I have a 2007 MINI Cooper.
The owner's manual, as well as staff at my local MINI Dealership, all confirm that ethanol can kill MINI engines.

I had two spark plugs replaced because of ethanol damage so far.

I live in DC, where there's NO REGULATION requiring gas stations to post ethanol content. Same as in MD.

Does anyone know of any list of ethanol-free stations in the District of Columbia?

There's some lists I found for MD, and other states through this link:
http://www.pure-gas.org/index.jsp?stateprov=MD

Any other insights about dealing with Ethanol would be appreciated.

 

I usually add techron every 3-4000 miles seems to help a little and above all change oil more frequently than Minis 10,000 mi intervals.My '07 S still runs as smooth as ever w/53,000 mi.

 

I live in Fairfax Virginia right outside of dc. Where at in dc do you live? It might be good for you to just cone out here to fill up. I think our gas is 10 cents cheaper too

 

How could they tell that it was ethanol that damaged the spark plugs?

 

Ethanol has less energy and ignites at a lower temperature. The higher octane fools your ECU into thinking it's burning high octane gasoline. This causes the timing advance to be wrong causing some engine knock. Engine knocking can damage a lot more than just the spark plugs.

However, if you are burning fuel at too low a temp, I believe the sparkplug color is whiter. Burned cleanly at normal temp, the sparkplugs should be a brown/tan color. Somebody should correct me if I have my science backwards. Burning oil or burning too hot causes your plugs to go black.

MINIs are safe for up to 10% ethanol in its gasoline. There is some tolerance built into the engines. However, especially in the US where gas formulation is not as regulated as it is in Canada, it's beware.

 

beken: I agree that light brown/tan tip indicates proper burning. I think running too lean is indicated by a light gray/white color, and too rich shows dark (and maybe a bit damp). Light detonation (usually not heard) may give a sand-blasted look, and heavy detonation (easy to hear) may break the insulator.

I'd still like to know what a plug ruined by ethanol looks like, so I'll know it if I see it. Most of us are probably running up to 10% ethanol in our fuel without noticing any change in plug readings; thus maintaining our usual plug change schedule. I wonder what's different in the OP's case.

 

are there websites that locate good gas stations?

 

Sigh...

 

I guess I'm one of the lucky ones. One of my local stations in Idaho has ethenol free premium fuel. They had lots of demand for it because of all the ATV and Snowmobile riders in the area. That is all I've used since the MINI was new and I've haven't had any problems with the High Pressure Fuel Pump.

 

Man, where do you start?

Higher octane is higher octane. It's a rating related to the ability of the fuel to resist knock. (ignite before the spark plug fires) The ECU take inputs from a lot of sensors, O2 sensor, IAT, throttle position, yada, yada, yada) And from all that, it decides on how much fuel to inject, and when to light it off.

It then looks at the results from the O2 sensor, traction control... And adjusts to try and keep things optimal.

Does ethonol have less energy? Yes it does. You will have lower fuel efficiency using fuel with ethonol. Will it kill your engine? Not directly no. May it have some long term isuues? Probably, but that's a guess. Probablywith the fuel system, and corrosion.


You can tell almost nothing about how the mixture is firing from looking at the spark plug color on a street car. These aren't carburated 60's cars. It just doesn't work that way anymore.

 

First, thank all for your input.

When I had my first issue with ethanol, at some point the engine would rattle badly when idling, especially when it was hot (coming into town after 20-30 minutes of highway driving). It got so bad, that the entire car would shake violently, and the engine would shut down. This happened several times, and the MINI dealership where I took it (car was still under warranty) said they have no way of knowing for sure what happened, but they suspected ethanol content. Replacing two damaged spark plugs fixed it (and I don't know what color the deposits were).


Anyway, looking at my owner's manual, it reads:

Fuel specifications
Do not fill the tank with leaded fuel, as this
would cause damage to the catalytic converter.
Do not fill the tank with E85, i.e. fuel containing
85% ethanol, nor with FlexFuel. Otherwise the
engine and fuel supply system will be damaged.<

http://www.minimania.com/pdfile/2007_MINI_Hardtop.pdf

That's pretty straight forward. And again, the problem is that I HAVE NO WAY OF KNOWING THE ETHANOL CONTENT, because gas stations in DC and Maryland don't have to post it. Some do, but you can't trust those who don't post the content.
So I'm resorting to talking to gas station owners on my route to/from work. Hopefully I'll find a couple pure gas stations (and thanks Achilles but VA isn't on my way to work..)

Also check out this US map of pure gas stations:
http://www.pure-gas.org/extensions/map.html


I checked all the ones in Maryland. They are almost all on Maryland's Eastern Shore. If you are not familiar, that's the giant peninsula on the Chesapeake Bay, where there are more boats than cars. I'm assuming stations there have to sell pure gasoline because boat engines can't take ethanol mixes.

