Water / Methanol Injection used with Carbureted Engines

[wikd69]

Ok, so who is using a water/methanol system with their carbureted engines ? I'm considering looking at this technology for use with my blower motor but want to find out more about it and get feedback from others.

I obviously don't know much about it but as I understand, you can use a plate under your carb and inject a water/methanol mixture in with your fuel/air flow and gain both horsepower and a cooler running engine at the same time.

Anybody out there with knowledge or experience with this stuff ?

[sc racing]

Thats pretty old stuff I havent seen it in over 10 years. Have you ever thought of switching to E85. Thats my next move.

[wikd69]

Thats pretty old stuff I havent seen it in over 10 years. Have you ever thought of switching to E85. Thats my next move.

I don't know about this being old, most of what I'm seeing is new technology, much of it oriented to use of MAF and other EMS sensors. I've been out looking at Snow and their offerings - they look pretty good.

http://www.snowperformance.net/index.php

I'm not really interested in E85- I'm not after cheaper or cleaner, but rather more horsepower with cooler intake temps.

[sc racing]

I never saw that before it does seam much better that the old Holley water inj I was thinking of. On the E85 stuff it will produce more power because you can run higher boost levels without detonation its around 110 octane rating but the Snow setup looks like it will do what you want.Im looking into the E85 as I have a 9.8:1 motor that I might spray or put some kind of forced induction on it but Im just a little about what I want to do.

[wikd69]

I never saw that before it does seam much better that the old Holley water inj I was thinking of. On the E85 stuff it will produce more power because you can run higher boost levels without detonation its around 110 octane rating but the Snow setup looks like it will do what you want.Im looking into the E85 as I have a 9.8:1 motor that I might spray or put some kind of forced induction on it but Im just a little about what I want to do.

Yeah, starting with 9.8 to 1 compression and adding a blower will quickly put you in detonation land if you're not careful. Maybe looking at a turbo would be a better approach for you. To my understanding, turbos are a little gentler in terms of boost curve and resulting pressure. You don't get the 'instant on' you would with a roots or pro-charger style supercharger, but you would get the benefit of having a power-adder. Combine that with one of the new water/methanol injection systems tied into your more modern engine mgmt system might give you a pretty nice result.

I've not really paid any attention to the E85 stuff. My blower setup is pretty sensitive to changes in fuel / octane, and I'm pretty wary of unanticipated changes in run states with rich/lean conditions.

[sc68z28]

Harry, I can't respond to carb/roots blower application, but my deal really liked the meth kit I just installed.

Mine sprays pure methanol, no water, water does not burn and displaces air (JMHO).

I'm injecting after the blower, lowered my intake air temps over 100 degrees

The, water vs water/meth vs meth is discussed here...
http://web.camaross.com/forums/showthread.php?t=491444
Both sides have good arguments

I've only made 2 passes with the alky on, so I can't say for sure, but of the 4/10th improvement in ET I'd say most of the increase was from the alky .
My car really came alive !! Almost 5 mph improvement.

---Bill.

[wikd69]

Harry, I can't respond to carb/roots blower application, but my deal really liked the meth kit I just installed.

Mine sprays pure methanol, no water, water does not burn and displaces air (JMHO).

I'm injecting after the blower, lowered my intake air temps over 100 degrees

The, water vs water/meth vs meth is discussed here...
http://web.camaross.com/forums/showthread.php?t=491444
Both sides have good arguments

I've only made 2 passes with the alky on, so I can't say for sure, but of the 4/10th improvement in ET I'd say most of the increase was from the alky .
My car really came alive !! Almost 5 mph improvement.

---Bill.

Holy moley !!! 4 tenths ? wow !! Bill, whose injection system did you use, and does it integrate into your EFI system ? The only sophistication I have on my rig is the MSD Digital6+ box and it doesn't figure into the equation here. My concern will be to adapt the injection system to my blower motor in such a way that it enhances the current power curve (not really a curve with a blown BBC, more like a power cliff ) without causing problems in my fuel/air ratio mix throughout.

