List of Ethanol-free gas stations in USA & Canada

I have a hot rod that has steel braided fuel lines. No problems for years, when they starting adding ethanol to the gas the hoses started weeping fuel, smelt like gas in the garage. After looking into it, the rubber used in some of these steel braided fuel lines could not tolerate even small quantities of ethanol. I had to rip all the lines out and replace them with a different brand. Interestingly the speed shop was also still selling the lousy original brand that I just removed and that brand was on sale for 50% off. The new line solved the problem. Years ago I was using Sunoco 94 in the hot rod, when I built the latest engine I lowered the compression to tolerate 91 octane. For quite some time now, I only use Shell or Canadian Tire premium (no ethanol) in the hot rod and small engines.
 
Last edited:
Remember Premium doesn't mean ethanol free.
If you figure you can get non ethanol for 15% more than normal gas you'll probably break even on mileage.
Currently I use E-85. 30% less per gallon than 10% ethanol which is regular gas here in MN. If I get 15%-20% (closer to 20) less fuel mileage I'm coming out ahead.
 
For me I have to travel over 100 miles to find the nearest ethanol free gas.
Our vehicles are all flex fuel so if they can handle E85 then they should be OK with the E10.
Whenever I go on a road trip out of the ethanol area I bring all of my empty gas cans to fill with non ethanol gas for the small engines.
If that E0 runs out, for my small engines I use a process to remove the ethanol from the gas and dispose of it.

I no longer have any mid size engines like ATVs, boats, snowmobiles.....

Many people do not understand octane.

Higher octane in an engine that is not designed for it will give noticeably LESS power output than regular gas of the correct octane rating. High performance engines all use high octane because of the way they are designed and tuned. NOT because high octane makes more power. Octane make the fuel burn SLOWER, that is why it makes less power in an engine not made for it. The higher the compression ratio and/or the more advanced the timing these moth make the fuel charge burn faster and thus need the higher octane to prevent detonation.

Most modern computer controlled cars have sensors so if you do put in high octane the computer can alter the timing and other tuning to take some advantage of it. That is why most modern cars do have more power and get better gas mileage with high octane.

I once ran an experiment with my truck, for one full year I used nothing but premium gas. I wrote down the mileage and gas put in at every fillup to be able to do the math at the end of the test. The result was a n increase of 2.8 MPG, BUT the $ per mile went up. The result was it was cheaper to run the low octane. I do still put in Premium if I will be towing just for the little extra power. I ran the same test with E85 and got way less MPG and noticeably less power. With the big hit on MPG it was more expensive to run the "cheap" E85 than it was to run regular or even premium gas. NOw this is all based on my truck, they way I use and drive it and the weather in my area, Someone else running these same tests under different conditions may get different results. That I why i ran the test foe a full year to make the conditions as average as possible for a valid comparison.

No matter how much you don't like it, or how much is spent on false advertising, you can not change the laws of physics. Ethanol has almost half of the BTUs per unit volume as gasoline. That means you need twice as much to get the same amount of work done.

OK enough learning for one day, I'll shut up now.....
 
Let me get this straight. Refineries are cutting their fuel with ethanol? Doesn’t that make them no better than drug dealers? Lol.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Ethanol cost less than gas, Especially with the government subsidies, that is why E85 is cheaper than E10 or E0. BUT they charge more to add the cheaper ethanol to E10 because they can and people do not understand what they are buying.
 
I believe it was originally to help farmers. Ethanol would never survive without the subjects subsidizing it.
 
vtcnc said:
Let me get this straight. Refineries are cutting their fuel with ethanol? Doesn’t that make them no better than drug dealers? Lol.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Click to expand...
It's not a function of the oil industry, but rather a function of the Federal Government. In 2009 ethanol in regular gas became mandatory. If I remember correctly the Obama administration mandated that 25% of the corn crop be used for the production of ethanol. To get things started they even gave companies subsidies to produce ethanol.

For 3 years the feds subsidized E85 to make it cheaper than regular gasoline. I remember a small no name gas station in Waupaca WI that was selling E85 for less than $1.00 per gallon when 87 octane regular was selling for close to $2.00 per gallon. As soon as the subsidies disappeared the station closed. There's now a Dunkin Donuts on that site.

It took another 5 years before non-ethanol now known as "recreational " gasoline came back on the market. It was in a direct response to all the problems created by the ethanol in engines under 50 hp. Almost all ATV's small outboards, and landscaping equipment suffered from fuel line and carburetor problems. In our area now almost all gas stations have either 87 or 91 octane recreational gas.

One thing I found extremely interesting during the transition to ethanol was that Iowa, the state that produces the most corn was the easiest place to find non-ethanol gasoline. It seems the agricultural equipment i.e., tractors, combines, etc., etc. weren't built to use ethanol. Like the "recreational" equipment they suffered from a myriad of fuel related problems. Hence almost every small town in Iowa had at least 1 gas station that was pumping non-ethanol regular gasoline.
 
ddickey said:
Remember Premium doesn't mean ethanol free.
If you figure you can get non ethanol for 15% more than normal gas you'll probably break even on mileage.
Currently I use E-85. 30% less per gallon than 10% ethanol which is regular gas here in MN. If I get 15%-20% (closer to 20) less fuel mileage I'm coming out ahead.
Click to expand...

Here in Canada, both Shell and Canadian Tire premium gas has no ethanol.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top