Question for Greg T

[TheSouthsider]

Hey Greg, a few years back on the BR forums, you and I had a discussion about mixing gasoline and acetone to achieve better fuel milage, I did experiment with it, and did get positive results, but I abandoned it. Do you remeber the ratio that you told me back then? Something like 10 gal/2.5 oz? Let me know if this is close, may try to do that again. Thanks. Rob

 

[Greg T.]

Hi Robert! Good to see you here!! Yes, the ratio I settled on was 2.5 oz/10 gal. But, that may not be what your particular vehicle wants. It's a trial and error thing that is tedious at best. I would mix all my fuel in 6 gallon cans so I could get a very precise measurement, as opposed to guessing by pouring acetone into the tank and then using the pump to hope it comes out right. I would increase/decrease my measurements by 1/2 oz at a time for a month or so to check results. As a result, my 96 Bonneville was getting 41 hiway mpg @ 2.5 oz/gal.

 

[livespive]

Hmmm, I might have to try this.

 

[TheSouthsider]

I was doing my testing on a 94 silverado, 350 tbi, and I went from 11 to 17 CITY, no freeway/interstate driving using fairly close ratio. But I was filling 3 five gallon jugs each time. Got to be major pain. But results were there.

 

[TheSouthsider]

Now, I'm thinking of trading in my present vehicle for a 13 silverado 2500hd 6.0 engine. From what I have heard, the 6.0 tops out at 15, and that's babying it. Towing wise, not worried, but it would be my daily driver, close to 60 a day work week.

 

[Greg T.]

Hmmm, I might have to try this.

I haven't played with it since I got rid of the Bonneville. I have enough to mix with my truck and I don't feel like having barrels of fuel hanging around. Did have success with it, tho. But, as far as the LS series, I'm not certain what kind of results one could get. I know the acetone cools the intake charge which makes the fuel more dense, but also atomizes it much better at the same time. Better atomization leads to more complete combustion, which leads to more power, which leads to less throttle opening for the same amount of work, which leads to less fuel consumption.

 

[livespive]

Yeah, I have a 2007 Cadi SRX that I might try it on that I use to drive out of town for work.
So are a lot of the additives in the stores acetone base with cleaners added?

I haven't played with it since I got rid of the Bonneville. I have enough to mix with my truck and I don't feel like having barrels of fuel hanging around. Did have success with it, tho. But, as far as the LS series, I'm not certain what kind of results one could get. I know the acetone cools the intake charge which makes the fuel more dense, but also atomizes it much better at the same time. Better atomization leads to more complete combustion, which leads to more power, which leads to less throttle opening for the same amount of work, which leads to less fuel consumption.

 

[Greg T.]

Yeah, I have a 2007 Cadi SRX that I might try it on that I use to drive out of town for work.
So are a lot of the additives in the stores acetone base with cleaners added?

I'm not up on the off the shelf additives. I have my own mix for my truck to bring it to 96 octane because I refuse to buy year old race gas at 8 bux a gallon. And getting my fuel at the airport is a total pain in the ass. This, along with a couple other things work very well.

 

[jim]

Greg, some guy on BR was looking for you...

 

[Greg T.]

He found me. "SouthSider"

 

[TheSouthsider]

That was me.
So Greg, you can alter octane also,aye?

 

[Greg T.]

That was me.
So Greg, you can alter octane also,aye?

Absolutely. There are a multitude of additives out there. Some better than others. What I have found is that Aces IV is about the best @ $90.00/pint because you only need about an ounce or two for 15 gallons. I found it much easier to mix the Klotz because you mix per gallon rather that per 10 gal, or per 15 gal. Klotz is $50.00/ gal, and I can mix 2 ounces per gallon of 91 to make 96 octane. That means a gallon will last me 64 gallons of fuel. Much cheaper than race fuel OR avgas.

 

[TheSouthsider]

I see. I would bet bracket racers would definatly benefit from mixing thier own fuel over the long term. A good friend who ran figure 8's, would by leaded 100 octane by 55 gal drum. I think he was paying 450.00,early 2000's

 

[Greg T.]

