The great ethanol scam continues

[Twayne]

>>

Funny; I was thinking you're a parrot without good backing for the tales you tell. I'm done - go way.

[clare]

I've seen LOTS of them with no screens at all.

[Jules Richardson]

But... water doesn't support combustion, and we all know that the carburetor is the part of the engine where things go bang! If the water just sits there because it can't burn, it'll eventually dry out and go all sticky ;-)

[clare]

Well, TECHNICALLY the "bang" does NOT happen in the carburetor. the carburetor just mixes fuel with air to be drawn (or forced by atmospheric pressure, if you want to get picky) into the cyl, where it goes "bang". And water in a carb, if left long enough CAN "permanently" damage a carb - or even a gas tank. Water covered by gasoline cannot evaporate, so the only way out is to rust through the tank or the steel bowl of a Tecumseh carburetor. In the meantime it corrodes carburetor jets and often damages float mechanisms as well. And yes, being covered with gasoline DOES help keep oxygen out of the process - unless oxygenates in the fuel get involved. I've seen a LOT of fuel tanks (and oil pans) rust away from inside where water has sat for a few years. And I've seen a good number of carbs that were "permanently destroyed " - aka, damaged beyond repair, due to water in the gas.

Never seen one "permanently damaged" by sugar though.

[innocent bystander]

>>>

Are you kidding? You want backing?

google "ethanol engine damage"

[Steve Barker]

LMAO!!! what a crock!

[Jules Richardson]

Yes, hence the smiley :-) I think whoever wrote the original artice must have been about 5 and hadn't read "my first book about engines" yet.

(Although I can't decide if the carb should be part of "the engine" or if its a separate entity, i.e. the fuel metering/delivery mechanism for the engine - if it's the latter then the author's assertion that water "gets sucked into the engine" is also wrong in the context of wrecking the carb)

I certainly agree with that - I had a carb on a tractor which had sat for a couple of decades and water had got into the carb; the float bowl was completely choked with rust.

I think the process takes quite a long time, but that doesn't mean that it won't happen.

No, nor me - or tried it. I think the theory I heard is that the sugar glazes the cylinder bores and trashes them, though (rather than it causing carb failure).

cheers

Jules

[Bob_Villa]

Everyone is missing the point here...this corn we hoard to satisfy our glutenous energy needs could be used to feed people in starving world communities. How do you think they view us obese, slovenly, retards...that we have become?

[Ed Pawlowski]

But we pay farmers not to grow crops. I don't know that the corn is being taken from the mouths of the poor, but it is used as an excuse to jack up corn prices.

[Kurt Ullman]

It isn't taking corn from the mouths of the poor. This is feed grain, mostly. So they are taking beef, etc., out of the mouths of the poor.

[clare]

Bad theory though, because sugar is insoluble in gasoline and won't go through the car or injectors. All it does is block filters - nothing a good sdosing with hot water won't remove.

[clare]

Due to supply and demand, the price of all corn products goes up - and so does the price of every corn replacement - putting ffood prices in the third world, in particular, out of the reach of many, financially. If our food prices go up 30% it is an inconvenience. If you are already spending 60% of your income on food and it goes up 30% you starve to death.

[clare]

"feed grain" is what feeds a large percentage of the world's poor. They do not eat sweet corn. Normal "feild maize" is ground to flour and used as a food staple.

[clare]

Direct injection forced induction engines can be twice as efficient as the "normal" IC engine, and there are still efficiencies to be gained, so don't rule out the IC gasoline engine yet. There are MUCH more efficient ethanol technologies in the wings too - using WASTE instead of primary food crops to produce ethanol. When this comes mainstream, petroleum products will be too valuable to burn for fuel - and food crops will not be wasted either.

Corn has to be the all-time WORST feedstock for ethanol production on an energy input basis.

[Douglas Johnson]

Dead wrong. From

"?Food prices have risen by 45 percent since end-2006, mirroring earlier price run-ups in other commodities (Source: IMF Commodity Price Index)."

"Rising bio fuel production adds to the demand for corn and rapeseeds oil, in particular, spilling over to other foods through demand and crop substitution effects. Almost half the increase in consumption of major food crops in 2007 was related to biofuels, mostly because of corn-based ethanol production in the US;"

This is a disaster if you were spending 70% of your income on food, common in the third world. Now you are spending 100% or going hungry.

-- Doug

[Dean Hoffman]

The days of paying farmers not to raise crops ended with the Freedom to Farm Act. I think that was in 1996. There is still some ground idled because of the Conservation Reserve Program. Farmers naturally won't idle their most productive ground. A bit of info here from Carpe Diem:

More info here if anyone is interested: Farmers get somewhere around 20% of the consumer dollar.

[HeyBub]

And we would want to feed people in starving world communities exactly why?

The concept of a famine in a democracy is virutally unknown and if the people of some benighted plain enjoy their theocrats or war lords, they have to deal with the consequences of their choice.

And why should we care whether they view us a slovenly retards?

[Bob_Villa]

For a human...you have no humanity.

[clare]

Nobody ever accused him of being HUMAN.

[HeyBub]

Sorry, but my idea of loving kindness is to not perpetuate the suffering. Change the government. Change the attitudes.

For example, it is self-destructive for communities to continue to grow water-intensive crops in areas subject to drought. The horn of Africa should be growing wheat instead of rice and trade the wheat for food products from Bangladesh or Indonesia. If the populace of Africa respond by saying "But we LIKE wheat," should I then be "humanitarian" enough to supply them with all the wheat they can eat?