# E85 now?



## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

So given the cost of gas going up at the pump, im a little torn as to what mod I should be doing next. Im about to get my taxes back and Im wondering if i should buy the body kit that Ive been looking at, or convert to e85. I know there has been alot of e85 topics on the tex, but Im really thinking that now is the time to convert. Any thoughts or opinions on the conversion? Im wondering what the total cost of the conversion is. i know the basics, but im wondering what i would need in terms of a "tune".


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## wrparrish (Nov 13, 2008)

Its not cheaper to run E85 versus pump gas.


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

wrparrish said:


> Its not cheaper to run E85 versus pump gas.


Yet. But with the price of gas going up, It will be. Maybe not within the next 6 months, but with the way things are going we could be seeing over $5 a gallon by this time next year.


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## madmax199 (Oct 28, 2009)

I can tell you that if you are doing it to save money you may be a little dissapointed. I am averaging 300 miles per tank in mixed driving and a little bit of a heavy right foot. Although price at the pump is cheaper per gal, you also burn more of it because of flow requirement of the high etanol content in the fuel. I will be posting my *E85 tuning notes *in the next day or so, it'll have plenty of info for you and all the guys that have been sending me PM on how to make it work, tuning wise.


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## madmax199 (Oct 28, 2009)

wrparrish said:


> Its not cheaper to run E85 versus pump gas.


It also isn't more expensive. It's about wash for me $ wise but I get much better performance than race gas


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

Im not doing this planing on saving a ton of money. But I figure its a good move in the long run.


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## Doooglasss (Aug 28, 2009)

Performance > body kits... what body kit looks good to you anyway?

I'd say the overall cost is under $1k after just doing basic math in my head. Fuel pump, wiring harness, fuel injectors, wideband gauge, cheap ebay vagcom cable. Assuming you have a laptop laying around and a basic flash.

I'm sure Max will cover it all in his writeup- let me tell you that car is a BLAST to drive. If I had known about this two years ago I would have skipped BT'ing my car. My friend Jeff also has a writeup on the 1.8T tech section (linked to in the FAQ). His name is 4cefed4 on here. Eventually when my motor is back together I'll be running E85 as well.


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

DougLoBue said:


> Performance > body kits... what body kit looks good to you anyway?
> 
> I'd say the overall cost is under $1k after just doing basic math in my head. Fuel pump, wiring harness, fuel injectors, wideband gauge, cheap ebay vagcom cable. Assuming you have a laptop laying around and a basic flash.
> 
> I'm sure Max will cover it all in his writeup- let me tell you that car is a BLAST to drive. If I had known about this two years ago I would have skipped BT'ing my car. My friend Jeff also has a writeup on the 1.8T tech section (linked to in the FAQ). His name is 4cefed4 on here. Eventually when my motor is back together I'll be running E85 as well.


I was gonna go ahead and get the new style Regula kit. But now, I might be converting to e85 instead.

I just wish i had someone near me that could help in the tuning dept without charging me an arm and a leg.


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## 320hpBlackTT (Dec 25, 2008)

warranty225cpe said:


> I was gonna go ahead and get the new style Regula kit. But now, I might be converting to e85 instead.
> 
> I just wish i had someone near me that could help in the tuning dept without charging me an arm and a leg.


Finally got mine in check it out.....you might be discouraged when you find out how they ship it and the fact it took exactly a month from when i purchased it


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## 20v master (May 7, 2009)

warranty225cpe said:


> I was gonna go ahead and get the new style Regula kit. But now, I might be converting to e85 instead.
> 
> I just wish i had someone near me that could help in the tuning dept without charging me an arm and a leg.


Then your next mod should be a laptop and cable. You don't need someone to help you tune it with all the threads out there detailing how to do it, you just need to be more comfortable logging your car. 

PS, E85 prices where I live rise with gasoline.


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## Doooglasss (Aug 28, 2009)

Same here in NY--- E85 is always a dollar less than 93. With 93 at 4.30+/gal... that makes zero sense to me since it's only 15% gasoline...


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## Neb (Jan 25, 2005)

warranty225cpe said:


> Yet. But with the price of gas going up, It will be. Maybe not within the next 6 months, but with the way things are going we could be seeing over $5 a gallon by this time next year.


Come to Canada. Cheap 91 is $5.30/Gallon. Gas has skyrocketed over the past 2 months (it's up 0.75$ / gallon)


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## PLAYED TT (Oct 17, 2010)

I saw $4.04 yesterday. Thats like $50 for half a tank:thumbdown:


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

Neb said:


> Come to Canada. Cheap 91 is $5.30/Gallon. Gas has skyrocketed over the past 2 months (it's up 0.75$ / gallon)


You Canadians with your flappy heads and outrageous gas prices. :laugh:

Yeah that sucks. And I know e85 prices are still gonna go up, as gas prices go up. But with the market being so nuts, e85 is a great option for long term fueling. Not to mention the power increase. I'm not sure if my rods could handle it tho.


