Homemade High Octane

[Kitika]

G'day fellas I was just wondering if anyone out there has/is making there own "octane booster" out of household chemicals that actually works and saves a few dollars over buying premium unleaded? I'm running a Carbed 1.3 sierra so need all the extra help i can get!
I know i'd have to advance the timing etc to get gains from the higher octane etc
So bring on the recipes:D

Cheers Kit

[trains]

Apparently napthalene flakes are the go.
Some have used napthalene balls, only to discover that they are not made of napthalene but some other gunk that didnt do anything ;) .
Old trick used by parents, and have heard of many others doing the same years ago.

T

[DGR01]

Toluene!!, also known as methylbenzene or phenylmethane!! been done for years!!! and you probably wouldn't have even known about it. SEARCH and you will find all the answers..

Toulene
R+M/2...114
Cost...$4.50/gal
Mixtures with 92 Octane Premium
10%...94.2 Octane
20%...96.4 Octane
30%...98.6 Octane

[et4wd]

Toluene!!, also known as methylbenzene or phenylmethane!! been done for years!!! and you probably wouldn't have even known about it. SEARCH and you will find all the answers..

Toulene
R+M/2...114
Cost...$4.50/gal
Mixtures with 92 Octane Premium
10%...94.2 Octane
20%...96.4 Octane
30%...98.6 Octane

Question 1, Where do ya get it?
Question 2, how much is the max recomendation? and how quick will it kill my pistons?

Ta

Steve.

[Kitika]

I've heard of xylene(spelling) being used before and I noticed it for sale at bunnings in the solvent section. I'm not sure what the added octane would be like tho... Where can you get napthalene flakes from and how much does it add to the octane? I got some Acetone to test out today and see how that goes at helping the little 1.3 along.

[M543]

Kit

Octane rating is just a measure of a fuel's resistance to detonation, not the amount of power it produces. There is an endless amount of information on the net about it so I suggest you read some of it before you get too carried away.

Be careful advancing your ignition. If you simply rotate the distributor to give it a few more degrees at idle, you will overadvance it at the top end and possibly cause detonation. LPG is a good example of this. A straight gas car could need as much as ten degrees more at idle in order to get the best out of it so the distributor has to be modified to give it a shorter but steeper advance curve.

You most likely won't advance yours that much but you could still easily go too far and damage your engine.

[Kitika]

I just did 80k's of highway driving using Premium unleaded from the same pump I usually buy from and noticed I could easily sit at 100-110kmh which in my sierra i find rather hard to do comfortably. I had added 60ml's of Acetone to my 37litre fuel tank when i filled up and it actually seemed to make a difference! I need to test it out over a larger length of time to make sure it works but if it does i may become addicted to solvents!!!!:crazy:

Thanks for the info M543, I've got my timing advanced 2 degrees and may go up another 2 but I'll keep it at safe levels since i don't wanna damage my fresh recon'ed motor

[M543]

I'll keep it at safe levels since i don't wanna damage my fresh recon'ed motor

Kit

How do you know what a safe level is? You have already added 2 degrees to its total advanve and now you are going to take it up to 4. Don't forget your ignition does not stay in the idle position, it advances as your speed increases to a predetermined maximum. The whole thing is designed so the maximum trust occurs just after top dead centre. The last thing you want is to have it occur before the piston gets to the top and that can easily happen when you start advancing the timing.

Do you also know exactly what acetone is doing to your fuel and to the engine itself? If your car is going faster then it is doing more than just raising the octane rating.

The subject of octane ratings and power has been discussed over and over again since super fuel was introduced in the 1950s. I always thought it was a stupid name to give the new fuel because it made many people mistakenly think it gave them more power. The last time I heard anyone talking about it was on Sydney radio two weeks ago when a guest motor engineer was talking about saving money on fuel. He told talkback callers they had nothing to gain by using the more expensive premimum unleaded in engines designed for ordinary unleaded.

