How Pure Do You Want It?
 
Gasohol, E-85, and pure alcohol vs. “Make your own” OK, you can find a lot of discussion on the Web about making 190-proof pure grain alcohol. These discussions are mostly for home distiller enthusiasts who are only thinking in terms of making drinking alcohol. Naturally, if you are going to drink it, you want to make sure it is free from any small amounts of poisonous byproducts like methanol and fusil oils, as well as any traces of heavy metals like lead or mercury. But when you are burning it in your engine, anything that contributes to combustion should be left in, really.  So there is no need to do any fine filtering, other than a paper filter like a coffee filter (for small amounts) or an in-line paper cartridge water filter for larger amounts. All you need to do is make sure there aren’t any particles which could clog your carburetor or fuel injectors. Next, in terms of proof, how high does it need to be? You are never going to make 200 proof alcohol in a still, because you always come up against a physical limitation which has to do with the concentration of vaporized ethanol molecules at a specific temperature. This is known as the azeotropic equilibrium barrier, and is beyond the scope of this article.  So 190 to 192 proof is as high as you can make with any still, no matter how efficient it is. To get the last 5% of water out of the ethanol can require just as much energy as it did to get out the first 95%. But it can be filtered out through corn grits (see the link on this page) to make 100 % anhydrous alcohol. Now, you don't need anhydrous alcohol unless you intend to mix it with gasoline (petrol). You may want to do this for the simple reason that you wouldn't have to do  very much in the way of converting your engine, as you can make your own E-85. E-85 is, as you might guess, 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline (plus some anti-corrosion additive). This is quite different than a product sold in the 1980s,  called Gasohol, which was gasoline with 10% ethanol. This name confused people, and they didn't know if they could use it or not, even though it would work in any engine. So they went over to calling it "Unleaded Premium".  This is a pretty good way to extend your gas mileage and also is a pretty safe way to use alcohol as a fuel, for the simple reason  that if you ever run out of your home-made gasohol, you can mix it with unleaded gasoline. Then you are back on the road again. But the only kind of alcohol which will mix with gasoline (petrol) is 100% (200 proof) ethanol. If you have any water content in your home-made ethanol, it will separate out once you mix it with petrol. Water is heavier than gasoline, so it forms a thin layer at the bottom of the fuel tank of you car, and then gets sucked up by your fuel pump and your engine will cough and die. This isn't the end of the world, as you can get it removed by adding a bit of methanol to your tank (it is sold as "Gas Dryer" or various other winterizing products at automotive parts stores). Now for those of us who like to run on pure alcohol which has no nasty petrol mixed in with it, then 160 to 170 proof is plenty high enough. You can get great mileage on this if you do a full conversion to alcohol, but you will be out of luck if you run out of fuel, unless you make your car a duel-fuel vehicle (which many people did back in the early 1980s, by installing a duel carburetor setup.) See my page on “Converting your engine.” You do not have to try to do anything different to get your 190 proof, (95% ethanol) other than to closely monitor the temperature setting of the automatic control valve. You may have to do an elevation correction (if you are living in the mountains) to make sure you know precisely what temperature to set it at, but the overall idea is that the top area of the reflux column, just before the vapors rise into the condenser section, must be controlled at precisely 2 degrees F above the condensation point of alcohol which is 174 F. Then you have pure alcohol moving up, and the condensed water never goes any higher.  This is thoroughly explained on my web page, “Principles of operation.” The automatic control valve I use is a thermostatic water valve, which opens on temperature rise. You will never get the precise control you require from trying to control the rate the water boils with an electric heating element. That is like cooking on an electric stove. The big problem is that the pot always boils over, right? Wouldn't you rather cook with gas?  Furthermore, you are much less likely to burn your mash if you have any particulates that come out of solution in the wash, even after it has been filtered. You have sugar, therefore you have carbon. You know what it is like to clean out a blackened stainless steel cooking pot. You don't want that burned taste to get into subsequent batches, so better to cook with gas, and also better to use a reflux column like mine which can precisely control the temperature inside the reflux column on a graduated basis, so that you have a reverse heat flow going on inside the reflux column. Trying to control temperature at the condenser section is like closing the barn door after the horses have escaped.  This still design was built by myself and a group of a dozen people, including three engineers. We refined the design with four different generations of successive models. This still is as different from the tabletop pot stills as a new Lexus is from a '57 Chevy. Those early models have their charm, but to make enough to be used as a fuel,  you want some serious production. Read my explanation of how this still works, in Principles of Operation, as well as the chapter on “Safety and boiler operations.” People who buy my still plans will also get a chapter on how to handle high volumes of mash and fluid handling. I have produced well over a thousand gallons of high proof alcohol in the many different stills I have built over the past twenty years. Sure, my intention was and continues to be using ethanol for fuel, but the principals are the same. I can and have produced 195 proof on my first run, it is just that when I am talking about 180 proof in my web pages, it is because this is a more efficient fuel in terms of getting more miles per gallon when you are replacing gas with homemade brew in your tank. In fact, you get better mileage than you would on gas.  I sell the blueprints for my still, just go to my “Order the plans” page for info on this. Also, I sell the temperature control valve for $290. I have looked for years, and haven't found anything better than what I have been using all along. You can see the valve on the left side of this photo, on the left side of this page.   Rule 1: Gas and water don't mix! Rule 2. High tuning for high performance. Rule 3. Carry an extra can!   Water and gas don't mix. This means you have to decide whether to convert your car to run on homemade high proof (then you are truly independent from relying on nasty and greedy oil companies like Esso/Exxon. ) For the best performance, you will need to change the size of your jets in your carburetor (if you have one) or the fuel/air mix of the electronic fuel injectors. You would also want to up the compression ratio to 12 to 1 by installing racing pistons. Finally, you may need to actually install a separate fuel tank so that if you want to switch between petrol and alcohol fuel, you can do this with a bypass valve/switch, without having to drain the tank. If you have a little bit of 180 proof in the bottom of your tank and add petrol, the water  in the alcohol will separate out and sink to the bottom. To get it out without draining the tank, you have to add either some 100% alcohol or better, some methanol (which is sold as a de-icer in automotive parts stores). High tuning for high performance: Up the compression ratio, change your fuel jets, advance your timing until it runs really smooth, and watch for cops in your rear view mirror! Carry an extra can! If you change over to home-made fuel, carry enough to get you home again. Henry Ford built the Model T to run on either gas or alcohol, because "There are more stills in this country than gas stations!"We used to be able to buy alcohol back in the 1920's, until Standard Oil of Pennsylvania started the "gas wars" by selling gas at $0.05/gallon for just long enough to run the "Alky sellers" out of business.        High compression engines work best on ethanol. http://www.thomasnet.com/nsearch.html?cov=NA&what=Zeolites&heading=95811006&navsec=prodsearchconvert_engine.htmlprinciples.htmllegal_issues.htmlorder_the_plans.htmlshapeimage_1_link_0shapeimage_1_link_1shapeimage_1_link_2shapeimage_1_link_3shapeimage_1_link_4
Hot cars run better on hot fuel!