Methanol....whats is about?

[vegabass]

What do you know about Methanol?

Used in controlled conditions EG race track and so forth....

useful opinions please.

[vegabass]

No one has any useful info?

[FPV GT]

Methanol can corrode older style fuel lines, and the plastic floats that some carbies employ.

Regards
Paul

[nugget378]

Runs alot cooler than petrol, gets used twice as quick so fuel system must be bigger, need high comp or boost to be worthwhile

[Martyvan]

Methanol is the fuel that Indy Cars use. Very clean burning and VERY high octane rating according to the third link. 140+ is possible (apparantly).

I think it is mostly based on ethanol (or even a variation of eth), so is actually quite an environmentally friendly fuel..... But it would more than likely be very corrosive as a 100% fuel. Brazil is the highest user of ethanol in the world, and they have 85% ethanol blend in their fuel.

Fuel consumption and BHP if tuned correctly will provide more power for less consumption. fuel lines/pumps on most current cars will corrode with a greater than 5% ethanol mix. (maybe even a slightly lower eth mix)

Opinion: Make say 25% ethanol standard in the fuel in say 10-15 years. Slowly increasing over time, similar to emissions standards. As Ethanol is a) cheaper and b) cleaner.

Which makes me wonder how Shell's optimax Extreme is more expensive, as it has a 5% ethanol content, which should realistically make it cheaper to manufacture.

Go Figure,

Marty


Methanol 1

Methanol 2

Methanol 3

[FLUB378]

As stated above you use 2.25 times the volume of methanol as you do petrol. The maintenence on a car running methanol is also alot higher. After every meeting I change the oil and filter as alot of methanol washes down the bores and gets into the sump, when used in a drag situation the engine and oil doesn't get hot enough to evaporate the methanol. I definately recommend (through experience) using the VP fuels additive M2 as it lubricates the pump , lines, regs and carby to slow down the corrosion. It has a candy scent that masks the fumes from the exhaust so you don't get the watery eyes or "methanol Fumes vomit". Through mates experience even in a low compression engine the use of methanol alone won't increase horsepower bit will increase torque. Too many more bits of info but I will send you a pm with my number if you want to find out more.

[bwhinnen]

What would you like to know?

RON - 105-115
MON - 89-91
Heat Energy - 9,800 Btu/lb
Latent Heat of Evaporation - 472 Btu/lb
Weight - 8 lb/gal

Methanol has a higher latent heat of evap when compared with petrol (472 compared to around 135), this means that it takes more heat to convert it from a liquid to a gas. Why is this important? Because it can effectively draw more heat from surrounding areas within the combustion chamber, ie inlet tract, valves, piston crown etc. This helps by ensuring that the intake charge is cooler (not as much heat in the surrounding area) and therefore denser (more oxygen molecules per volume).

Moving onto the tuning aspect, less heat in the intake charge means it will burn slower, this in turn means that you can advance the timing significantly without risk of detonation. Taking into account the old rule, timing = power.

Now we move to fueling, take a nominal 13 - 13.5:1 AFR for fuel as the so-called optimal mixture for maximum power (varies from engine to engine and application to application, a forced induction motor is usually in the vicinity of 12 - 12.5:1), Methanol like to be much richer at around the 5 - 5.5:1 mark in an NA environment (roughly). Great, but what does this mean? Take the Heat energy of the methanol, 9800Btu/lb compared to the heat energy of fuel which is about 19000Btu/lb, oh well methonal looses out, having less energy. No, take this into account, 13.5 / 5.5 = the ratio, 2.45, now we times the heat energy of methanol by this to get how much energy we have in comparison to petrol, 9800 x 2.45 = 24055Btu/lb that is a 27% increase over petrol, so much more energy.

