• Sign Up! To view all forums and unlock additional cool features

    Welcome to the #1 Fiesta ST Forum and Fiesta ST community dedicated to Fiesta ST owners and enthusiasts. Register for an account, it's free and it's easy, so don't hesitate to join the Fiesta ST Forum today!


Washington & Oregon Gas Sources

danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#41
Another thing I'm interested in is how accurate the fuel level % parameter is on our AP's. I see Adam's calculator wants a percentage and obviously can only be acquired through the AP.
Ah yeah - I work a few blocks from Jays so this wouldn't be a huge hassle, though scooting over to the Clackamas Costco (since gas is frequently like $1/gal cheaper there than it is in downtown Portland) would make it a little trickier.



I think if I decide to run E30 I'll grab a dedicated gauge that runs a sensor in the fuel tank/lines, either the Zeitronix one of the one that Dizzy is making. Not that I don't trust the AP, I just don't like to leave it plugged in all the time and would rather have dedicated gauges and sensors for stuff I need to keep an eye on.
Since Jay's is literally the only e85 station in Portland now, I bet they get their share of motorheads coming through and know what exact percentage their e85 is... Arizona is as low as 51% (the legal e85 lower limit) most of the year, but you could always call and ask but I've also heard those ethanol sensors are quite accurate too... Another thing to consider is that with our e10 premium actually very solid in quality and octane, AND e30 tunes being fairly flexible, you never have to be exact, we could probably get by with running as low as low e20's actual on an e30 tune safely, as most importantly our octane will be there to keep it around the 96 octane the e30 tunes target, but it's a good question for the tuners, I know Jason of Dizzy has been very active on FiST's of Fury today...
 


Messages
257
Likes
73
Location
Vancouver
#42
Since Jay's is literally the only e85 station in Portland now, I bet they get their share of motorheads coming through and know what exact percentage their e85 is... Arizona is as low as 51% (the legal e85 lower limit) most of the year, but you could always call and ask but I've also heard those ethanol sensors are quite accurate too... Another thing to consider is that with our e10 premium actually very solid in quality and octane, AND e30 tunes being fairly flexible, you never have to be exact, we could probably get by with running as low as low e20's actual on an e30 tune safely, as most importantly our octane will be there to keep it around the 96 octane the e30 tunes target, but it's a good question for the tuners, I know Jason of Dizzy has been very active on FiST's of Fury today...
I mentioned it earlier, or maybe in another thread, but Jay's does know what % ethanol they're at. And right now it's high 80s. Best I've ever heard it was 91. You are also correct with it not needing to be exactly 30% blend. Jason's tunes are actually built around E28.5 or something like that.
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#43
Second gear will be a handful, I agree. 3rd and 4th should be a blast. With Jason's integrated TC (Stratified does this as well as you know), I don't think it will be that bad however.
Quite true, love the Strat TC, I guess there is no need to limit torque since I have that in place... but if I go with Jason/Dizzy for e30, he doesn't do his own TC and I guess I'd have to experiment with the Cobb settings at that point, although I hear 4 is good and that can be enabled by default just for asking Jason on submitting the tune order, but you never know what your personal preference is until you try... Also, am now curious about Strat's new high torque e30 option as well, I just like Jason's quality and datalogging included for the same low price...
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#44
I mentioned it earlier, or maybe in another thread, but Jay's does know what % ethanol they're at. And right now it's high 80s. Best I've ever heard it was 91. You are also correct with it not needing to be exactly 30% blend. Jason's tunes are actually built around E28.5 or something like that.
There we go.. and not sure if the tune is mainly built around that certain octane and how much flexibility there is there or in fuel pump demands tuned for a certain % of E as well... hmmm.
 


Messages
257
Likes
73
Location
Vancouver
#45
I don't know if he changed his policy, but when I bought my tune you had to already have his 91/93 tune to be able to purchase the E30 (or buy both at the same time and save $25 like I did).

Pretty certain Stratified said they simply use one of the middle settings on the Cobb chart as the default, so it's not hard for Jason to do the same as you mentioned.
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#46
I don't know if he changed his policy, but when I bought my tune you had to already have his 91/93 tune to be able to purchase the E30 (or buy both at the same time and save $25 like I did).

