Other fuels and stuff.

[kneegrow]

I was having a think about different things to do with fuelling.

1. With a blown engine, Hydrogen Peroxide injection. This generally undergoes free radical decomposition and has a large oxygen content like water. It would act as a mild octane booster whilst the associated water would act as a coolant to further supress detonation at higher boosts. (This is as a change to water injection).

2. Running a car on Hydrogen Peroxide and Hydrazine as a pseudo 2 stroke with NO carbs and 2 injectors per cylinder. The cam would be set up so that the exhaust valves (both inlet and outlet) are timed to open before BDC. These would both be exhausts (because you would need it) my logic being that Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2) and Hydrazine (N2H2) would be injectable where upon they would instantly react forming Nitrogen and 2 lots of steam at very high temperature. As the power strokes are doubled, the engine could be made to produce serious welly. In fact easily class winning welly. PLUS the products of combustion are completely eco-friendly).

They are the 2 points I am interested in discussing.
However I have a few more mad ideas about octane boosters/shed made avgas, etc.

What do you think? stu

[deltaf]

I think youre completely insane...........i like it!
Do tell more!

[Fatboy]

Hydrazine as an environmentally nice fuel?

Utterly bonkers - but it has merit

Top fuel dragsters run a nitromethane/methanol mix, which has much the same (if not better) properties of a Hydrazine/hydrogen peroxide mix (which incidentally has been used as rocket fuel).

Another potential fuel would be cubane - but it's a) very expensive and b) really unpleasant to work with. Apparently it was used in top fuel dragsters for a while - if you want to see bizarre fuels, look at top fuel dragsters

[kneegrow]

Ok, will do. I thought that Hydrazine/Hydrogen Peroxide was one of the most exothermic reactions per volume of stuff. Do you have any references for the alternative fuel stuff. Sod it being expensive. Make it in the shed!!!!

stu (will be back with some more ideas)

[kneegrow]

I would be stoked if you could find some info as all I could find were Nitro/Methanol mix stuff.

I would also be interested in contacting anyone who knows a fuels chemist.......(I'm a chemist too)

stu

[cptsideways]

Used to run a water injection system with Methanol on a turbo car. Then looked in the big book of automotive engineering for soemthing slightly better. Found it in Boots of all places....

Surgical Spirit!, it has some interesting propoerties that are rather suited to the job.

[plipton]

What about boring old fashioned Avgas? Much easier to get hold of - loads of the stuff lurking at your local airport (the PPL guys buy bucket loads of it).

IIRC the low lead stuff is about 105 octane and has more lead than a vey lead-like thing, it's cheaper than petrol and apart from having to de-cat (which I'm sure you could manage) has no serious disadvantages.

Not as interesting to talk about down the pub as your idea though!!

[Fatboy]

plipton said:

What about boring old fashioned Avgas? Much easier to get hold of - loads of the stuff lurking at your local airport (the PPL guys buy bucket loads of it). IIRC the low lead stuff is about 105 octane and has more lead than a vey lead-like thing, it's cheaper than petrol and apart from having to de-cat (which I'm sure you could manage) has no serious disadvantages. Not as interesting to talk about down the pub as your idea though!!

Well, if you're going to be conventional, , and can get your hands on toluene, use regular unleaded and toluene in a 9:1 mix should give you 110+ octane fuel that won't kill your cats. As a side note I should probably point out that toluene is fairly unpleasant stuff (carcinogenic, serious pollutant etc) but you shouldn't worry about that when you see the dyno readings

[kneegrow]

I think there is a catch. Benzene/Toluene/Xylene are often quoted in books as being 118 octane. I think this is RON instead of MON. I know for one it kills leaded fuels performance as does unleaded (contains benzene). What we need are "Paraffinic" petrols (LRP) to start leading. Do we have those in the UK? My thought so far have been taking the benzene out of unleaded for my "shed leaded" or using "brush thinners" for an "aromatic brew" this is the Toluene/xylene mix which is discoloured, hence cheap. I have no recollection which book it is in but I think the Paint Thinners as an octane booster isn't quite as great.........do carry on.

Anyone know where I can get some good books on fuels. I have yet to find one and have looked bigtime.