 

Depending on your level of trust in your government (specifically, the EPA) you might find this document to be an interesting read:

http://www.epa.gov/oms/regs/fuels/ostp-3.pdf

It lacks any real test data, is based heavily on a 1995 EPA study so it's a bit dated, and contains several claims that aren't well supported, so take it for what it's worth. If nothing more, it is a good starting point for getting educated about the issues.

 

You surely have this all correct. The car does what it has to to reduce/eliminate "knock"

I get about 15% better mileage when I can get ethanol free gas and yes the vehicle response is much better.


Well lets be real here if there is something really wrong with the car the plugs can get fouled and you will see that. Something like an oil leak into one cylinder for instance. But as you say for the most part there will be very little chance of seeing anything. And as for fouling from ethanol no way will anyone see that.

 

I seriously doubt that the tech has any idea what the ethanol content of the fuel used was and was speaking out of turn on this matter.


Well the biggest problem with high ethanol content is that it will destroy the High Pressure Fuel Pump (HPF). If you had put in E85 or Flex you would only have gotten a few mile and the car would have been towed as the fuel pump would not have been working any longer. Would it have caused other engine damage probably but not just two spark plugs.

While that may be true for 10% or 15%, I would bet that there is some sort of "mandatory" notification if it is E85 or Flex, as that can damage ANY vehicle not made for it.

 

Well E85 isn't readily available in the Washington Baltimore area. It is 85% ethonol, and 15% gas. I imagine it would cause a few issues in a car not designed to run it.

 

In Washington State, the few gas stations that have E85 mark the pumps pretty prominently and they charge a lot for it too!

Dave

 

Go ehanol free if you can. I've been using it for a few months now and my car likes it a lot. My mileage and power seems like it's 10 percent more. With 7500 miles since my last oil change my oil doesn't look all black like it used to.

 

As richardsperry said above....higher octane is higher octane. You can't "fool" the ECU into thinking its running higher octane...because it is.

Depending on which calculation you use for octane E85 varies between 100-105 octane. Pure ethanol is like 110+.

Ethanol's octane rating is not the cause of issues on cars not designed to run it.

 

Maryland may be a state where there is no required pump labeling, but it doesn't mean they can blend higher than 10% ethanol (E10). You may not know how much but you do know it is less than 10% and BMW says 10% is Okay.

- Mark

 

i ment another site cause that one lists nothing in my area

 

Markjenn - the manual does say that 10% (or up to 10%) ethanol is bad:

Use high-quality brands
Field experience has indicated significant differences in fuel quality: volatility, composition,
additives, etc., among gasolines offered for sale
in the United States and Canada. Fuels containing up to and including 10% ethanol or other
oxygenates with up to 2.8% oxygen by weight,
that is, 15% MTBE or 3% methanol plus an
equivalent amount of co-solvent, will not void
the applicable warranties with respect to defects
in materials or workmanship.

So sounds like they are saying - we know it's bad stuff. And to top that off, right after they mention that ethanol content is bad (even 10% or less), they continue to say:

The use of poor-quality fuels may result in
drivability, starting and stalling problems (this is the problem I had. OB)
especially under certain environmental conditions such as high ambient temperature and high altitude.
Should you encounter driveability problems
which you suspect could be related to the fuel
you are using, we recommend that you respond
by switching to a recognized high-quality brand
such as gasoline that is advertised as Top Tier
Detergent Gasoline.
Failure to comply with these recommendations
may also result in unscheduled maintenance.

 

The first statement says that fuel quality varies. (Duh.) The second says that up to 10% ethanol will not void the warranty. From this, you get that ethanol in any concentration is "bad". Bizarre interpretation of these statements.

Looks like you have your mind made up to blame ethanol for everything and anything about your car that you don't like. Party on.

- Mark

 

lmao blame the ethanol!!

 

Mark- I just read and copied two paragraphs from my manual.
One says that ethanol mixed fuel, 10% or under, will result in "significant differences".
And yes, this wouldn't void the warranty. Ok.
And right after they explain this, they tell you that the use of poor quality fuels (and I'm assuming they are referring to the same fuel types they just described in the preceeding paragraph) may result in all sorts of havoc.
And it just so happened that some of this havoc happened to my car. And it just so happened that the service manager of a large mini dealership thought ethanol was to blame.

So Mark, thanks for your concern.

 

I too had the 2 spark plug damage and was told they was going to fix it under good faith or something like that. Now I buy from the exact Shell station the the dealership uses since I live across the street. Any mention of me using bad gas and Im gonna ask them where they buy there gas from and if they have ever had any issues from that station. Then I'm going to show them all the receipts with a log of milage.