Water injection, 50:50, alch injection.
 

Ok. Disapointed at the evaporation of the other thread i would like to try again.

This is my thread and i will cry if i want to.

Please keep it all Fact with no blatant product endorsment. There was a lot of knowledge about to spill out of the previous thread but it got cut short. I will dig out some data and stuff to kick things off in a mo.

Over to you boys.

Scott :)

Thanks for the new thread, Scott.

As I posted over in Howard's 80/20 thread, I am doing some testing today. I've got an errand to run up to Dallas that requires about 30 miles of round-trip highway travel so I'll have plenty of opportunity today to get some datalogging in. I plan on cranking up the boost to well past 1bar if everything suffices.

Currently running a 75/25 ratio of gasoline to methanol at 15psi+ boost (having removed 25% of my fuel injection on my old 100% gasoline tuned map) stepping down to only a few % at 5.5-6psi of boost when the alcohol system comes online at low pressure.

B

Good deal with starting a new thread. I'll keep an eye on this one to make sure it doesn't get out of hand.

Zach

Ive been really busy today doing a Water injection test (again)

So far i have maped the following

Methanol

50:50

I am now playing with straight water.

I have also sprayed various mixes into another wise safe fuel map to gauge what goes on.

I will get my note pad out and take some notes from what i have done so i can post up some propper ( real world info taken from my own car )

Scott

The facts about water/ethanol/methanol injection.
 

I am going to give what information I know about all these AI systems, including my personal experiences and some of the points touched on by the threads that are still here or are gone.

Facts about WI:

1. Water can remove more heat then Alch or Meth
2. Water is the superior knock supressant (it doesnt burn, infinate octane)
3. Water can NOT be injected in large amounts (i.e. 50% water to fuel ratio) or can NOT be substituted entirely as a fuel or we would all be burning it.
4. Water is FREE
5. Require another pump and tank

Facts about Meth and Ethanol:

1. Have a lower ability to cool (latent heat of vaporization)
2. Have an effective octane of around 110
3. Can be injected in any amount, or can entirely replace Gasoline as the primary fuel (see alcohol funny cars, et al)
4. Once injected above a certain amount, will start to remove more heat then water, and can continue to do so with even more increased amounts.
5. Cost money.
6. Are NHRA legal in all states
7. Require another pump and tank

The NACA study:

Some will trot out an old study done by the government where an airplane motor was run on water and on alcohol. The study concluded that water was superior to alcohol injection. What WASNT said, was that the amounts of water and alcohol injected were the SAME amounts. No variation in delivery. This could be due to the fact that being an aircraft application, the tank size is a CRUCIAL factor. Not so much in cars (see Water Burners).

Here is a study where it is shown that 50/50 water/meth is superior to water for knock supression thresholds in aircraft.

http://www.enginehistory.org/Convent...awPete/ADI.pdf

Also, here are the NACA studies on water (interestingly enough, they cite the overuse of water as a limiting factor in the study):

http://www.rbracing-rsr.com/downloads/NACA_H2O_2.pdf
http://www.rbracing-rsr.com/downloads/NACA_H2O_2.pdf

So which one is the better knock suppresant? Thats inherently easy to answer. Its water. Which one makes more power? Well, thats not so easy to answer because you can in theory inject enough Meth or Alchy to make more power and cool better.

So what system is for you?

Thats your choice. I run an Alchy system because I have personally logged temperature drops in excess of 50 degrees from ambient while injecting. Furthermore, I did 387 RWHP on 91 octane with alchy, and 434 RWHP on 104 and alchy. This was on a stock motor, stock ports. This motor recently came apart for rebuild and the apex seals showed NO SIGNS OF WEAR. In addition, I can run larger amounts of boost on days when I dont feel like ponying up for race gas. HOWEVER I am a drag racer, and we generally dont look for options that allow us to remain on a track for any extended length of time. So its no problem for me to refill my tank if I run low, as i just carry another jug with me. Also my car RARELY leaves town, so the limiting factors are not much of a hassle for me. This car made tons of 12 and 11 second passes down the 1/4 mile in Tucson heat with no complaints for over 3 years. I think that speaks volumes for AI itself.

