Running E-85 in the whizzer now!

[80's old school]

I posted in another post that my bike was running bad. It would idle fine, have no power off throttle until about 30 mph and then take off great. I determined that the carb was jetted too rich.

So I am doing a little experiment!!

I did a little "chemical jetting"!!! By that I mean I mixed up a concoction of about 75% E-85 and 25% gasoline and it runs perfect!! Now it takes off without peddling and actually squeaks a tight belt now!

Since it takes much more E-85 to run right, this basically did the same as jetting the carb down.

I may play with it a little and see how she does at 100% E-85. I think I will have to raise the needle a little and maybe idle her up since I feel the idle jetting will be too small. Right now I have the air bleed (idle mixture screw) completely closed and it idles perfect.

Gasoline is stoiciometric at 14.7 parts air and 1 part fuel. E-85 is stoiciometric at 10 parts air and 1 part fuel.

Interesting experiment.... I will keep you informed!

 

[80's old school]

Ran the bike for about 45 minutes yesterday. Still doing good. I need to raise the needle (lower the clip) so I can richen up the lower to mid circuit. It seems to surge a little when I am going about 25 mph (throttle barely opened).

Top end seems fine even though I have not really opened her up. Quenton told me to break in the engine like it was a new one, so I am taking it easy.

Idle seems fine once she warms up, but does need some "milking" of the throttle when cold.

After adjusting the needle, I will be adding more E-85 until I am at 100%.

Will keep you informed.

 

[80's old school]

Guess I am giving up on the E-85 experiment. It runs OK at some parts of the powerband but poorly on other parts.

I need to order the "proper" jets from Quenton and tune it right with pump gas.

Problem is my bike is running so rich it fouls out the plug on gasoline.

 

[WZ507]

E-85 is a good fuel and popular with drag racers because it is inexpensive and has a very high octane rating (excellent anti-knock performance). I tried it in a vintage Whizzer engine with an adjustable main jet carb and it ran OK, but turned out to be very low on power. Simply drained it, refilled with gasoline, adjusted the main jet and it came back to life with much better performance.

Why? All the modern flex fuel vehicles that run the stuff are much higher compression engines (10-11:1) as are the drag racers (13-14:1), and do well on it. Low compression engines like Whizzers (6-7:1) just don't have enough pressure to get a good burn out of it. I was all excited about using it initially, but no amount of tinkering with timing or mixture changed the result on the Whizzer engine.

Had you continued adding E-85 to gas I think you would have become more and more disenchanted with the performance.

 

[80's old school]

E-85 is a good fuel and popular with drag racers because it is inexpensive and has a very high octane rating (excellent anti-knock performance). I tried it in a vintage Whizzer engine with an adjustable main jet carb and it ran OK, but turned out to be very low on power. Simply drained it, refilled with gasoline, adjusted the main jet and it came back to life with much better performance.

Why? All the modern flex fuel vehicles that run the stuff are much higher compression engines (10-11:1) as are the drag racers (13-14:1), and do well on it. Low compression engines like Whizzers (6-7:1) just don't have enough pressure to get a good burn out of it. I was all excited about using it initially, but no amount of tinkering with timing or mixture changed the result on the Whizzer engine.

Had you continued adding E-85 to gas I think you would have become more and more disenchanted with the performance.

I got my smaller main jet today from Quenton. I will give that a try today on regular gasoline! Hopefully she will run like she is supposed to now!