@Dougfir @ai6yr There are a bunch of YouTube videos on wood gasifiers and similar.

I'm pretty sure a modern engine doesn't need many mods to run on pure ethanol though.

Here in the UK (and the EU) we use unleaded petrol with the stamp E10 which means up to 10% of it can be bioethanol with the idea the standard fuel moves to more and more bio fuel with each standard. It was E5 for a number of years.

Less issues with classics than when we moved to unleaded.

@naturepunk @Dougfir @ai6yr Modern engines usually can handle a decent amount of alcohol (usually up to something like 80% I think it was?)

But you can't just "convert" necessarily. If the system isn't tuned to recognize and adjust for it, it is going to go very very badly and end even worse.

One thing to remember is how simple vehicles were way back then. It was mostly a matter of adjusting the carburetor I'm given to understand. But we have a whole complex fuel system with multiple computers and etc and an ECU. If they don't know how to properly handle it they're probably going to do really bad things with it...

There are a lot of vehicles that were designed to do both though. Any that says "flex fuel" on it definitely does.

@naturepunk @Dougfir @ai6yr Reprogramming an ECU is one heck of a mod these days...

But also I think much of the fuel system itself has to be adjusted at this point.

I think way back then they just adjusted one screw, but these days it involves expensive equipment and I imagine voiding a warranty or two.

@nazokiyoubinbou @Dougfir @ai6yr yeah, was probably changing the jets in the carb and giving the distributor a twist on an old engine but it would have blown itself up in weeks due to lack of lubrication and seals breaking down on an engine that old.

Most cars have been hacked by the time you're going to be interested in making major mods to the ignition system these days.

Even if it means replacing the entire ECU and hacking it into the loom everything is hackable :)

@naturepunk @Dougfir @ai6yr I'm not saying it can't be done. I'm saying most people can't do it. Even most people who are good with cars... And it's not cheap equipment to modify an ECU...

I think at that point you also have other components that will fail to connect to it, no? I seem to recall even the body control module in a previous car I owned being problematic with engine stuff of all things.

It's way beyond like 99.99999% of the populace even to find some friend who can do it for them. A handful of people might do it, but that's it.

But then too, alcohol is still very very expensive in such high purities. (You can't use the stuff for drinking after all!) And I don't think they can handle 100%? You'll still need to mix and do massive adjustments.

Just not realistic.

@nazokiyoubinbou @Dougfir @ai6yr 73% of cars in Brazil run on 95% ethanol (the rest is water) so the people who can't do it are the places with governments in the pockets of companies who sell you new cars every few years or millions of barrels of oil to keep them on the road ;)

It's just distilled fermented sugar water after all and unlike liqueur it can be waste sugars from other industries or grown with bacteria. The engine doesn't care ;)

@naturepunk @Dougfir @ai6yr

the people who can't do it are the places with governments in the pockets of companies who sell you new cars every few years or millions of barrels of oil to keep them on the road ;)

Well, we were discussing modifying presumably modern (or modern-ish) cars to do it which is a separate subject, but, putting that aside, yes, we have such a setup in the countries where all this is specifically relevant to anyway. Right down to them trying their very best to make it prohibitively difficult or even illegal to modify a vehicle in such a manner.

Regardless, we do not currently have the infrastructure in place.

So yeah, it just isn't realistic to just switch.

BTW this is all kind of an awful lot of work to just... not simply use an EV instead...

@nazokiyoubinbou @Dougfir @ai6yr I didn't suggest that growing all those calories and using them as fuel was a good idea did I?

Just that it was possible.

We have most of the infrastructure though.

All those fields growing animal feed, all those oil refineries that will need repurposing, all those tankers set up to move bulk liquids, all those petrol stations set up to pump inflammable liquid from below the ground into a car.

It's 80% the same infrastructure.

@naturepunk @Dougfir @ai6yr That is potential infrastructure. It would take a long time and a lot of cost to switch it all over. And it would also mean less production of those other things, which is a problem in itself. It would take a lot more costs and years than you think. Especially since those in charge are indeed, as you implied, in the pockets of oil industries so would not only do nothing to help but would probably try to hinder it. They actually did try to convince people to do it in the past and oil won.

And... again... that is an awful lot to jump through just to... not use EVs that already exist and already have infrastructures being expanded right now or already in place even.

@ai6yr @naturepunk @Dougfir It definitely would require a more functional government than most places have these days. As someone who lives in the sticks I can tell you they'll have to actually build something for all that. We definitely don't have anything in place. If I took a bicycle on these roads I wouldn't even make it to the nearest grocery store before a random SUV or something ran me over and killed me.

I sure would love it if something of that general sort was possible though. It's not just the gasoline. Everything about cars is a ridiculous, wasteful cost full of enshittification and problems. (And now they even want to have infrared sensors watching our every move and arbitrarily deciding if we're drunk or impaired but probably getting it wrong 99% of the time.)