This is all really good, why don't we use it all the time?

i) We are burning more than twice the amount of fuel, oops we need a fuel system capable of sustaining that flow, not even taking into the equation the costs associated and weight.

ii) Methanol is poisonous, it can form formaldehyde when it oxidises.

iii) it has a scouring effect on fuel lines, tanks and components, releasing residues that can block jets and injectors.

iv) Soaks up huge amounts of water, this can be a godsend or really bad. Godsend because small amounts act as an anti det agent (knock inhibitor), bad because it can leave water in the engine, components and lead to rusting.

For some real world experiences in a normal car, I use methanol with water injection in my WRX, a 50/50 mix of water and methanol is injected post intercooler pre-throttle body. This is at a ratio of roughly 10 - 12% of fuel loading. Helps bring the intake charge level right down and stabalise the combustion at high boost and advanced timings (still around 12 - 12.2:1 AFR).

I'd like to thank A. Graham Bell (automotive author) for his insight into Methanol and it's uses.

Cheers
Brett

[FLUB378]

Originally Posted by Martyvan

Methanol is the fuel that Indy Cars use. Very clean burning and VERY high octane rating according to the third link. 140+ is possible (apparantly).

I think it is mostly based on ethanol (or even a variation of eth), so is actually quite an environmentally friendly fuel..... But it would more than likely be very corrosive as a 100% fuel. Brazil is the highest user of ethanol in the world, and they have 85% ethanol blend in their fuel.

Fuel consumption and BHP if tuned correctly will provide more power for less consumption. fuel lines/pumps on most current cars will corrode with a greater than 5% ethanol mix. (maybe even a slightly lower eth mix)

Opinion: Make say 25% ethanol standard in the fuel in say 10-15 years. Slowly increasing over time, similar to emissions standards. As Ethanol is a) cheaper and b) cleaner.

Which makes me wonder how Shell's optimax Extreme is more expensive, as it has a 5% ethanol content, which should realistically make it cheaper to manufacture.

Go Figure,

Marty


Methanol 1

Methanol 2

Methanol 3

METHANOL AND ETHANOL AREN"T THE SAME. METHANOL DOESN'T EMULSIFY WITH PETROLEUM BASED FUELS IN A STABLE FORM

[Martyvan]

Originally Posted by FLUB378

METHANOL AND ETHANOL AREN"T THE SAME. METHANOL DOESN'T EMULSIFY WITH PETROLEUM BASED FUELS IN A STABLE FORM

Thanks for clearing that, I was making an incredibly big assumption

But i still think Ethanol is the way to go!

[ebxr8240]

We , the gov should have tax concessions etc to help farmers and petrocompanies either grow sugar beat or cane etc to make ethanol...So we are NOT part of this world dependence on oil/petrol...Sooner or latter this is going to happen...

[vegabass]

Ok some great stuff here guys, so if you wanted to tickle your fuel.....what would you use and how much?

[GT290]

Originally Posted by Martyvan

Methanol is the fuel that Indy Cars use. Very clean burning and VERY high octane rating according to the third link. 140+ is possible (apparantly).

I think it is mostly based on ethanol (or even a variation of eth), so is actually quite an environmentally friendly fuel..... But it would more than likely be very corrosive as a 100% fuel. Brazil is the highest user of ethanol in the world, and they have 85% ethanol blend in their fuel.

Fuel consumption and BHP if tuned correctly will provide more power for less consumption. fuel lines/pumps on most current cars will corrode with a greater than 5% ethanol mix. (maybe even a slightly lower eth mix)

Opinion: Make say 25% ethanol standard in the fuel in say 10-15 years. Slowly increasing over time, similar to emissions standards. As Ethanol is a) cheaper and b) cleaner.

Which makes me wonder how Shell's optimax Extreme is more expensive, as it has a 5% ethanol content, which should realistically make it cheaper to manufacture.

Go Figure,

Marty


Methanol 1

Methanol 2

Methanol 3

You said it mate, so much for passing the saving on to the consumer. That will never hapen in this country.

[ebxr8240]

Though I'v posted this before you may find interesting...
http://www.turbomustangs.com/smf/ind...?topic=47094.0