Has anyone used E85 or other Ethanol blends in their V70 XC (2002 or similiar)? What, if any, conversion steps were required? Were there any problems?

With the prospect of very inexpensive alcohol fuel becoming available later this year, we're very interested in running our cars on a mixture of mostly alcohol and as little gas as possible. Thanks in advance for any help.

Hi,
just found these clips http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXajLGqafyk
Enjoy your Ethanol drive..
Cheers :460:

new flexifuel volvo engine

b4204s4F

Derived from original b4204s4 engine for petrol only.

Changes for ethanol operation amongst other things include

larger fuel injectors (need more ethanol injected as not as efficient as petrol)

valve seats in harder mineral (valve seats burn out)

material in fuel lines (ethanol degrades normal fuel line rubber and plastics)

fuel tank (as above)

fuel pump/level sensor (works on PWM instead of linear signal)

AC/DC convertor (using dc current in tank with ethanol causes corrosion of electrical contact points, changing from DC to AC current vastly reduces this)

Different fuel injection strategy (clever enough to work out how much ethanol mix is in tank and adjust injection system to suit).

Different catalyst (more platinum and rhodium to help the catalyst reach operating tempreture more quickly)

From a official source, I would guess that volvo made these changes for a reason.

Also a car running on e85 will get less miles to the gallon (up to 20% less) so is not really any cheaper at the pump and does not produce more power as the internet would have you believe. It is being developed purely as a renewable source and as a cleaner fuel.

Just had a look at some of the crap being sold on the internet, I would be wary of these flexi fuel kits.