I was toying with the idea of using dissolved low volume polystyrene in de-benzened unleaded at about 1:4. A couple of trials on "the donk" seemed to pay off quite well. I was trying to get my head around running high carbon fuels with an extra oxygen source, hydrogen peroxide or NOS. Seeing how that went.

The point being, there must be an achievable, cheap additive to fuel to enable more power to be developed. Forget paying over the odds for race fuel!!

Hopefully I will have a good engine/water dyno set up soon to try ideas.
stu

[Fatboy]

kneegrow said:

I think there is a catch. Benzene/Toluene/Xylene are often quoted in books as being 118 octane. I think this is RON instead of MON. I know for one it kills leaded fuels performance as does unleaded (contains benzene). What we need are "Paraffinic" petrols (LRP) to start leading.

So what you're saying is that aromatics basically screw up the way that lead works in the engine? I thought lead was just an octane booster with lubricating properties, therefore finding an alternative octane booster (such as toluene) and using other additives for lubrication would do the trick?

How does it kill the lead's properties, as AFAIK aromatics don't coordinate well to group 14 metals?

kneegrow said:

Do we have those in the UK? My thought so far have been taking the benzene out of unleaded for my "shed leaded" or using "brush thinners" for an "aromatic brew" this is the Toluene/xylene mix which is discoloured, hence cheap. I have no recollection which book it is in but I think the Paint Thinners as an octane booster isn't quite as great.........do carry on. Anyone know where I can get some good books on fuels. I have yet to find one and have looked bigtime. I was toying with the idea of using dissolved low volume polystyrene in de-benzened unleaded at about 1:4. A couple of trials on "the donk" seemed to pay off quite well. I was trying to get my head around running high carbon fuels with an extra oxygen source, hydrogen peroxide or NOS. Seeing how that went. The point being, there must be an achievable, cheap additive to fuel to enable more power to be developed. Forget paying over the odds for race fuel!! Hopefully I will have a good engine/water dyno set up soon to try ideas. stu

Afraid I don't knw of any good books on fuels but will look into it at the uni bookshop...

Another idea that's just come to me is perhaps use nitro ethanol (nitrated ethanol if I've got the terminology wrong) as an additive - top fuel dragsters run a nitromethane/methnol mix, so it's got to be good stuff. Nitro ethanol would have a high oxygen to carbon ratio, and should give one hell of a boost to the specific power of the fuel, plus it's easy to make from meths and nitrating mix If you're feeling really brave/daft you could try adding nitroglycerine, but I wouldn't fancy making it at home

[kneegrow]

Well, I think the aromatics delocalise the free radicals which are formed when TEL breaks down. This means that the time of the reactions caused by their presence are longer hence the stuff is less significant. I think the TEL breaks down into 4 ethyl radicals which each start a free radical decomposition of the fuel molecules which react with the oxygen more readily. I have also heard that lead helps smooth the flamefront and causes the stuff to burn more thoroughly and slower (less explosively, which is a good thing). The lead itself is liable to react with products unless a "mopper upper" is there. These products clog up the valves and cause mayhem. Ethylene Dibromide is used to form Lead Bromide which then exits via vapour from the engine. The big product on the market is "Tetraboost" which allegedly consists of TEL in a solution of "Aromatic Hydrocarbons" I find this very strange. I wonder if they have thought it through. They call octane results above 100 MON "Performance Numbers" and I quote an old book calling this "Lead Response" (probably an old term) Aromatics are said to reduce the "Lead Response" hence.........

Iso-octane (cant remember the IUPAC name) is the best stuff for lead response and I think you can get 160 octane with 4% TEL/EDB added. That is as good as it gets.

I had a read somewhere about drag fuels and the problem is the combustion products/space getting too hot. The alcohol burns cool and the explosive (Nitro Methane) burns hot. I suppose there is a limit to this as you will always have to quench the heat of an improved explosive. So dragsters are running on the limit of the engines reliability with their fuels and can quite easily go over it with 'Nitro' and so there isn't much point in researching anything else right now.

However, Nitromethane doesn't do storage and so it might be worth looking at something which does. Picric acid for instance. (Might make some gnarly salts with tank/carb components though)Picric acid is also pretty straight forward to make. As for people running cubane and things like that, I assume this is just for some bizzare straight hydrocarbon contest as you would be able to achieve very similar results to that of nitro.

