After doing a little research, it's possible to get a a power increase of around 10-20% (with a proper map) when running a 20% meth mix. So I'll be looking at around 35 essentially free bhp to take me up to 375ish

Now a 205l barrel of meth is only £135, enough for 20 fuel-ups and works out at about 65p per litre, so you're making major savings there. From reading all this it seems like a no brainer, aside from storing the stuff of course (I live in a flat for now). Is there anything I might be missing?

 

Carrying it around in the boot and messing around in the petrol station, making sure you get your sums right when filling up, and being careful not to spill any of it on yourself, there is also the cost of mapping to add into the mix.

But if your fine with all that then hey ho happy days.

 

So far so good haha. Plus the car needs a map anyway, and the cost of meth will offset that fairly rapidly. Cheers bro!

 

Don't suppose if anyone knows if Ecutec maps are switchable on an 03 WRX?

 

The main catch is over time it will eat away at the fuel lines/tank and other associated bits and if its left in the tank for a long time in can draw in moisture, This is more of a long term issue though.

 

Cheers Gaz, that's exactly what I wanted to know. I'll weigh up the odds

 

At 20% there isn't a problem as long as you don't leave it in the tank when stood for any length of time. I don't use my car much in winter so I switch it to the V Power map when the winter starts to draw in. Carrying in the boot is a bit of a pain & when handling it you must treat it with great care as it is potentially lethal & can be absorbed through the skin, the vapours are poisonous & far more flammable than petrol. The mix is easy I just add a 5L can of Meth the tank then add 25L of VPower which is slightly less than 20% but is what it was mapped for. If you hawe twin fuel maps & Meth is a PIA just run it on VPower all the time. I personally only buy 20L barrels now as 205L of the stuff is a massive fire hazard when decanting to a 5L container.

 

I'll echo the safety points here. Methanol is extremely dangerous to your health and has a short term cumulative effect. So if your using it regularly and are in contact with liquid or vapour (ie almost certain) then you have the potential to always have methanol in your system and possibly have further effects if you get a higher exposure on occasion.

When I use it for producing bio, I pump it into a container then use a vacuum to draw it into the sealed reactor to minimise my exposure.

Tim.

 

Great, cheers for the heads up on the safety hazards gents, I'll have a diligent read up before I decide on something. 20L barrels definitely seem like the way to go.

 

It is great stuff but treat it with the ultimate respect & you will be fine. If you are remapping anyway it is BHP for free really.

 

Surprised no one mentioned that it burns with a naked flame.

Other that the already mentioned safety issues, make sure you have enough fueling capability for it.

 

It's not just the extra bhp but the extra torque you will get, and if you was getting Boost at 3500rpm with 20% meth you will get boost at about 3000 rpm
Approx 500 revs lower
But your mpg will come down, you will require a updated fuel pump,

Tax law states you are supposed to declare you are using a fuel that you have not paid tax on, and then pay the tax on that fuel.

Be careful with it and you will be fine,

Best value £ to bhp gain by far

Bez

 

For a road car definitely not worth the hassle (imho) the faffing about and health issues outweigh the potential gains. For a race car it makes more sense but I personally avoid it altogether. It's nasty stuff that made me chesty and I went from a meth map back to Vpower only. Oh the convenience of not pratting about decanting and taking ages at petrol stations.

 

I've been using it now for nearly 12 months and have experienced zero issues so far.

Bez,
Can you explain how using Meth improves boost ramp - it makes no logical sense to me and certainly something I have personally not experienced on this 2ltr engine or when I used Q16 race fuel on my previous 2.5 Cossie engine (vs VPower maps).

 

I done 22,000 continuous miles on 20% Meths.

We spoke to fuel research technicians at length regarding many issues.

Corrosion to any parts was not evident. It will only corrode some plated metals, non of which is in fuel lines, pumps etc.

I gained 65 bhp.

The only health issues are if you continuously expose you skin to neat Meths. It will eventually **** your kidneys but I am talking long term. I have splashed it on myself many times and other than your skin feeling really cold for a few seconds it's okay but not advised.

Jerry cans need to be the internal lined type for constant storage.

The most important issue regarding Meths is the way it's stored. Keep it air tight and it will be okay. Not sealing it properly will cause it to seperate in your tank from the petrol. Tests at RCM proved this.

Cheapest power gain you will ever get.

Ideal to have two maps, one for 20% and one for regular petrol.

 

Spot on buddy, I'll keep all of this in mind. Can I ask how much power you were running prior to meths to gain 65 horses? Thats impressive!

 

I'm having a meth map end of this month

 

Hi Shaun
Many years ago I was running 286bhp after After having a few mods done to the car and getting it mapped by Scoobyclinic,
I then retuned for another map for methanol, this took the power up to 306bhp
And increased torque by 40lbs up to 376
But it started making the torque about 500rpm earlier,
I was told this is could be done because the timing can be advanced earlier because of the use of meth and it been a denser fuel, and because timing is advanced earlier, boost is made quicker and torque comes in at lower rpm,

The only upgrade on this was Methanol

And I gained 20bhp

The 65bhp gain from Skullfudge might of been from a std car to a car been mapped for te first time and using methanol,

But I might be wrong on that,

Now Shaun, a question from me to you,
I am running a Gt30 at just short of 500bhp

What did you manage to get out of yours yours, it was a GT30?

Bez

 

Hi there

We run on previous engine(2.1L) 20% methanol and Water methanol injection(this we run with smallest jet)

On 20% methanol we gain 38bhp and around 40lb-ft,on WMI(Water Methanol Injection) we gain 15bhp,no gain on torque

Spool up time seems on Methanol has not improved,but we gained mainly on bhp and torque figures with same boost

If you will be running 20% methanol you will need keep ratio(fuel vs methanol) almost as same(if your car will be mapped for 20% you will need to use 20%,not you will put only 10% methanol at full tank)

With better aftermarket ECU you can use Flex fuel sensor,which is good investment to have,if you are not sure how much methanol you are putting,but this must be mapped/set etc

Best about the Flex fuel sensors is speak to Tim@JTi and yours mapper



Jura

 

Cheers for the figures Jura. How much power was the wagon making before the meth out of interest? I'll have a chat to Simon at JGM to see if it might be possible within EcuTek

 

Hi there

We made 452bhp/440lb-ft on V-power alone,490bhp/480lb-ft on V-power and 20% methanol

On 50/50 Water Methanol with smallest jet we made 465bhp/440lb-ft

Depends what car you have,if you have earlier STI/WRX you can't have two fuel maps on the EcuTek,if you have later STI/WRX you can have switchable fuel maps on the EcuTek


Jura

 

Thanks man, quite an improvement at almost 10%! I have an 03 WRX, any idea which group that falls into?

 

Hi Bez,
The more power/torque at X rpm using Meth is totally understandable but that does not always relate to boost profile/ramp as a matter of fact. This I know from personal experience. Again from my experience the increases have been down to the ability to take more ignition.

To answer your question.....
I presume you're referring to my SPEC C with the 2.5 in it?

I was running an AET Hybrid based on a 3076 core. It made 540bhp (and that was at ScoobyClinic) on straight VPower. It also made 620+bhp on Q16 fuel. Up until (afaik) last year it was the most I was aware of from a drop in standard fit GT30 sized turbo on a 2.5. Bob Rawle achieved around 555bhp on VPower with his 2.5 and LM500 last year (git lol).

 

Sadly,you can't run dual fuel maps on yours ECU via EcuTek,you can run dual fuel maps only via CarBerry ROM(Open source)


Jura