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## madmax199 (Oct 28, 2009)

warranty225cpe said:


> I'm not sure if my rods could handle it tho.


If you plan on fully taking advantage of the high octane, highly oxygenated fuel by pushing "real man" boost and timing, I'd say that *you need rods*. I bent two of mine shortly after the conversion(first time I really got on it).


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## PLAYED TT (Oct 17, 2010)

madmax199 said:


> "real man"... you need rods..... I bent two of mine...


:laugh:Sorry I had to


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## omerkm1 (Feb 23, 2010)

E85 is about $.75 less than premium in Oregon. Its cheaper but I will use more because of my heavy foot. 

Max - PUBLISH THOSE VOODOO NUMBERS!!!

I guess it depends on what you want out of your car. Doesnt really make sense as a money saving option but if you want crazy fast spool and HP out of a small or stock turbo then it is the way to go I think.


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## madmax199 (Oct 28, 2009)

omerkm1 said:


> Max - PUBLISH THOSE VOODOO NUMBERS!!!


I will soon, I just need to to find time to sit down and put all the data together in one detailed post.
I mostly post from my cell (at work) and by the time I get home, my ready to pop pregnant wife has a list of things waiting for me.


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## omerkm1 (Feb 23, 2010)

madmax199 said:


> I will soon, I just need to to find time to sit down and put all the data together in one detailed post.
> I mostly post from my cell (at work) and by the time I get home my ready to pop pregnat wife has a list of things waiting for me.



I feel ya, my wife isnt pregnant but when she and I are together trolling vortex is frowned upon.... :what:


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## 20v master (May 7, 2009)

omerkm1 said:


> Max - PUBLISH THOSE VOODOO NUMBERS!!!


Why do you guys think there are some magic numbers you need to know/understand to run E85? This has all been documented in the 1.8T forum for years, I don't know what you are waiting for if you have the E85 local to you. Max's settings will just be ballpark as every car is different. Get a way to run the additional fuel (injectors, FPR, and/or MAF), a fuel pump, add timing, adjust primary fuel trim, log timing pull and AFR, adjust as needed, repeat. This is for WOT. For warmup and cold start, you'll have to play with values to make your car happy, but you aren't going to blow anything up sitting in your driveway. All I ever had to do on my BT files was go from 3 bar to 4 bar FPR, add 15% to primary fuel, add 6* of ignition timing, and enjoy. Or, start off with a 50/50 mix of 93 and E85, leave timing alone, and just raise fuel pressure to 4 bar. It's a safe middle ground to start on.


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## madmax199 (Oct 28, 2009)

20v master said:


> Why do you guys think there are some magic numbers you need to know/understand to run E85? This has all been documented in the 1.8T forum for years, I don't know what you are waiting for if you have the E85 local to you. Max's settings will just be ballpark as every car is different. Get a way to run the additional fuel (injectors, FPR, and/or MAF), a fuel pump, add timing, adjust primary fuel trim, log timing pull and AFR, adjust as needed, repeat. This is for WOT. For warmup and cold start, you'll have to play with values to make your car happy, but you aren't going to blow anything up sitting in your driveway. All I ever had to do on my BT files was go from 3 bar to 4 bar FPR, add 15% to primary fuel, add 6* of ignition timing, and enjoy. Or, start off with a 50/50 mix of 93 and E85, leave timing alone, and just raise fuel pressure to 4 bar. It's a safe middle ground to start on.


You are right, the ball park setting to get the car to just run on E85 is floatting around but you also know that there is more to it (both hardware and software wise). 

-Both additive and multiplicative fuel enrichments need significant modications

-Secondary fuel channel (controls injection reaction time) need appropriate tweaking for the choosen injectors.

- On a car seeing big boost I would not run more than 3bar of fuel pressure because that leave no room for boost on the final rail pressure(max of 90 psi safely on stock rail) and you risk going static, not because of injectors but rail flow. As you suggested 4 bar =58.01 psi, so when substract the max rail pressure(90 psi) to that you are left with not much for boost.
*90 psi - 58.01 psi = 31.99 psi left for boost *
You can always upgrade the rail size but that would require bigger lines to go with it and most people don't know that kind of things.

-6* of timing is no where near MBT on the 1.8t and that' leaving boat loads of power on the table

-Most people are clueless as to what kind of AFR to run or just follow those ball park numbers that are not right.

There is still more and that the kind of things I was going to attack since most of these write ups failed to go that deep and unfortunately that's the difference between a car that runs on E85 and a car tuned on E85:beer:.


