> Someone told me that ethanol is corrosive to aluminum. Is this true?
 >
 > Thanks,
 >
 > Doc Custer
 >
 > Extremely so ! Chuck
 >

Yes I'll go along with that, but

I did see a documentary many years ago about Brazil and Ethanol, if
I remember correctly what they did was to "hard chrome" the inside of
the intake manifold and other components as needed also used plastic
components, plastic fuel tanks, plastic fuel lines, plastic floats and
so on, they used other metals that were non reactive and plastic as
required to overcome the issue but essentially it was still the STD
engine. All these things should also be OK for other fuels as well
these were carb based engines at the time, I'm sure you get the idea,
the internals of the engines were not modified, this appeared to work,
I believe that "Castro" could provide more info on this as I think he
is in Brazil and should have access to detailed info on this subject.

Regards David

Aloha David and all...

As far as I read about, besides you should use plastic and inox steel  to
avoid the ethanol higher rate of corrosion, the major problem were the
carburetors.
The corrosion appears when 3 elements are present: ethanol,  metal, and
oxigen.
Since the fuel injection system works under pressurization  (1 to 4 BAR)
there is no enough oxigen available for the corrosion.
A problem you should consider are the eletric fuel pumps
They should be from the new generation (no more than at least 10 years of
fabrication), for the Flex Fuel system to avoid corrosion on this part.
Mostly (not to say all) fuel systems Made in Brazil are already, lets say,
immune to the ethanol corrosion, since our fuel uses a misture up to 25% of
ethanol with gasoline, since 1975 when we started the Proalcool Program.
There is a Master Thesis from Dr Fernando Rovai (in Portuguese but abstract
is  in English) you may download (not for commercial purposes, an agreement
is asked in Portuguese before download) at
Mestrado_Rovai_Edicao_Revisada_Depositada.PDF
A part of what he found on his research is, after bench testing 6 different
fuel pumps for 300 hours, although  some corrosion was detected, none of
them presented any failure  mode, and could be installe in vehicles without
prejudice.
Castro from Brasil (I thought we could be no less than soccer vice
champions, with Germany in the final, but without firing passion nothing
could be done... sorry guys, the CUP will stay in Europe) 2010 is comming...

Sorry guys
the link did not work
use this:
http://www.teses.usp.br/teses/disponiveis/3/3151/tde-13042005-090624/publico/Mestrado_Rovai_Edicao_Revisada_Depositada.PDF
Press the "CONCORDO" wich means: I agree with not using this work for
commercial purposes without authorization from the autor.Abstract in
Portuguese
Castro


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