FYI it looks like I may be upgrading to a meth kit. Much more energy stored there, but requires even more to be injected then alchy.

Summation:

I am not a "alchy" proponent, I am a proponent of what works for YOU. My results are posted everywhere, and I wont steer anyone to or from any form of AI, because they all have merits. I will continue to use AI, but I will definately be looking at 50/50 meth water, or straight meth.

If i missed anything or provided any erroneous information, please let me know.

Jarrett

To add to Jarrett's stats (nend to find link again since its been deleted in other thread)

But have done 443rwhp @ 26psi on our 98 RON (= your 93 MON octane rating) with stock T2 block engine, the 443rwhp is on a dyno dynamics dyno which reads significantly less thn a dyno jet unit. Dynojet number would be 500rwhp.

Similar result to his in reliability 60 000km + covered when engine tore down had minimal apex seal height variation to stock, had no leading edge chamfering and had no bowing of seal either.

Water can be injected at ratio up to 50% of pertol supply, but you need to run lean (unlike methanol) this is published way back in 1930's tests and can be easily verified. *just to clear up that point* and you still make big increases in BMEP and power. Common set ups though we use around 18 to 25% to fuel ratio........ it just depends on what your trying to do and how you go about it, on some cars the minimum I use is 9% to get significant gains.

Its also a balance to do a race distance as well?
When Ferrari and Renault were using WI in F1 turbo era they were running around 9% area, just enough to give them a big advantage over others but carry minimum wieght penalty (for WI system inc fluid) over the course of a grand prix distance ;) its a balance :)

As an addition, my 434 was at 20.6 PSI on a dynojet.

50% of fuel delivered with pure water? Is this one of the other NACA tests? Please post the link because I would like to see the particulars (engine type, fuel used, ignition system, etc...). And if this was done on a rotary then that would interesting too.

Of course. I all but handed you that premise on a platter. Less water can be injected to be a knock suppressant. But if additional cooling is your goal, then a larger tank with more alchohol or meth will better suit your needs if longevity of your supply isnt an issue. Not too mention that Meth/Alchy releases energy. No energy in water other then some mild dissasociation of 02 due to vaporization.

again, I am posting what I have researched over the 2 years I have been using AI.

Yeah I need to post up dyno graph again but it was.

26psi 5000rpm 443rwhp
23psi 7500rpm 440rwhp

On dyno dynamics, when I have time will dig up link again and post it. Same for your other requests ;)

After a long conversation with Richard from aquamist yesterday he sent me this link in the absence of his forum.

I could ask him to take part in this forum ?

http://forums.evolutionm.net/showthr...0&page=1&pp=15

He knows a lot, sure get him to come past I could do with some more help educating people why water is the ultimate answer for turbo rotary reliabillity :)

The more I look at my race spec Aquamist kit the more I wish it (my new engine combination) was all ready right now for some 30psi boosted pump fueled love :)

P.S. Cant wait for his forum to be back up and running !!!!

What size injectors are you guys using for your AI? Both for the WI and 50/50 crowds?

I use a 7 pound nozzle for pure alch.

nozzle sizing, methanol, per Julio Don Alkycontrol:

one M10 400 rwhp
one M15 500 BDC runs this setup currently
two M10s 550-600 i run
one M10 and one M15 650+

hp above is for piston engines. rotaries should make a bit less. i assume different systems would produce somewhat diff results for the same sizing.

howard coleman

There was a hell of a lot of referance material on there that we could do with posting up on here.