I see. I would bet bracket racers would definatly benefit from mixing thier own fuel over the long term. A good friend who ran figure 8's, would by leaded 100 octane by 55 gal drum. I think he was paying 450.00,early 2000's

Yeah, pretty pricey. Even avgas low lead has a lot more lead than our old leaded fuel had. I used to pay $5.30/gal for that but that's not the best choice because it is formulated with much smaller molecules and is designed to be most efficient at 3500 RPM. So cruising around town it's running pretty rich because you get more fuel running thru the same sized jets. At 6k it leans out. So that's why I started mixing the Klotz with alky-free 91 to make about 96 or 97. Seems to be working well.

 

[livespive]

So do you mix acetone with you Klotz? Or just one or the other with you "special" ingredients
Or is the Klotz now in place of the acetone?
Also where are you getting straight acetone from? I know you aren't using nail polish remover.
I didn't know if it was a chemical store, or even a beauty shop.

Thanks,

Absolutely. There are a multitude of additives out there. Some better than others. What I have found is that Aces IV is about the best @ $90.00/pint because you only need about an ounce or two for 15 gallons. I found it much easier to mix the Klotz because you mix per gallon rather that per 10 gal, or per 15 gal. Klotz is $50.00/ gal, and I can mix 2 ounces per gallon of 91 to make 96 octane. That means a gallon will last me 64 gallons of fuel. Much cheaper than race fuel OR avgas.

 

[Greg T.]

So do you mix acetone with you Klotz? Or just one or the other with you "special" ingredients
Or is the Klotz now in place of the acetone?
Also where are you getting straight acetone from? I know you aren't using nail polish remover.
I didn't know if it was a chemical store, or even a beauty shop.

Thanks,

None of the above . My daily driver was what I used the acetone in, and you can get it from nearly any hardware store. Be sure it's 100% with nothing added. I use the Klotz to get mid 90s octane for my hot rod which is running well over 11:1 SCR and 9.80 DCR. Two different animals.

 

[livespive]

Funny that you mention 11:1....

My Cadi is about 10.5:1, and I happened to catch a comment from Klotz:

Use octane
index A.K.I. and R+M/2. Octane Booster is effective in inverse ratios to the octane level of the
base gasoline

Now just a WAG, do I need to be running about 100 octane?

Now trying to figure this.....

I see the RON MON and how they make up the AKI, but not quite sure where the compression comes in....

The comment by Klutz said inverse ratios, so if the R+M/2 is 93 (base gas octane), and 1/10.5 is 9.52%
is it saying that I need to increase by another 9.5 numbers for a total of 102.5?

Just seeing if I get this stuff, and like you said, us engineers need heroes too

None of the above . My daily driver was what I used the acetone in, and you can get it from nearly any hardware store. Be sure it's 100% with nothing added. I use the Klotz to get mid 90s octane for my hot rod which is running well over 11:1 SCR and 9.80 DCR. Two different animals.

 

[Greg T.]

Funny that you mention 11:1....

My Cadi is about 10.5:1, and I happened to catch a comment from Klotz:

Use octane
index A.K.I. and R+M/2. Octane Booster is effective in inverse ratios to the octane level of the
base gasoline

Now just a WAG, do I need to be running about 100 octane?

Now trying to figure this.....

I see the RON MON and how they make up the AKI, but not quite sure where the compression comes in....

The comment by Klutz said inverse ratios, so if the R+M/2 is 93 (base gas octane), and 1/10.5 is 9.52%
is it saying that I need to increase by another 9.5 numbers for a total of 102.5?

