Post
by TXGOAT2 » Tue May 24, 2022 10:31 am
As far as I know, Ford never supplied Model Ts with dual fuel tanks, at least to the USA market. Ford designed the Fordson tractor to operate on kerosene and similar fuels, and supplied a dual tank arrangement to facilitate starting and warm-up. I don't think ethanol ever was used in tractors, probably due to its very low BTU content and other disadvantages as compared to gasoline and kerosene. I have no doubt that many T owners adpated Model Ts to operate on crude oil, alcohol, kerosene, naptha, wood gas, or whatever they could find, especially during WWI, the Depression, and WWII. The fact remains that gasoline is what Model Ts were designed to run on, and they will run best on gasoline, even low quality gasoline. Alcohol was, and is, a very poor fuel for motor vehicles, and in most places, including the USA, it is far from cheap. Most people apparently do not understand what octane rating is about, or why it is important in some motor fuel applications, and nearly irrelevant in others. A good fuel for gasoline engines has a sufficiently high octane equivalency rating to prevent detonation under normal operating conditions, and it also has a high BTU content, among other important characteristics. Alcohol does have a good octane equivalency, but it has very poor scores on BTU content, stability, and several other important factors, including cost. It's a poor excuse for a motor fuel for on-road vehicles. It might make sense, on a limited basis, for some situations in some countries, like Brazil. Even there, it's a poor second choice for most people. It makes no sense at all to use it as motor fuel in most parts of the world, and it makes no sense at all to use it in the USA. The USA cannnot produce sugar cane on anything like the scale that Brazil can, and using heavily-subsidized corn to produce heavily-subsidized ethanol in the USA is beyond absurd, especially in a hungry world.