I run 15.1 gph nozzle on 50/50 mix

I run 1 x aquamist 0.8mm jet @330cc/1

I have 2 but i currently only use 1.
In the past i have used the m rated nozzels. I think they originate from oil heating systems

When i ran 100 % meth AI i used 1 x M5 (316cc)and 1x m 0.5 (30cc i think)

I found that when using alch the egts were very low on boost and i had to lean back further than i was confortable with ( past 12.3:1 at 16.5 psi ) The timing had to be quite aggresive in order to get a good burn from the lazy burning meth. IAT's were icy cold howeva but the tune never gave me confidence due to the fittings on the kit and the random nature of the afrs after tuning ( due to the pulsation of the pump ) I also had some problems with deposits in the tank and eventually block nozzels. One good thing came from it tho. I could see the spray patten on the throttle butterflys so could tell i was getting very poor cylinder distribution. With the pump i run at high delivery you will get a lot of drop off when you up the delivery ( ie the head of pressure will drop off ) its well documented that a pressure of 60 psi is required to atomise the fuel correctly ( i strongly believe this to be true in all usages in this field ) poor atomisation wil only lead to droplets etc.

With the 50:50 i switched to aquamist jets. i ran 1 x 0.8mm jet and all new fittings to cure the previous problems. I also run a DDS3 to monitor the flow ( i did post a video up of this in action )http://s8.photobucket.com/albums/a32...3092006011.flv
This tune was completly differant. I was able to pull more fuel out and also run a good level of advance. My inj duty on 4 x 850 cc inj was back to 80 % with low egts at the same icy cold intakes. eg on a 21 deg Cday with 46 % humidity with 50:50 i was getting AIT's of 9 deg C. This tune made more power than the meth tune and felt more stable in general. I will revisit this tune next week to take more fuel out ( following some assement and calculations today )

My new tune is 100% water. SO far i am back to 12.5:1 at 16.6 psi on a close split.Still loads to play out on this one.( following on from todays home work LOL).
So far it seems the more meth i pull the more power i can make and the more stable the car is in general. There is only one way to prove it... I will just have to re tune my car again...... its getting silly now becasue its the 5 th time this year LOL

attached is the pic of the meth throttle body and a datalog of meth and 50:50 ( not final tunes )

scott,

thanks to an offhand comment on a previous post i contacted dataloglab and straightened out my DLL so it now works w the newer DL. i did my first 06 DLL run yesterday and made 421 going up a hill. (a police free area)

how do i capture the window in the DLL so i am able to post it?

thanks and thanks for all the good info.

howard coleman

Cool. copy it to the clipboard and inport it to word. Do a paste special.
See how you get on

Scott

My first post, a few days too late. Pity I have missed all the excitiments from the deleted thread.

Having visited a few other threads for the last few days, great to know the Rotary technology is still going strong, very encouraged that water/alcohol has made its mark on the community.

I know very little about the rotaries so Iam here to learn. I am an engineer so selling is not my strong point. My aim is not to push our Water injection system, but like to join in and acquire some new knowledge on WAI on Rotary engines. Something all WIA systems share and capable of delivering.

I do have a question if anyone can help me with, what is the ideal afr to get best power from a rotary? disregard the safety factors.

Welcome to the club Richard.
It's nice to see someone at your level of experience chime in on the subject matter.

ON a street ported modern 13B I have found 13.1:1 the point of maximum power when running Shell Optimax 98 Ron

Nice one Boss glad you could join us. Lets hope we can get the info flowing again like last time we tried LOL.

Scott

it is a great pleasure to welcome one of the most accomplished players in the AI world. many of us have hugely benefitted from the AQ site as well as AQ's products.

thanks for blazing the trail Richard:)

howard coleman

unfortunately I'm a newby to the AI game so I haven't seen the auqamist forum yet however am waiting very patiantly for it to come back online. Glad to see you here Richard! Lets get this discussion going strong again I have a feeling lots more can be learned now. Should be nice to see a guy with mainly piston knowledge learn about rotaries, this way he will be able to tell us the major differances we need to look out for when getting on other sites and gathering info from piston people.

Welcome to our board Richard.

Isn't heat what pushes the rotor? Can more power be made at 15 psi from AI when pump gas will do?

Is race gas kinda like AI in the same idea that it has heavy leads to soak up the heat too?

