So I have been fielding alot of questions lately, and heard some feedback from some other FC tuners, concering the question of ancilliary injection systems. Most noticeably alcohol, alcohol/water, methanol, meth/water, and simply water. I am putting this in the 2nd gen section, because there isnt really a section for this type of thread, and I am a second gen person.

So let me start out by stating that I have a straight alcohol injection setup (it is also rated for Meth). This setup is made by Steve Chlupsa for SMC enterprises. It comprises a boost progressive delivery setup, that is set to start spray at 7 PSI, with max delivery at 15 PSI, and delivers denatured alcohol through a 10 GPH nozzle. This setup is what allows me to run around town on 100+ degree days, boosting to 17 PSI on the 91 pisswater thats available in Tucson gas pumps. So the blanket statement that over 15 PSI on pump gas cant be done is no longer accurate (although I am cheating in a way).

Water you say?

Most people say water is the answer, because it cools, and it has an infinate amount of octane (I.E. it doesnt burn, and you can compress it and it wont ignite). This makes it pretty much the ultimate knock suppressant, right? Well thats all fine and good, but the amount of water you can add to your mix is SEVERELY limited. Why? Because it doesnt burn. So you can get cooling, but I get much more cooling from alcohol. Water will allow you to run leaner mixtures, and more aggressive timing curves, but you can do all this and MORE with a straight alcohol or methanol system. Let me explain that.

Alcohol?

Alcohol, is a fuel, and coincedentally, it burns. What does that mean? I can add a TON more alcohol to the mixture AND subtract fuel to maximize the cooling effect AND the added octane (up to 110 octane ratings). So this gives me race gas octane, and on 85-100 degree days, I get 55 degree intake temps (while spraying). Some may call BS on this, but I logged it in the Haltech. I have no reason to make any of this up, if alcohol didnt work I wouldnt try to convince anyone else of that either. Now you can do a 50/50 mix if thats what you want, but why? The only reason I could think of to run 50/50 was to save the pump (Alcohol is a "DRY" fuel and is hell on pumps), but we have upper lube (Klotz) that is added to the alcohol to keep the pump happy.

So what we have is basically a power adder like nitrous, but on a much smaller scale. This adds power 3 ways. Increase in octane, cooling the charge, and power released by the alcohol itself.

Meth(anol)?

Meth is even better then alcohol because you can add EVEN MORE and get more cooling. Not too mention that there is more energy available from the fuel. Why dont I run Meth? Because its hard to get. The denatured alcohol I run is available at any hardware store. You have to get meth from a race shop.

Any drawbacks?

Sure, you run out of alcohol, you had BETTER turn the boost down, or you will pop the motor. Along that same line, whenever you add another system, you introduce another link in the chain that could possibly break. Not too mention that I now have to fill 2 tanks instead of one. But to me, the benefits of not paying 4 plus dollars a gallon for race fuel outweighs the minimal risk. I get a tank of race gas, for the price of a tank of 91 and 2 bucks worth of alcohol. This system virtually pays for itself for any of us that run at the track frequently.

So the question here is, why is everyone still hooked on water? None of the big turbo guys that use these types of systems use water, its either straight alcohol or meth.

I encourage anyone to post up thier experiences/ideas, and mods, if this is in the wrong spot, by all means move it.

Rat

 

Extremely useful thread RAT, thanks for taking the time to write this and share it with the forum.

but 3 questions still remains in my opinion...

1) Is there a low level buzzer or something to warn you your alcohol tank is almost empty? also, what kinda size this tank is??

2) what's involved in installing it? pretty straight forward or you you have to custom make everything and drill/tap manifolds etc?

3) What bracket of price are we talking about here???

 

My system, and any system worth ANYTHING is going to have a low light. My low light comes on at about 1/3 tank. Its about a 1/2 gallon tank that generally lasts up to one tank of gas, depending on how heavy your foot is.

Installation is basically straight forward. I have pictures of my setup, that I can post later in the day.

My system is considered by most to be a "High End" system, and costs $500. Basic systems can be had for 300 or so, or if you are crafty enough, you can build one!

 

I should mention one fun thing about alcohol here:

When you are spraying your exhaust will smell like POOP!

 

I dont care since there's gonna be all the ricers behind looking at my car's sexy butt

So you say it runs for the same price as a good wideband system?
do you have a link to a site that sells this stuff?

l-p

 

I only stumbled upon this post by accident, being I am a 3rd gen guy.

I run a water injection system and I just love to have the peace of mind to have that added protection. I only see a couple flaws in your post. You state that you get an increase in power because of added octane. This is false, the higher the octane fuel the less power you are going to make due to the fact higher octane fuel burns slower. Most people know this. Also, you made the statement about cooling the intake charge. This actually may happen on a very small scale, but you wont gain any noticable power from cooling the intake charge, what you do do is cool the combustion process which results in cooler eg. temps and makes it much much much less likely to detonate. The actual power gain you get is by increasing the boost or advancing the timing. Most people who run this system use it as a safety device (just like me) and dont actually tune for it, so those who run the system are more likely to result in a couple of hp loss, but it wont be much.

Overall, great post! I hope more people catch on to these systems so it can result in less posts of how rotaries are unreliable pieces of crap, or new threads that state "I just broke my motor, what do I do?".