I am primarily concerned with something I can make in my shed. TEL/EDB is possible allthough I haven't managed to get my own glassware at the moment. The recipe is pretty straight forward. You make a sodium lead alloy and then react that with chloroethane. (Sodium electrolysed from salt) Chloroethane is a common refridgerant (was). The ethylene dibromide is more complicated. I havent thought about the synthesis yet. Might involve acetylene. As an inorganic chemist it has been a while since I played with all things carbon based.

stu

[Fatboy]

kneegrow said:

Well, I think the aromatics delocalise the free radicals which are formed when TEL breaks down. This means that the time of the reactions caused by their presence are longer hence the stuff is less significant.

So the aromatics are basically acting as 'radical sinks' and hence messing up the working of the lead - I see...

kneegrow said:

I think the TEL breaks down into 4 ethyl radicals which each start a free radical decomposition of the fuel molecules which react with the oxygen more readily. I have also heard that lead helps smooth the flamefront and causes the stuff to burn more thoroughly and slower (less explosively, which is a good thing).

That's what I remember from along time back as well - reduces the chances of premature ignition and hence knocking IIRC?

kneegrow said:

The lead itself is liable to react with products unless a "mopper upper" is there. These products clog up the valves and cause mayhem. Ethylene Dibromide is used to form Lead Bromide which then exits via vapour from the engine.

Didn't know lead products fouled up the engine - though it stuck to and hence lubricated the valves?

kneegrow said:

The big product on the market is "Tetraboost" which allegedly consists of TEL in a solution of "Aromatic Hydrocarbons" I find this very strange. I wonder if they have thought it through.

Does sound like typical marketing bollocks, going from your explanation above it'd be a pretty pointless booster

kneegrow said:

They call octane results above 100 MON "Performance Numbers" and I quote an old book calling this "Lead Response" (probably an old term) Aromatics are said to reduce the "Lead Response" hence......... Iso-octane (cant remember the IUPAC name) is the best stuff for lead response and I think you can get 160 octane with 4% TEL/EDB added. That is as good as it gets.

IIRC the RON number is calculated from the comparison to the burn rate of iso-octane (set at 100 RON) by gas chromatography, though I'd have to ask an analytical chemist

kneegrow said:

I had a read somewhere about drag fuels and the problem is the combustion products/space getting too hot. The alcohol burns cool and the explosive (Nitro Methane) burns hot. I suppose there is a limit to this as you will always have to quench the heat of an improved explosive. So dragsters are running on the limit of the engines reliability with their fuels and can quite easily go over it with 'Nitro' and so there isn't much point in researching anything else right now. However, Nitromethane doesn't do storage and so it might be worth looking at something which does. Picric acid for instance. (Might make some gnarly salts with tank/carb components though)Picric acid is also pretty straight forward to make. As for people running cubane and things like that, I assume this is just for some bizzare straight hydrocarbon contest as you would be able to achieve very similar results to that of nitro.

Picric acid being trinitro-phenol? dead easy to make IIRC

kneegrow said:

I am primarily concerned with something I can make in my shed. TEL/EDB is possible allthough I haven't managed to get my own glassware at the moment. The recipe is pretty straight forward. You make a sodium lead alloy and then react that with chloroethane. (Sodium electrolysed from salt) Chloroethane is a common refridgerant (was). The ethylene dibromide is more complicated. I havent thought about the synthesis yet. Might involve acetylene. As an inorganic chemist it has been a while since I played with all things carbon based. stu

I'm a theoretical (computational) inorganic chemist myself, so my organic chemistry is even rustier (and my practical synthetic chemistry is pretty much extinct)
I do miss being able to liberate neccessary chemicals from the labs, but they tend to question why computational chemists check out chemicals here

edited to add
While I remember, I'll nip off ad have a look in the uni bookstore for fuels chemistry books.

Something they have out here in canada is ethanol blended gasoline, has a rating of 92 octane (the north american one, which is that odd average value of RON and MON), and I remember reading a few years ago that ethanol has as good anti-knock properties as benzene - so perhaps an ethanol/gasoline based fuel?


>> Edited by Fatboy on Wednesday 3rd March 21:34