Just seeing if I get this stuff, and like you said, us engineers need heroes too

No, Klotz is not the best at explaining octane requirements. They get it, they DO it right, but when it comes to verbiage...........not so much. R+M/2 is what you see on the pump and is the industry standard. The auto mfgs will never release a production vehicle that requires race gas. They ALL MUST be able to run on whatever horse piss gas is being sold BumFuck Idaho. The thing is, most people have no clue about octane vs compression ratio. SCR (static compression ratio) is calculated by using total combustion chamber volume, bore, and stroke. It does not take into consideration the fact that the valves do not always close at BDC, so you're not really using the full stroke to compress the A/F mix. Let's say you have a 3.5" stroke, If the intake valve doesn't close until the piston is 1/4" up the bore, you now have an effective 3.25" stroke,. They also do not take valve overlap into account when calculating. To get the spent gasses out (scavenging) the intake and exh valves are both open for a time simultaneously. They do that to let the exhaust help pull in the fresh A/F mix. BUT, this also bleeds of cylinder pressure. When you take all these figures (calculated via cam specs) you arrive at your DCR (dynamic compression ratio). DCR is what you need to calculate your octane needs. Not ENTIRELY, because I didn;t even get into the deck height and quench area. The tighter the quench, the less chances of detonation. Anyhow, to sum it up, DCR can easily be manipulated by changing the valve time and events. If one was to use the right cam, you could easily and safely run a 14:1 motor on 89 octane. This is done by manipulating the valve events to end up with a DCR of say, 7.5:1 or so. Since I calculated and designed my own cam, I kept my DCR high to preserve gobs of low end torque because it's a street machine. Now, how do the mfgs get away with adding boost to an already 10:1 motor? They're using VVT (variable valve timing) to manipulate the DCR. I don't know the year of your Caddy, but it has to be 91 octane safe.

 

[TheSouthsider]

Live, usually where I picked up acetone was usually in the auto body section of the local napa. 100% only.
Or I suppose where paint thinners at a H.D. or Menards

 

[livespive]

Cool,

It's a 2007, and it is supposed to run on premium.

So I guess my main question is (seeing as I am an engineer that likes numbers and like to mess things up )
Is there a formula for figuring out the missing amount of octane you need?

Example

If you the octane number from the pump, and then say you find you compression ratio, or if you are in the process of doing work on it
you calculate it, is there something that say that for this vehicle at this compression ratio needs this octane to maintain this compression ratio? Or is it really trial and error with a ballpark figure?

I'm just kind of obsessed with numbers.

Never figured I would be on a bowling site learning about cars Thanks for your time, instead just buying the raffle tickets, I'll have to make my way up there

No, Klotz is not the best at explaining octane requirements. They get it, they DO it right, but when it comes to verbiage...........not so much. R+M/2 is what you see on the pump and is the industry standard. The auto mfgs will never release a production vehicle that requires race gas. They ALL MUST be able to run on whatever horse piss gas is being sold BumFuck Idaho. The thing is, most people have no clue about octane vs compression ratio. SCR (static compression ratio) is calculated by using total combustion chamber volume, bore, and stroke. It does not take into consideration the fact that the valves do not always close at BDC, so you're not really using the full stroke to compress the A/F mix. Let's say you have a 3.5" stroke, If the intake valve doesn't close until the piston is 1/4" up the bore, you now have an effective 3.25" stroke,. They also do not take valve overlap into account when calculating. To get the spent gasses out (scavenging) the intake and exh valves are both open for a time simultaneously. They do that to let the exhaust help pull in the fresh A/F mix. BUT, this also bleeds of cylinder pressure. When you take all these figures (calculated via cam specs) you arrive at your DCR (dynamic compression ratio). DCR is what you need to calculate your octane needs. Not ENTIRELY, because I didn;t even get into the deck height and quench area. The tighter the quench, the less chances of detonation. Anyhow, to sum it up, DCR can easily be manipulated by changing the valve time and events. If one was to use the right cam, you could easily and safely run a 14:1 motor on 89 octane. This is done by manipulating the valve events to end up with a DCR of say, 7.5:1 or so. Since I calculated and designed my own cam, I kept my DCR high to preserve gobs of low end torque because it's a street machine. Now, how do the mfgs get away with adding boost to an already 10:1 motor? They're using VVT (variable valve timing) to manipulate the DCR. I don't know the year of your Caddy, but it has to be 91 octane safe.