Fuel will detonate, that is explode with a destructive shattering force on everything around it instead of burning with a controlled pushing force, whenever the temperature and pressure in the cylinders exceed the level the fuel has been designed for. When you modify an engine with all the usual things like higher compression ratios, cams. carbs etc to get more power, you will increase the temperature and cylinder pressures and need a higher octane fuel to avoid detonation. That same higher octane fuel in the standard version of the same engine is just wasted because the engine has no hope of producing the temperatures and pressures it has been designed to withstand. It most likely won't damage the engine but it won't make it go faster either.

Playing around with engines is great fun and a good hobby but do yourself a favour and study exactly how it all works and what is happening. I can assure you engine failures can be very expensive, they can happen far too easily and are not much fun.

[trains]

For information regarding acetone. which pretty much acts as a wetting agent for the fuel, which makes its combustion more efficient.
see this thread here
http://www.4wdmonthly.com.au/forum/showthread.php?t=52862

Trains

As far as advancing your ign timing, I would suggest you learn what it does, how it affects the motor, and then make an informed decision on getting a regraphed dizzy and dyno tune to do it correctly.
Well thats what I did.

Trains

[Brillo]

i would strongly advise staying the hell away from methylbenzine / toulenne this shit is real bad joojoo for your HEALTH it is a known carcernigen ( causes cancer ) will affect your respitory system, skin allergies , burn your eyes (retina) ,affect your central nervious system . As a firefighter this is treated as a classified chemical and haz chem incident if its involved , we wear protective clothes breathing apparatus all the shit . I moved to a new house recently and myself the wife and my young children started to get rashes my 4 yo got migraines a rash and vomiting sent to hospital after 2 weeks ,2yo daughter breathing problems and rash well you get the picture . GUESS what i found under the house a 20LTR DRUM OF METHYLBENZINE TOULENNE wih the lid off :mad: . the fumes were enough to affect veryone in the house . I contacted te EPA and they were not impressed either was the land lord when the epa got hold of her. i got the drum removed and no moe probs at the house . the moral to this rant JUST BE CAREFUL WHAT U PLAY WITH and read the caution label:)

[et4wd]

i would strongly advise staying the hell away from methylbenzine / toulenne this shit is real bad joojoo for your HEALTH it is a known carcernigen ( causes cancer ) will affect your respitory system, skin allergies , burn your eyes (retina) ,affect your central nervious system . As a firefighter this is treated as a classified chemical and haz chem incident if its involved , we wear protective clothes breathing apparatus all the shit . I moved to a new house recently and myself the wife and my young children started to get rashes my 4 yo got migraines a rash and vomiting sent to hospital after 2 weeks ,2yo daughter breathing problems and rash well you get the picture . GUESS what i found under the house a 20LTR DRUM OF METHYLBENZINE TOULENNE wih the lid off :mad: . the fumes were enough to affect veryone in the house . I contacted te EPA and they were not impressed either was the land lord when the epa got hold of her. i got the drum removed and no moe probs at the house . the moral to this rant JUST BE CAREFUL WHAT U PLAY WITH and read the caution label:)

Cheers for the heads-up Brillo!
Wont go near that stuff then, dont need any help gettin cancer thats for sure!

Steve.

[piepalook]

Naphtalene:Moth balls into the tank.
(your valves might not last long though)
The fuel will burn hotter and the valves will burn away if you overdo it.
5 balls to 60 litres of petrol should do it.

[V Williamson]

I'd take Brillo's advice rather strongly in all this. Playing with petrol (itself containing carcinogens) and making home brew.... If you are going to start, get hold of the material safety data sheets first on any chemicals. Anyone remember what happenned at Bhopal, India in the Union Carbide plant once?

I seem to recall that a servo at Warilla (south of Wollongong NSW) got "done" bigtime by having, I think, toluene in the petrol (or some paint thinner) as sold. It nearly or did destroy engines.

Its a nice idea to dyi your own octane boost, but the consequences if and when something goes wrong... Is it worth it?

Cheers Vaughan.

[Fox Shooter]

Also with Toly and Xylene it's usually made using 104Ron platformate and distilled to have less than .09% benzine content. But like what Brillo said it's not good for you, also you may consider with these solvents they may attck your fuel lines and seals.

