E85/Flex fuel hard start?
 

Anyone else having a hard time starting their car with e85 or flex fuel? I was wondering if this is normal or if it's a tuning issue. The colder it is the harder it tries to start, I tried starting the car up around 60f and it just cranked over once and died.

It occasionally takes me two starts before it stays running for me, and the coldest we've seen lately is 60F as well. Worried how it'll end up this winter. Do you prime the fuel pump before you try to start it? Just click the key to "on" for a few seconds and then turn it over. Helps immensely.

I prime the fuel pump, but there's always that stumble on a initial start after more then 6 hours parked. It just makes me nervous since pump fuel starts as soon as you hit the ignition.

I've experienced the same stumble on cold starts with an E85 tune and I always prime the pump for a few seconds while I select my appropriate map. It has never struggled to start but it does take like an extra second or two. I wouldn't worry about it unless it's really cold then you may want to switch back to pump gas if it gets really stubborn.

Yeah the stumbles make me concerned. When it starts and then dies after the first crank... yeah, worrisome haha. Illinois and Wisconsin are going to see much colder starts than 60F. :(

I always get a cool sweet smell of E85 with every morning startup too, in addition to the choking & stumbling. Doesn't smell at all with 93 fuel though.. which is good because I don't mind the sweet E85 smell in the morning.. its addicting now. :D

Which tune do you have? I have the fa20club tune and the colder it gets, the harder it is to get it running. These guys are in floriday though, so I can't blame them. They did provide me with a tune that is supposed to improve cold starts, but I haven't flashed it yet, since the weather has been nice lately.

FA20Club can fix the cold start stumble...I had issues starting on E85 (not even cold weather) and a simple update fixed it.

Visconti tune here at the moment and it starts pretty hard. Some tweaks in the tune can definitely improve the E85 rough start, but it's what? 108 octane? Anyone try starting a car with C16/MS109 in it with snow on the ground? (I live in Wisconsin, it happens) ;)

Visconti and FA20 are doing the best they can with the limited amount of data they have on individual engines. If they overdo the cold temperature starting compensation, you will at the very least get major oil dilution. Typically on a cold start, the ethanol goes right into the crankcase and then boils off. In OEM flex fuel applications there can be boil-off models in the ECU to account for this.

I would contact them directly and let them see datalogs of the issue.

It's inherent to running on ethanol fuel. The colder it is the harder it is to burn. At 50 something degrees it starts this behavior. Cold start is fixed by adjusting IPW based on temperature. Problem being the ECU doesn't know the temperature of the fuel. Google "E85 cold start" and you'll see it's normal and everyone has the same problems.

last set of revisions were made early this year for all the cold temp guys. if you have one of our tunes with that last revision you should be fine. i spent quite a bit of time revising those settings with more than a few guys and seemed to work well. but most of you might not have such changes because you never bother to submit any issues to us. posting on the forum is secondary. issues should always be referred to us directly cause im not a post whore im usually assisting customers offline with random issues.

I am on pure e85. Its starts slowly or normal. The slowly never sputters. On had to 2 start twice out of 200 starts. Not bad. I might need a update when its gets frigid or go back to my 93 file on 9 psi

i get rough starts, always starts second go though. it doesnt bother me that much, ill get around to logging it eventually. im on Visconti flex, doesnt happen on 98, when im at around E60% is when i get perfect starts