The only good use for ethanol as a fuel is in high compression/ high performance engines. Its octane rating makes it a nice alternative to racing fuels. But as a fuel for a normal car, I agree with everyone and say that it is not worth the money spent to try it. Use that money to buy regular gasoline.

 

So back to my original question. If they built an engine designed to run 100 percent ethanol, you may get good mpg and power and clean emissions, but the engine design may be expensive and and don't know if maintenance is expensive as well?

 

Kensai, from my research you can get great performance out of ethanol and good mileage if the engine is built for it. Maintenance would be no different from a converntional engine. Possibly even less due to no carbon deposits to foul plugs and contaminate the oil.

A engine built for ethanol would need to have revised combustion chambers and a higher compression ratio arouns 11:1 maybe 11.2ish. This would make the engine very powerful and efficient and make more power than e85 in a low compression engine. The problem is that ethanol is less energy dense so the mileage will not equal that of gasoline but it would be much better than it is now.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E85_in_standard_engines

the greatest benefits come with the higher compression ratios
and some have been able to use as high as 14
with delayed closing of the intake valve

http://www.circletrack.com/techartic...ine/index.html