i been reading on various web sites about using methanol mixed with petrol in cars. my question is.... Is it just "meths" they use or some other type? and how much to how much petrol?

i like the idea of adding a 50p bottle of meths to a tank and geting more power!!!!!!!!!

 

Interesting question!!!
But I don't think methanol(methyl alcohol), is the same as methalated spirits.

Paul

 

bet theres someone out there who knows, or should i just pop to b and q and get some meths and pour it in my tank and see wot happens! nowt like experimenting and finding out things for yourself!!!!

 

Methylated spirits is denatured ethanol (to make it undesirable to drink). It's a mixture of ethanol + additives (like oils, scents, dyes etc). Methanol is a specific alcohol, CH3-OH. I don't suggest you try putting meths in your fuel tank! Methanol could perhaps be used. Ask the question in the General Technical forum.

 

I think methanol has a higher octane rating, but also burns faster. So if you put too much in, you'll need to retard the spark abit.

 

where can i get hold of methanol, and how much is it?

 

Why not try :- 106 octane racing fuel? (76 cool blue), believed to be much safer.

http://www.76racing.co.uk/frameset.cfm

 

try posting in the scotland section, and ask for some advice from john banks. I'm sure that he was running with a 10% methanol 90% optimax mixture at star on sunday, that plus all the other mods helped him make 434bhp

 

Methanol:

1. Burns with a colourless flame so you don't know if you are on fire until it hurts.

2. Toxic - could be fatal or result in blindness if much of it got into you by absorption through the skin or drinking it and to a lesser extent inhaling it.

As an aside also toluene commonly used to pep up octane rating of petrol.

 

Seen some absolutely hilarious (to the viewer) videos of the old indycar races where they montaged a heap of footage of "alcohol" fires, cars melting and blokes running about grabbing buckets of water to put themselves out, makes me smile recounting it! I think they still use it in the states, I think thats why there is a guy that sprays water around the fuel filler after fueling

 

jaf01uk

yep, those yankees r still at it. hwever the times/powa them cars showing r jus amazing.

 

I got given a bottle of 'power boost' for christmas it claims to clean the engine and give more power but the main ingrediant appears to be methanol. Not used it yet but I you go for something like that rather than sticking some nicked from a school science lab methanol in your tank.

 

You'll need to add quite a lot of methanol - far more than you get in a can of octane booster.

A 10% mix should give no separation problems and gives a nice octane increase with Optimax, probably to 100 RON like a good dose of NF. This level should not damage the fuel system, higher concentrations can be corrosive.

It will weaken the mixture from stoich, best results if you map for it.

Handled carefully it is not particularly a problem - handle it as you would petrol.

It is also high in oxygen, so it effectively chemically enlarges your turbo but also seems to have a marginal enhancement on spool up probably for the same reason.

 

The oxygen is from the hydroxyl group in methanol (CH3-OH). I imagine that the oxygen would be liberated/used in the same way as oxygen from nitrous oxide would also be used.

 

I used to use a mixture of petrol and methanol in my racing turbocharged engine some while ago. I think the speedway guys use it a lot. I also used to inject a mixture of water and methanol into the intake to cool the charge before it was compressed, until it turned out to be illegal in the racing rules. It worked well though.

Les

 

You injected the mixture pre-turbo? What effect did that have on the turbine blades?

 

Where can you get methanol from? I did a quick search on the web but came up with not a lot more than cheap vodka warnings

 

Drop John Banks a line & see where he's bought from.

 

p Blakeway

Jennychem and 76 Racing fuels

Leuven

Cool Blue can only be bought I thought in 25 litre bits and is very expensive............!!!

Plus as its explosive you would have to pay more than normal delivery cost to get it - i.e. specialist delivery

At over £3 a litre all in - its not worth it.......

 

In the US they can get race fuel at the pump for similar to our normal unleaded price!

 

Hi Fatman

It did not seem to bother the compressor blades at all, they were aluminium anyway and did not stay wet for long since it was a bit warm under the rear engine cover. I used to pressurise the water/methanol tank from the manifold and control the amount injected with a needle valve. It was a fine spray from an old carburettor jet. All very simple!

Les

 

Methanol is available from Jenny Chem as stated previously.
I have used a mix of 6% toluene and 6% methanol when I could not get N.F. May also be advisable to add a small amount of upper cylinder lubrication.
To get full advantage of the fuel mix you need to remap and then stay on that fuel mix/map. Not very practical carrying around 3 litres of each and mixing on the forecourt.
As a stop gap, because you cannot get N.F. or similar, and you are mapped to run on it, do NOT do it if you cannot monitor knock and AFR and preferably EGTs, unless of course you can afford rebuilds regularly.

 

I am using one gallon of metanol per tank = 8%, (may have to increase it to 10% !), and 100% methanol injection (instead of water !!).
So you save on buying 1 gal of optimax (£4), but pay about £7 for the methanol, so it costs £3 per tank.
Stan

 

Could you use industrial methylated spirits which is ethanol and 5% methanol as an addative for water injection ?

Mark A

 

Why bother with that piffly 106 when you can buy 112 RON on line? Just added a 55 litre pail to my basket....£151.58.....for a tankfull

 

Much more of this chat and Bush will be round to Scoobynet looking for weapons of mass destruction!!!

 

well he has to find them somewhere!

 

What about using the Nitro/Methanol mix thats used for r/c engines. Would probably only work in a 2 stroke engine though but would give loads of power

 

i see my old thread has been dug out with some new ideas!

 

Methanol does not have extra oxygen to give away when it burns. The chemical formula shows this; it's a fuel and burns in the same way as petrol, i.e. it combines with atmospheric oxygen to make new products. In this case, the products are carbon dioxide and water.

CH3 - OH + O2 -----> CO2 + H2O. This isn't a balanced equation, it's just showing what goes on. NO2, or Nitrous oxide, is an unstable molecule with oxygen to give away. Nitrogen isn't very reactive; it can't hold onto oxygen very tightly; what a nitrogen atom really wants to do is join another nitrogen atom to make a stable molecule of nitrogen gas (N2). Each pair of NO2 molecules that do this have two oxygen molecules (ie four oxygen atoms) to give away towards the combustion of petrol. The energy that powers the car comes from the fact that energy is released from the hydrocarbon molecule when it is broken apart.