Thought id dig this up and post a relevant reply..
I was not the 1 to email them but was sent this by a friend..
my testing kit has seen 74-75% from caltex fuel i have purchased from Wrongary Caltex on the Gold Coast..
the ELF e85 i had previously came in at 91-92% and i believe the sucrogen CSR comes in at 92-93%...
I've been told that ANDRA can only test for E85 but can't distinguish between the brands etc (yet).
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I emailed Caltex regarding bio e flex availabilty of a all year availability of 85% mix (for drag racing), their response:
Thank you for writing to Caltex. I understand your concerns and recognise that drag racing needs consistency. It's worth bearing in mind however that Bio E-Flex was specifically designed for use in original factory-made flex-fuel vehicles (fitted with flex-fuel sensors that can adjust to the level of ethanol) - hence the discord in specs to your racing requirements.
Having said all that, Bio E-Flex has been at 70% ethanol since it launched for NSW, Vic & SA. Qld has been at 73%. There has not been a change since the launch of the product.
It was a deliberate choice to use the winter blend at that time as we knew that sales would be extremely low at all sites. Hence there was a risk that some of the summer blend would still be in the tanks from the summer rolling into the winter.
It's also our first foray into the product which means that we began by making a few conservative decisions: considering this is the first relatively large-scale rollout of the product in Australia, we wanted to ensure that there were absolutely no issues with it that could possibly tarnish its reputation in the marketplace. Basically we wanted to separate it from the E10 stigma, and some regular motorists' opinion on ethanol blended fuel.
We wanted to make sure that every flex-fuel vehicle that rolled in there had no start-up or vapour pressure issues, and demonstrate that ethanol blended fuels work beautifully in engines designed to use it.
However, this does mean that cars that have been modified and tuned specifically to use E85, and do not have a flex-fuel sensor have to be very careful about measuring the ethanol content in Bio E-Flex, as you have been. We will only change the ethanol content twice a year at most.
At this stage we haven't changed the % yet as we began with the winter blend for the reasons stated above. As we grow our understanding of the fuel, and the relative sales, we should be able to better balance ethanol content with vapour pressure requirements of the flex-fuel vehicles. Please note that factory made flex-fuel vehicles cannot be tuned to use 85% ethanol in winter due to legislated tuning requirements (to minimise vehicle emissions).
So in answer to your question, it is likely that we will increase the ethanol content in summer, however I cannot guarantee that it will be 85% ethanol.
Some states including NSW and Qld, are subject to legislation that limits the maximum vapour pressure in petrol. Hence our refineries change the volatility of our petrol every year to meet these requirements. This directly impacts E-Flex, because it is blended with this petrol. If the volatility of the petrol is high, then we can use more ethanol. If it is lowered, in order to meet the legislation, then we may only be able to put in 70-75% ethanol. So as you can see, our decisions were driven by a number of factors: operability, legislative and our commitment to the success of renewable fuels in Australia.
