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Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 9:30 am
by Daninski
More Info:
Toluene can be used as an octane booster in gasoline fuels used in internal combustion engines. Toluene at 86% by volume fueled all the turbo Formula 1 teams in the 1980s, first pioneered by the Honda team. The remaining 14% was a "filler" of n-heptane, to reduce the octane to meet Formula 1 fuel restrictions. Toluene at 100% can be used as a fuel for both two-stroke and four-stroke engines; however, due to the density of the fuel and other factors, the fuel does not vaporize easily unless preheated to 70 degrees celsius (Honda accomplished this in their Formula 1 cars by routing the fuel lines through the muffler system to heat the fuel). Toluene also poses similar problems as alcohol fuels, as it eats through standard rubber fuel lines and has no lubricating properties as standard gasoline does, which can break down fuel pumps and cause upper cylinder bore wear.

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 11:41 am
by fowljesse
Daninski wrote:Toluene, methylbenzene. POISON! DANGER! HARMFUL OR FATAL IF SWALLOWED. HARMFUL IF INHALED OR ABSORBED THROUGH SKIN. VAPOR HARMFUL. FLAMMABLE LIQUID AND VAPOR. MAY AFFECT LIVER, KIDNEYS, BLOOD SYSTEM, OR CENTRAL NERVOUS SYSTEM. CAUSES IRRITATION TO SKIN, EYES AND RESPIRATORY TRACT.
We don't use this product at all now because of the medical issues associated with toluene. I suggest if your going to use this product you exercise caution. It's not the one time exposure but the repeated little hits that add up and eventually cause moderate to extreme medical issues.
Yeah, IIRC it's 1 of theose things that your system has a hard time eliminating.

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 11:47 am
by fowljesse
Daninski wrote:More Info:
Toluene can be used as an octane booster in gasoline fuels used in internal combustion engines. Toluene at 86% by volume fueled all the turbo Formula 1 teams in the 1980s, first pioneered by the Honda team. The remaining 14% was a "filler" of n-heptane, to reduce the octane to meet Formula 1 fuel restrictions. Toluene at 100% can be used as a fuel for both two-stroke and four-stroke engines; however, due to the density of the fuel and other factors, the fuel does not vaporize easily unless preheated to 70 degrees celsius (Honda accomplished this in their Formula 1 cars by routing the fuel lines through the muffler system to heat the fuel). Toluene also poses similar problems as alcohol fuels, as it eats through standard rubber fuel lines and has no lubricating properties as standard gasoline does, which can break down fuel pumps and cause upper cylinder bore wear.
I found a cocktail that a guy has been using for a few years that included Acetone, Toluene, top end lube, and something else I don't remember..
I need to look into the cost effectiveness of using Toluene in every fill-up, and advancing the timing. I have 4.5 gallons of 120 octane gas that I could slowly add, also.

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 11:59 am
by onlytrueromeo
Honestly, You'd have more benefit and less problems by going water/meth injection! It just costs more to set up, also winter means that you need to use windshield washer fluid, which is more expensive than tap water.

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 12:06 pm
by Daninski
Water injection is only for a short burst use. You can't run it all the time but hey how about window wash fluid with Teflon. Will your engine parts slide better. :) Kidding. On that note they're putting teflon in contraceptive jelly,,,so your meat won't stick. lol

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 12:10 pm
by fowljesse
The paint I have for my car has Teflon in it :D It's wet enough here, so H2O injection might be too much.

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 3:52 pm
by onlytrueromeo
LOL @ Teflon. Water injection is sometimes used in bursts for high compression applications, but it can also be made to run on an equal basis per tank of gas without having extreme amounts of it. You dont need to inject alot of water to get the benefit of increased volume of steam and decreased engine temps, from what I have read. The biggest part is tuning your car to take advantage of it, since most people don't use it to get better mileage.

Water injection allows for lean burn. Lean burn means hotter temps which means the water goes to steam faster which makes more power (and cools cylinder by change from liquid to gas) Without water this is not possible because of the likely hood of detonation. Cars run much more efficiently when heat is being transferred from cylinder walls into power.

Water injection allows for advanced timing. It also allows (and really needs) increased compression, which is why it's used on performance engines. At cruising speeds (which is really the point where you want to use water injection since stop-go traffic sucks up gas almost always anyway) you can achieve 20-30% better mileage.

It isn't the easiest thing to do, nor have I tried it myself yet, but the theory is completely sound. Water to steam is a great cleaning agent, necessarily takes heat away from its environment (cylinders) and increased volume.

Check this:
Water to steam (in a perfect phase change) 1 to 1650 that means 1ml water goes to 1.65L steam. This wont be perfect every time - lets say 1000 to 1 to be conservative.

Gasoline/air mixture to burned mixture volume - I cannot find any definites on this, since it is so dependent on temperature, octane gas used and AFR. I can tell you though that it is NOT the volume change that powers a combustion engine, it is the HEAT produced that vaporizes the byproducts and therefore creates pressure. Lots of HEAT is lost in the combustion cycle because there is nowhere for it to go expect out the tailpipe or into engine components...only SOME of this heat is used in typical combustion reactions. Adding more water to this will utilize some of the heat and therefore make more power.

Heres an oversimplification. C8H18 + 12.5 O2 ----> 9 H2O + 8 CO2
Doing the math (copied from internets)

1ml of Octane = 2.3L of gas byproducts. This is clearly better than just vaporizing steam, but like I said there is still excess heat! If there was no excess heat your engine would NEVER overheat and you would have water gushing from your tailpipe. Because you do have excess heat we can supplement that. Adding equal parts water to gas (which is more than you'd want to do) will give you almost 60% more volume. This also cuts down heat which means healthier engine.

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 5:19 pm
by fowljesse
For the drier months, and for a long time now, I've been thinking about making a bong in a line for one of the extra IM ports. It would introduce humidity without the danger of having too much water in it. With my Ram air setup, and the rain, I get plenty of water injection :|

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 18th, 2008, 11:26 am
by nos92mx3
I once fooled around with adding acetone into the gas tank of my old 94 s10 blazer.

I could tell when i added to much because if i stomped on it then let off and stomped on it again, it would load up and shoot a huge fireball out the tail pipe, who needs a catalytic converter anyway?
But once i figured out how much to add, i gained right around 1 mpg, and this was on a beat up vortec 4.3

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 18th, 2008, 1:34 pm
by cjthor
FYI acetone is just as bad for you...

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 18th, 2008, 7:48 pm
by SuperK
cjthor wrote:FYI acetone is just as bad for you...

Aww man, but it made such good smoothies...

Re: Using Acetone in your Fuel- Research

Posted: December 18th, 2008, 11:12 pm
by Ryan
The fumes are hazardous, and if you spill it on yourself in any great ammount, it destroys the oils and fats in your skin and can do some serious damage that way... cracks, bleeding, and very red and sore if you do it too much.

I wouldn't stir it with my finger.