Making Ethanol?

[MeTarzan]

So crazy question, we have converted our shop cars over to run E85 but its not very readily available around here unless we drive 50miles to fill up. We have looked at having fuel delivered to a holding tank we have at the shop but we were also playing around with the idea since we are DIY guys of making some Ethanol ourself.

Has anyone on here had any experience making this yourself. We have done a lot of research online and think we might invest in something like this
Micro Fueler Is First Ethanol Kit for Brewing Backyard Biofuels on the Cheap - Popular Mechanics
We have most fabrication equipment to make our own Destillery but wondering if its actually worth trying to make it ourself.

[Turbo Beast]

Get a tank for ethanol. Did you read 1 gallon of ethanol from 10 gallons of sugar?
You would have to store ethanol AND sugar on site. One rain, and you'll have a solid clump of sugar too.

[MeTarzan]

from what Ive read its not an exact scince but seems that its actually about 1 gallon of ethanol from 5-6gallons of wash (wash= 1# of sugar to 1 gallon of water)
which you can also increase the amount of sugar to get more ABV thus more ethanol
I can get a 25# bag of sugar from walmart for $14

[Turbo Beast]

14 bucks is a lot to pay for sugar. We use it a lot for cementing wells, get it for about 5 bucks a bag. But, thats bought in bulk.
Im pretty sure there is more to it than mixing sugar and water (read something about yeast?) but Im sure you know that.
So one bag of sugar would make 5 gallons of fuel?

Like i said, id get a bulk storage tank for filling up and start messing with making it on a small scale.
Unless you're considering buying a hundred bags of sugar from walmart that is.

[vr4tune]

Home brew ethenal is not government subsidized. Hence cost more than going to a pump. Just get a large fuel container and store the ethenal at the shop. Or buy drums at a time.

[green-lantern]

I've made moonshine, I live in Tennessee though.

[MeTarzan]

If we are going to play around making it ourself we will probably start with a couple 55 gallon drums of wash, and yes you need yeast to make the stuff

As far as being gov. sub im not sure what you mean by it being cheaper to go the the pump. They do offer you a credit if you buy a machine like I had posted in my orginal post but other than that I'm not sure of anything else. We actually have a 1500gallon tank that was used for disel which if we decide to just purchase it we will clean it out and reseal it and use that since we would have to get at least 300gallons delivered at a time.

[BaadVR4]

Here is a good write up about storing and using E85. Like all "alcohol" products, it has corrosive properties that may not be a problem initially but will come back to bite you later. IMHO it would be wise to make sure all the parts of both your storage and delivery system are fully compatible with the E85.

www.nrel.gov/docs/fy06osti/40243.pdf

[MeTarzan]

Like all "alcohol" products, it has corrosive properties

Alcohol isnt actually the corrosive part, it is extremely hydroscopic (pulls in water) and unless you dry ethanol it contains water after it has been distilled. That is one reason Moonshine (corn ethanol) isnt 200proof, its usually around 140proof.