renewable fuel forever. Alcohol isn't a perfect fuel but it's a better environmental hazard as fuel than gas.

Didn't Brazil make it the regular daily drivers fuel? I think I remember in my old VW mags them talking about new type 1 beetles running on alcohol. I think they did that in the 80s or something. I wonder how that has worked out with the power of the big fuel companies?
 
After I discovered in a post on farcebook that I was tagged in, that the previous owner of my 245 let his father in law run the car on 3 year old E10 a few weeks before I bought it, I realized that I probably should not reuse the old fuel distributor from said car on any car. So, I did what Volvo says not to do...


Yup!


One side of the metering needle assembly. Note some corrosion on the screens...


More corrosion.


Not bad here.


Looks ok.


Minor corrosion.


FPR looks kinda crappy.


Corrosion on these as well.

So, yeah, probably not a good idea to let a K-Jet car sit with E10 in it. For that matter, maybe not run E10 on an LH-Jet car either, if at all possible. Apparently, the ethanol eats the FPR diaphragms.
 
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