Date: 28 Mar 2006 16:40:14 -0800 From: "SmaartAasSaabr" <smaartaassaabrnospaml.com> Subject: Re: Ethanol ?
Dima wrote: > Hello, > > What is your guys' opinion of the engine development at Saab (GM) that > runs on ethanol-based gasoline? Please, keep all GM-bashing to other > threads; here I am just curious to see the technical merits/demerits > that people are aware of. > > I have not been able to locate a single gas station here in Portland, > OR, that carries ethanol-based gas (E85). > > -Dima Ethanol is by no means a new technology. Remember "Gasohol" from the mid 70's? Various American sedans (Taurus, Lumina, Cavalier, Impala, Dodge Spirit, Stratus) have had a flexible gasoline / E85 model in their lineup since the early 1990's, mostly for fleet sales to the US government. And GM's has produced flex-fuel pickup trucks for many years, again mostly for the government. Also other alternative fuel vehicles, such as cars running on compressed natural gas (pickups, Cavaliers), and of course the one-off hydrogen and other things... However Saab introduces the first production E85 car that doesn't suck donkey balls on the road performance aspect. There was a Ford show car some years back, a Mustang with a supercharged 5.4 litre V8 running on E85 that made 450 horsepower or something like that. Portland isn't so much "progressive on environment" as "very progressive in the fucking over of motorists" I'd say ;>