Pretty certain Stratified said they simply use one of the middle settings on the Cobb chart as the default, so it's not hard for Jason to do the same as you mentioned.
Dizzy has always shown the stand alone option since I've had my car six months anyway.. and with Stratified TC, they refine the Cobb version, then set their own scale... so then if you order it with it enabled by default it uses a tweener of their settings they call Optimized by default but you can adjust it to one of their scale settings manually if you'd like.

Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk
 


OP
anticon

anticon

Active member
Messages
602
Likes
525
Location
Sherwood
Thread Starter #47
Since Jay's is literally the only e85 station in Portland now, I bet they get their share of motorheads coming through and know what exact percentage their e85 is... Arizona is as low as 51% (the legal e85 lower limit) most of the year, but you could always call and ask but I've also heard those ethanol sensors are quite accurate too... Another thing to consider is that with our e10 premium actually very solid in quality and octane, AND e30 tunes being fairly flexible, you never have to be exact, we could probably get by with running as low as low e20's actual on an e30 tune safely, as most importantly our octane will be there to keep it around the 96 octane the e30 tunes target, but it's a good question for the tuners, I know Jason of Dizzy has been very active on FiST's of Fury today...
Based on these discussions, I have a feeling Jays may have a new batch of motor heads coming through in the near future.

also, I can't imagine having a monopoly on e85 in a major metropolitan area and not gouging the shit out of every one. Maybe I should get into this game.
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#48
So... Chatted with Jason at Dizzy and I have some good news: He said it's fine to run regular with e85, just maybe lean towards e35-40 instead of of the lower end like e25. No need to go drive elsewhere this way!

Also randomly chatted with Adam of Tune+/AdamTuned and he says our fuel IS pretty good here, very close to/pretty much 93 but places like the midwest where it says 93 at the pump is actually closer to 94... So hopefully that helps.. and of course he mentioned that flash tunes are a little conservative so I can say without hesitation that 93 flash tunes are definitely safe here just don't expect a ton of overhead when datalog refining. Which makes it even more puzzling how my Costco Cali gas wasn't very good even on my 91 tune, very strange!
 


OP
anticon

anticon

Active member
Messages
602
Likes
525
Location
Sherwood
Thread Starter #49
So I emailed the Dept. of Ag rep about octane tests in Oregon. This is what I got back.

ā€There are two checks we perform at a retail gas station to verify the octane posting as you saw on our website;

1) A field test using a portable near infrared spectrophotometer calibrated to report motor octane numbers, and
2) An inspection of the delivery documents which are required to certify the octane of the gasoline delivered.

Compliance doesnā€™t seem to be an issue. The only time we really find problems are those rare instances when a miss-delivery occurs (i.e. 87 octane gasoline into the 92 octane gasoline storage tank)

The posting standard is a minimum per 16CFR Part 306. The gas station operator may post an octane number on the dispenser which is less than the actual octane rating of the fuel, however in the Oregon market there is little or no 93 octane gasoline in circulation. In the vast majority of the cases when you see 92 octane on the dispenser you may safely assume that the gasoline actually has an octane rating of 92 octane.

Generally speaking the gas stations keep their own records and they are required to maintain delivery documents for the last 3 deliveries onsite. We inspect those records once a year and when a consumer complaint is filed so our public records are pretty limited.ā€
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#50
So I emailed the Dept. of Ag rep about octane tests in Oregon. This is what I got back.

ā€There are two checks we perform at a retail gas station to verify the octane posting as you saw on our website;

1) A field test using a portable near infrared spectrophotometer calibrated to report motor octane numbers, and
2) An inspection of the delivery documents which are required to certify the octane of the gasoline delivered.

Compliance doesnā€™t seem to be an issue. The only time we really find problems are those rare instances when a miss-delivery occurs (i.e. 87 octane gasoline into the 92 octane gasoline storage tank)

The posting standard is a minimum per 16CFR Part 306. The gas station operator may post an octane number on the dispenser which is less than the actual octane rating of the fuel, however in the Oregon market there is little or no 93 octane gasoline in circulation. In the vast majority of the cases when you see 92 octane on the dispenser you may safely assume that the gasoline actually has an octane rating of 92 octane.