If I do this, my thought is to modify my carb-blower-adapter plate and add injectors there - 1 on either side under each carb (4 total) should provide a good even spread and help chill the air intake significantly while adding the methanol to the equation. I've been looking at Snow Performance, they offer quite an assortment of systems, designed to fit both EFI and non-EFI engine combos (diesel as well). There's still a lot of unmapped territory around my neighborhood (conventionally blown carbureted engines) but I think I can tweak things to make this work. It's hard to imagine gaining that much of a horsepower increase with the Camaro - it's a real beast as it is - adding more on-call grunt would really be icing on the cake :) Yeehaw !!!!!!!

[vegaracer]

This system is pretty neat. Its progressively controlled based off of boost.
http://www.alcohol-injection.com/water- ... -2-12.html

[sc68z28]

, whose injection system did you use, and does it integrate into your EFI system ?

I'm using Julio's kit from http://www.alkycontrol.com/
It stands alone, but takes it's boost signal from the EFI's MAP sensor.

Keep me posted if you do this, I have a buddy (6-71) that will be interested if you can get it working.

---Bill.

[wikd69]

, whose injection system did you use, and does it integrate into your EFI system ?

I'm using Julio's kit from http://www.alkycontrol.com/
It stands alone, but takes it's boost signal from the EFI's MAP sensor.

Keep me posted if you do this, I have a buddy (6-71) that will be interested if you can get it working.

---Bill.

Thank you for the info :)

Interesting product line. How did you settle on that vendor ? Did you have to 'recurve' thier system after installation ? I like the way they approached ramping the feed up to match absolute pressure in the manifold instead of stepping it. Very clean. I wonder if they have customers with the sort of old school setup I have. You would think so - my blown BBC setup is prolly common as dirt and just as challenging.

Is your MAP sensor an electric sending unit ? If all I need do is plumb in a new sensor, mount some hardware and run some plumbing, then it should be pretty straightforward to get running. The toughest part will be to get the tune just right, in terms of jets and shooters for the carb along with timing. That's an area I've not done a whole lot with yet, settling with degreeing my cam, running lots of advance and getting my carbs tuned to the point I won't hurt the motor under WOT. If adding this water/methanol kit will give me a bit more power *and* cool things down a bit, that would be a winner. I'm thinking that at a minimum I'll need to add an AFR setup to help me gather metrics on fuel / air mix. I don't know otherwise how to determine the proper jetting, etc., etc.

Which raises another question - does the introduction of alcohol (and/or water) degrade or otherwise inhibit the AFR measurement / mechanism ? I would assume that since AFR is really a measure of how much free oxygen is in the exhaust, anything upstream of that is moot. But having never used anything more exotic than boost referenced power valves, I don't know much. I'm an old hammer-mechanic and all this more advanced stuff is new to me.

[sc68z28]

How did you settle on that vendor ?
Did you have to 'recurve' thier system after installation ?
Is your MAP sensor an electric sending unit ?
I'll need to add an AFR setup to help me gather metrics on fuel / air mix. I don't know otherwise how to determine the proper jetting, etc., etc.
Which raises another question - does the introduction of alcohol (and/or water) degrade or otherwise inhibit the AFR measurement / mechanism ? I would assume that since AFR is really a measure of how much free oxygen is in the exhaust, anything upstream of that is moot.

I looked at Snow, DevelsOwn, and others. AlkyControl has a great rep all over the net and is almost exclusively used by the guys over on the turbo Buick forum. Those guys are doing amazing things with there 6 bangers, 25+ psi boost, and pump gas I like the idea that Julio sets up his pump to spray pure meth or both W/M, and his progressive controller is the hot ticket .

I'm still on his basic tune, haven't had time to tweek on it.

The GM MAP sensor most often used with EFI needs a 5 volt sorce, sends a 0 to 5 volt signal. Julio may have a way to do all this anything is possible.

For tunning, I really use the O2 sensing and data logging (comes with EFI) and you are right about oxygen in exhaust, the O2 sensor does not care what you burn, it only looks at O2. But it does not like lead, I use VP 103 unleaded.

---Bill.