In short leave the fuel alone unless you can get hold of a knock engine tester ( which we have 3 at work ) this tests the fuel and how much compression and ignition timing can be used before knocking occurs. Also other host of test equipment like copper strip, Gas chromatograph etc etc.

[Fox Shooter]

I'd take Brillo's advice rather strongly in all this. Playing with petrol (itself containing carcinogens) and making home brew.... If you are going to start, get hold of the material safety data sheets first on any chemicals. Anyone remember what happenned at Bhopal, India in the Union Carbide plant once?

I seem to recall that a servo at Warilla (south of Wollongong NSW) got "done" bigtime by having, I think, toluene in the petrol (or some paint thinner) as sold. It nearly or did destroy engines.

Its a nice idea to dyi your own octane boost, but the consequences if and when something goes wrong... Is it worth it?

Cheers Vaughan.

Vaughan the accident in Bhopal was MIC ( methylcyanate ) real nasty stuff. It's used for making plastics, foam and I think pesticides. It was caused by a operator flushing a piece of line work with water that entered the tank where a reaction took place. At the time none of the safety mechanisms worked thus the tank exploded and gas was released into the air. There are still trace's of it present today over there in the soil / ground water etc etc.

[V Williamson]

Fox Shooter commented "the accident in Bhopal was MIC ( methylcyanate ) real nasty stuff. It's used for making plastics, foam and I think pesticides. It was caused by a operator flushing a piece of line work with water that entered the tank where a reaction took place. At the time none of the safety mechanisms worked thus the tank exploded and gas was released into the air. There are still trace's of it present today over there in the soil / ground water etc etc."

I was aware of more of the Bhopal incident after I checked it on Wikipedia after posting:o. But the relevance that I wanted to put forward was the danger in mixing chemicals as a homebrew octane boost might suggest. Some chemicals can do nasty things. Could you imagine the headlines if something went wrong and a forum was in the line of blame?....

Cheers Vaughan.

[Green X]

Tolulene is used to make PULP as it is, BP use to say on there website to add up to 10% Tolulene to ULP if no PULP is available when you need PULP.

It used to be readily available in Bunnings but I noted they no-longer stock it when I was as in there the other day, may have to do with it’s the stuff in ULP that gets you high, Should still be able to buy it from a paint supplier thou.

As mentioned above do not breath the chit in and mix in a well ventilated environment, or you will be off ya face.

[marki]

Fox Shooter commented "the accident in Bhopal was MIC ( methylcyanate ) real nasty stuff. It's used for making plastics, foam and I think pesticides. It was caused by a operator flushing a piece of line work with water that entered the tank where a reaction took place. At the time none of the safety mechanisms worked thus the tank exploded and gas was released into the air. There are still trace's of it present today over there in the soil / ground water etc etc."

I was aware of more of the Bhopal incident after I checked it on Wikipedia after posting:o. But the relevance that I wanted to put forward was the danger in mixing chemicals as a homebrew octane boost might suggest. Some chemicals can do nasty things. Could you imagine the headlines if something went wrong and a forum was in the line of blame?....

Cheers Vaughan.

Fair comment, but handling toluene is no more dangerous than mixing up 2-stroke for your lawnmower. But wear gloves and either a respirator or do it in open ventilation...

I'd be looking under "chemical suppliers" in yellow pages. Alternatively, motorbike shops sometimes sell it as racing fuel.

[V Williamson]

Fair comment, but handling toluene is no more dangerous than mixing up 2-stroke for your lawnmower. But wear gloves and either a respirator or do it in open ventilation...

Yeah... but check what Brillo said earlier....

[marki]

Yeah... but check what Brillo said earlier....

Yeah i did. The same thing would have happened if he'd had an open drum of petrol under his house - except worse.

Here's a quick lesson on the chemistry (and toxicity) of petrol:

The most volatile components (most easily evaporated) are the so-called BTEX compounds (Benzene, Toluene, Ethylbenzene, Xylene).

Of these, the most toxic component - by far - is benzene. Toluene and others do possess substantial toxicity - true - but nowhere near as bad as benzene.

So when you get a whiff of petrol, the most harm comes to you from the benzene. The odd whiff of Toluene is not as bad.