Adam

 

www.SMCenterprises.com

As always, I recommend you call Steve and discuss your system with him. He makes them all from scratch, so custom work will cost you little or no money at all. There are many other systems out there, but I like Steve's system, and he has been in the alcohol game for a LONG LONG TIME.

 

Correct, this is a generalization. Octane itself does not yield HP, in fact in some cases it can inhibit HP. You have to tune the car to make use of the added octane rating. I will be more careful next time.

As stated, with the amount of alcohol I spray I see typical 55 degree drops in intake temps as shown on the datalog. Take that for whatever its worth, I am just posting my experiences.


Thank you sir!

 

Rat I am going to get a injection system here in the near future and I appreciate this post and the link. I might have to consider running the acohol instead of water. I might need to find out how easy it is to get in my area and if this is something i can carry a spare can or bottle of in the car while parked on a hot day. But I do like this system and if we can get 110 race fuel with 93 pump and a additive that will make my car run around on 25-30lbs of boost all day.

 

I honestly dont understand why anyone considers water anymore. I am hoping someone here can come on and make a case for water, but I wont run it.

More random notes:

When I talk about “alcohol” I mean denatured alcohol which is like 97% ethanol.



Also, about methanol. It’s highly corrosive and likes to chew up metal when left in contact with it for long periods. Hence the need to make sure the components in the system can put up with it. The SMC system IS rated for methanol.

 

Where is the actual alcohol injection going? Right before the TB? Interested to know more about the nozzles. Does it have a special nozzle to create a fine mist to help atomization like WI kits such as the aquamist?

 

I like water, 'cause water costs nothing.

Sorry, but water is a better knock suppressant than methanol with almost twice the specific heat and twice the latent heat of evaporation.

 

well the sole purpose of water injection is to prevent detonation.
it is relatively inexpensive and simple.
i don't see any advantage over alcohol/meth unless you are specifically using it as just a safety barrier, in which case water injection is the simplest way to go.
if you are tuning WITH this barrier then water doesn't do much for you.

good thread, maybe archive is in order, but yeah this info is good for any boosted car i guess, so who knows where you would post it

- Aaron

 

First J-rat nice post and appreciate the experience shared. My ? on the systems are this.

1# how do you tune for it. How do you know what is going on when you slap it on?
2# How much Klotz are you using per amount of alcohol?
3# how does the system know how much to spray per boost, and when to turn on and off?

Sorry for lame ?'s but you are prolly going to get allot of n00b ?'s in this section.

 

Damn you rat.

Your making me want Alcohol!!!

I would love to use it as a preventative device during hot *** summer days.

Actually.

I think I have one Water side example.

In a water injection you could have a dual injector setup.

One for the intake and one possibly mounted as a IC sprayer.

W/ alcohol I wouldn't feel as safe spraying that in open atmosphere near and engine(although unlikely to really do something bad).

 

Wouldn't the water instantly boil on combustion? Then doesn't it expand rapidly into a gas? Wouldn't this process give more power?

 

3) the aquamist system has an electronic control system

 

My system injects at the throttle body elbow (I have an RE Amemiya elbow). The place where you inject is somewhat up to debate, but what is universally accepted as that you do not spray before the turbo.

I am not sure what nozzle Steve uses, but I can find out.

I even stated this in my post. Water has better properties for cooling. BUT.... You cant add enough water to make much effective use of these properties. Thats where alcohol shines. YOu can spray gobs of alcohol. This increases available cooling, and adds the energy of alcohol to the mix.

Tuning is sort of an art. My tuner tuned the system for around 11.5 or so AFR, which is relatively safe on Alcohol, of course you have to reduce the amount of fuel in order to allow the alcohol to balance the mix.

Klots is used per manufacturer recommendation of about 1/2 oz per gallon.

System has an on board map sensor that (obviously) senses pressure and initiates the spray. As stated before, mine is boost dependent, and my start spray is about 7 PSI, and voltage to the pump is ramped up from 7 to 15 PSI. This ensures a nice smooth delivery without choking the motor out.

 

i remember reading something about how the conversion to steam/gas gives better volumetric effeiciency. don't know too much about that though...

- Aaron

 

Thx for your posts on my ?'s guys. Last rat you said it injects at the elbo. Now being on a stock ECU "dont know about stand alone" but the ECU will pull timing per the intake temp sensor on the elbo. Doing it this way the alcohol is not cold to pull the timing back however it cools the chamber and intake temps. Is this a efected factor in any way?

 

I, as well as history, would tend to disagree...

 

Then by all means, prove your point!

 

Cant speak intelligently on this, I dont have a stock ECU. I would imagine there is some merit to that statement though.

 

What is there to prove? Water injection's been used since the 1940's. Why would they use it if you couldn't make effective use of its properties?

There's always that classic saab example that everyone quotes, how they were limited to 14psi before the engine started detonating and after water injection were able to go up to 21psi with no problems.

If you like personal testimonials, this's from one of the guys on the 3rd gen forum, which seems to like water injection much more than us 2nd gen guys.

 

You still havent proved that water is better then alcohol. I can post testimonials for alcohol all day long.