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

Well, im starting to feel the need for a clutch. And if I go E85, I need rods as well. So that just makes this whole "its not hard" concept BS. Looks like Im gonna have to save up for rods, clutch, and install.


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## 20v master (May 7, 2009)

madmax199 said:


> -6* of timing is no where near MBT on the 1.8t and that' leaving boat loads of power on the table
> 
> -Most people are clueless as to what kind of AFR to run or just follow those ball park numbers that are not right.
> 
> There is still more and that the kind of things I was going to attack since most of these write ups failed to go that deep and unfortunately that's the difference between a car that runs on E85 and a car tuned on E85:beer:.


I disagree, you don't need to mess with much if you are already chipped. I didn't say 6* of timing, I said ADD 6* of timing. Where you end up obviously depends on where your software of choice has you starting. My setup aims for ~21* BTDC at WOT on pump gas so adding 6* puts me near 28* BTDC where pumping losses begin to occur on stock camshafts. AFR doesn't matter, labmda is lambda, 1:1 is stoich, and leaner is leaner. Understand all that and you don't have to worry about AFR numbers. Just shoot for the same WOT targets as on regular fuel. Sure you can tweak all the fuel trims to read zero, but that doesn't really interest me as what the fuel trims show has little affect on WOT AFR as long as you are within correction range of the ECU. I ran E85 on the stock fuel rail and 4 bar FPR with a 3076 plenty of times, but I didn't go over 24 psi of boost as there just isn't a need on the streets. For K0x power though, the stock rail is fine. My point was, you don't need to know someone's exact method for running E85 as it's more about trial and error on your part as there is no off the shelf software for it.


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## 20v master (May 7, 2009)

warranty225cpe said:


> Well, im starting to feel the need for a clutch. And if I go E85, I need rods as well. So that just makes this whole "its not hard" concept BS. Looks like Im gonna have to save up for rods, clutch, and install.


Between all that and a body kit, you have some decisions to make or a new/2nd job to get.


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

My car needs a job:facepalm:


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## omerkm1 (Feb 23, 2010)

warranty225cpe said:


> My car needs a job:facepalm:




ha ha.... I have 3 jobs and it doesnt help. Just call the credit card company and get that limit raised. :laugh:


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

omerkm1 said:


> ha ha.... I have 3 jobs and it doesnt help. Just call the credit card company and get that limit raised. :laugh:


Lol, NO THANKS! I learned my lesson my first year in the military.


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## madmax199 (Oct 28, 2009)

20v master said:


> I disagree, you don't need to mess with much if you are already chipped. I didn't say 6* of timing, I said ADD 6* of timing. Where you end up obviously depends on where your software of choice has you starting. My setup aims for ~21* BTDC at WOT on pump gas so adding 6* puts me near 28* BTDC where pumping losses begin to occur on stock camshafts. AFR doesn't matter, labmda is lambda, 1:1 is stoich, and leaner is leaner. Understand all that and you don't have to worry about AFR numbers. Just shoot for the same WOT targets as on regular fuel. Sure you can tweak all the fuel trims to read zero, but that doesn't really interest me as what the fuel trims show has little affect on WOT AFR as long as you are within correction range of the ECU. I ran E85 on the stock fuel rail and 4 bar FPR with a 3076 plenty of times, but I didn't go over 24 psi of boost as there just isn't a need on the streets. For K0x power though, the stock rail is fine. My point was, you don't need to know someone's exact method for running E85 as it's more about trial and error on your part as there is no off the shelf software for it.


All the thing I pointed out are with a chipped car in mind(mine was).

E85 allowed my car to take 12.75* on top of the what the GIAC flash had. So adding 6* of timing is not enough if you really want to take advantage of the fuel and get closer to MBT.

I use lambda also as my lc1 is set to that - but talking lambda numbers confuses most so I try to use conventional gas AFR so everyone can follow.
My point was that WOT lambda target is much different than regular fuel(even exotic race fuel) and those write ups don't specify that. I target 0.85 lambda safely on E85 (12.5 AFR on a gas calibrated gauge for everyone else) and the fuel is capable of 0.89 lambda(13.08 AFR) on the lean side.

I am on the stock K04 and run around 33 psi daily so the stock rail wouldn't have cut it at 4 bar. To you and me, it seems that everyone would know about things like that but in reality they don't. A solid explanation on what's really involved, would go a long way IMHO at helping the average modder get the most out the conversion.

Maybe you are right that nobody needs another write up, and that would save me my time. I know my car is running right, and it wasn't before from the basic settings floating around.