Generally speaking the gas stations keep their own records and they are required to maintain delivery documents for the last 3 deliveries onsite. We inspect those records once a year and when a consumer complaint is filed so our public records are pretty limited.ā€
Interesting, but also doesn't make much sense considering the proof over 3 different cars tuned for 93 and even how the Cali 91 gas did worse on a 91 tune then 93 tune on 92 here, same tuner of both too... Just strange seeing maxed out positive corrections and OAR *always* maxed out on a 93 tune, hmmmm. There is always the chance that somehow the 91 tune is tuned for a full 91 while the 93 is tuned more at 92, but the throttle response and butt dyno can very much feel the difference. sounds like to me you got a canned legal dept. approved response and not what the reality is out there.... If I wasn't so broke I'd order the datalog refinement and discuss all this openly with Stratified and get some feedback on what they are seeing but instead I'll do a new version Dizzy tune later in the fall for only $75 including datalogging once my bills are caught up a bit more.
 


XanRules

Active member
Messages
527
Likes
239
Location
Portland
#51
So... Chatted with Jason at Dizzy and I have some good news: He said it's fine to run regular with e85, just maybe lean towards e35-40 instead of of the lower end like e25. No need to go drive elsewhere this way!
Eeeenteresting. Adam's gonna be tuning my car once I get an intercooler so I'll ask his thoughts on this.
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#52
Eeeenteresting. Adam's gonna be tuning my car once I get an intercooler so I'll ask his thoughts on this.
Basically, that the difference in octane isn't what matters most as long as you go a little higher in your mix, since up to e50 is safe anyway, might as well run e40 with Regular to get the same octane and cheaper this way too... I'm just concerned that the regular there may not be the best quality either, while Top tier is mainly a marketing thing it DOES guarantee the proper level of additives for a clean engine, it's about cleaner combustion in the first place, not the cleaning effect of detergents added.

Edit: Playing with the ethanol fuel calculator, 50/50 of regular with E85 gives you e47.5 and ~96 octane, that's if it's exactly actual e85, the range allowed by law is 51-85%, and you said Jay's is always at 85%? I wonder what octane they shoot for in these tunes, or is it mainly the E percentage? Hmmm
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#53
Well, since this was last touched upon (other than the weird political rant that was removed), I've been using the Dizzy e30 tune picked up on the Labor Day special the last week or so... Wow, e30 really makes that stock turbo easier to deal with. I had Jason set the Cobb traction control to On and at a setting of 4 by default, but even in Sport mode I would get the flashing for TC on the dash. Looks like even the relaxed Sport Mode TC is kicking in before the Cobb so I would suggest a setting of no higher than 3 on the Cobb TC unless you go all the way to Race Mode... But, the main point is the guy at Jay's Garage said the e85 should be at 90% year round!
 


Messages
39
Likes
25
Location
Sherwood
#54
The e85 from Jay's, showed 90%, when I tested with the Holly e85 Fuel Tester available from Summit Racing and elsewhere.
Using only one gallon of e85 with OR 92 (Costco), I tried my Dizzy e30 tune, for a short time (as a test--not my common configuration), and did see some neg correction, only on WOT pulls, noting the OAR stayed at -1. Weather was warm, not hot...but still impressive show of antiknock, I reckon.
 


danbfree

3000 Post Club
Messages
3,510
Likes
1,196
Location
Tigard, Oregon, USA
#55
The e85 from Jay's, showed 90%, when I tested with the Holly e85 Fuel Tester available from Summit Racing and elsewhere.
Using only one gallon of e85 with OR 92 (Costco), I tried my Dizzy e30 tune, for a short time (as a test--not my common configuration), and did see some neg correction, only on WOT pulls, noting the OAR stayed at -1. Weather was warm, not hot...but still impressive show of antiknock, I reckon.
I posted about this elsewhere, but when I was accidentally filled with 87, I burned some off on Stage 0 then I had 4 gallons of Jay's e90 added and boy, that sure worked well, No negative corrections at all! I think I calculated I was at about e35 or a bit higher, but goes to show that Octane is only half the equation, the other half of an e30 tune is the cooling effect allows for more aggressive boost and timing as well... But now I'm hooked on this stuff, I have to plan to go out there before 7:00pm if I need to fill up and stuck paying $3.89 for Shell V-Power as the closest station to top off my mix, hehe...
 




Top