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

madmax199 said:


> All the thing I pointed out are with a chipped car in mind(mine was).
> 
> E85 allowed my car to take 12.75* on top of the what the GIAC flash had. So adding 6* of timing is not enough if you really want to take advantage of the fuel and get closer to MBT.
> 
> ...



Yeah, i dont feel comfortable enough doing the conversion on my own. If it wasnt my only car, it might be different. The install of the hardware needed, I can handle. But getting the tune right.. Id rather trust that to someone whos done it SUCCESFULLY.


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## RabbitGTDguy (Jul 9, 2002)

keeping an eye on this one... Max def. knows his stuff!


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## tt_kcalb_nevar (Feb 26, 2010)

Max, definitely do a writeup please! 

I have the 91, 93, and 100 octane APR tune, if I wanted to go the E85 route would the tuning cause problems with the current tune, would it void or negate my tune? My understanding is that the E85 is at a higher octane rating and as such I would be able to run my 100 tune, is that correct? 

:beer:


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## warranty225cpe (Dec 3, 2008)

tt_kcalb_nevar said:


> Max, definitely do a writeup please!
> 
> I have the 91, 93, and 100 octane APR tune, if I wanted to go the E85 route would the tuning cause problems with the current tune, would it void or negate my tune? My understanding is that the E85 is at a higher octane rating and as such I would be able to run my 100 tune, is that correct?
> 
> :beer:


I'm in the same boat. It would be great if we could use our apr tunes. It's my understanding that (I could be wrong), but APR tunes can't be tweaked like Uni and other companies. And the ability to make adjustments is whats necessary for E85 conversion. Being able to save money by not having to pay big for a new chip would make this laundry list of parts/money a little less painful.


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## tt_kcalb_nevar (Feb 26, 2010)

warranty225cpe said:


> I'm in the same boat. It would be great if we could use our apr tunes. It's my understanding that (I could be wrong), but APR tunes can't be tweaked like Uni and other companies. And the ability to make adjustments is whats necessary for E85 conversion. Being able to save money by not having to pay big for a new chip would make this laundry list of parts/money a little less painful.


 
I agree! The one other concern I have is that by upgrading the fuel system and being able to use more fuel as is required for the E85, when you pump regular gasoline, you are using it at a higher rate and ultimately burning your money. Im concerned about this since there are very few E85 stations near me closest being maybe 20 miles away.


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## omerkm1 (Feb 23, 2010)

warranty225cpe said:


> I'm in the same boat. It would be great if we could use our apr tunes. It's my understanding that (I could be wrong), but APR tunes can't be tweaked like Uni and other companies. And the ability to make adjustments is whats necessary for E85 conversion. Being able to save money by not having to pay big for a new chip would make this laundry list of parts/money a little less painful.



I bet you could run the APR race gas file, injectors and fuel pump with E85. Just get a wideband A/F gauge so you can watch whats happening with your engine. 

Lean is bad
Rich is ok
Max posted that you are looking for 12-13:1 on the AFR gauge for running the E85.


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## CUL8R (Nov 9, 2005)

*Contact these guys if you are interested in an E85 Conversion and Tune...

Blue Water Performance*

They already have a few conversions out for VW cars/models. Shouldn't be that much different for our Audi's.


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## 20v master (May 7, 2009)

tt_kcalb_nevar said:


> The one other concern I have is that by upgrading the fuel system and being able to use more fuel as is required for the E85, when you pump regular gasoline, you are using it at a higher rate and ultimately burning your money.


Wrong. If you are blessed with a wideband o2 sensor and ECU, the ECU will lower injector on time to get the right AFR regardless of fuel being used (within reasonable limits, which this would fall under).


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## Luis92 (Jan 25, 2011)

CUL8R said:


> *Contact these guys if you are interested in an E85 Conversion and Tune...
> 
> Blue Water Performance*
> 
> They already have a few conversions out for VW cars/models. Shouldn't be that much different for our Audi's.


 
Hey guys im running Bluewater Performance E85 tune on my 2000 TT 180Q, includes software, injectors, and harnesses. been running full E85 since November 2010 on this tune, runs great im happy with it, E85 here in Colorado can be found from $2.60 to $2.99 (most expansive ive fueled) give Gave a call (303) 800 7193 or E-mail him at [email protected]
are on his web site
power was definatelly felt as soon as i left the shop, highly recomended, my gas/milage/money didnt change by much to be notisable, but power really did.

i gotta include that they are comming up with* LAUNCH CONTROL *upgrade!!!! 2-step!!! launch with boost, at the magical RPM number you want!! i belive thats a $100 upgrade not too sure, wich im getting as soon as it comes out, so get that E85 Flextune along with launch control.


*P.S. they have videos on youtube about the launch control with an R32 Golf and a 1.8T GTI running E85 Flextune too, sound alone makes me wanna get it sooner*











-Luis


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