I can see good oil cooler and radiator as being benificial to prevent pre-ignition.

It is begining to sound like AI is a safer alternitive to race gas for me (18 +psi )as I just fried my wideband again on it.

Witch is easer to tune/predict water or alk?

I believe that more power can be released with WI/AI as compared to pump fuel.
simply wi/AI will allow you to travel further into un enterable teritoty than with regular fuels.

You are creating a similar enviroment to race gas ( there are differances but the fundementals are the same )

Detonation is the spontaneous combustion of some of the air/fuel mixture in a part of the chamber ahead of the propagating flame front, after the spark plug has fired. This happens near tdc and leads to short, very large pressure spikes which "hammer" on everything and can blow head gaskets, pound out rod and main bearings, crack rings and pistons, etc. These spikes can be up to 10 times the normal chamber pressure. In preignition the pressure rise is much more gradual and not the major cause of damage. However, the heat buildup from preignition can lead to detonation in not too many seconds at wot. Preignition is also sometimes called pinging, because that's what it sounds like - kind of like a few marbles rattling in a metal can. Detonation is also called knock, and it sounds like someone is hitting the motor with a hammer.

This is insert is from the innovate froum.

If you can reduce in cylinder temps you window for power and boost will increase.
most find that you can exceed there capabilites before the water does.

the key to this is the pressures/temps at ppp ( point of peak pressure ) if you can reduce this then the tuning world is your oyster. WI or AI will help this.


I have little experiance with race gas but i believe leaded fuels to be detremental to 02 sensor life. Alchs and water have no such affects.

In response to the which is easier question. simply put water is easier. there has to be no doubt. Water has a latent heat evaporation 6 times that of pump fuels. Water will not give you the icy cold temps of methanol but is that really the goal ? or are we after internal cooling.

I am so far neutral untill i can prove one way or the other. so far tey all look pretty close but at high boot (20 psi and up ) i dont know yet. I leave that to people like, RICE RACING, Howard coleman, BDC,BNA ellis to prove.

I 100% agree with howards sentiment. you should add something !

Scott

Well I can say this.

I HAVE run @ 0.89 Lambda with water alone, I am not sure if alky runners have tried this???

Looking to drag racing world for advice on tuning is a bit silly @ end of the day IMHO ;) I deal with most of them direct or indirectly on of which holds the outright 13B world record for et and MPH and I would NOT look towards any type of tuning tips from them ;) ;) ;)

These people need to run at far different operational parameters than what your trying to achieve as an ideal for a road going car, its a totaly different animal TOTALY. Those people be it running C16 or Pure Methanol ALL have to run stupidly rich to get any type of durability form any of the apex seal products they choose to run. Typical ranges are from 10.5:1 to 11.5:1, the mean average is towards the lower end of scale (10.8:1)....... again this covers fastest untubbed rotary in world C16 and fastest chassis 13B Turbo Methanol

What we do with water injection is on another level totaly from this philosophy, I have proven you can run reliably at 14.0:1 for economy OR you can actualy set your vehicle up to make MAXIMUM HP (just like Richard was asking) @ 13.0:1 *around about* ratios. Its a BIG PLUS for WI over other types of thermal control in the combustion chamber.

Thermal control is what this is all about at the end of the day, your best gauge of this @ the end of the day is if your apex seals warp, your plug fails OR short term more drastic effect is if you have pre ignition. I know one thing for sure constantly drowning your engine is mainly hydrocarbons does accelerate the wear and tear on it, this same effect does not happen with water, so thats another thing to consider ;)

I managed to get back to 0.83L on methanol. I always tune Alchs in lambda its just a more natural figure as apposed to afr which tells you very little/ nothing when tuning blended fuels. My 50:50 tune dipped into 0.85L but not yet at peak tq.

I strongly feal that when tuning alchs you will have to lean out qite a bit more than most find comfortable. At the end of the day this is called progress

I am runing 2 tuning projects
1. 50:50 which is very close to the finished product
2. straight water which is quite a way from finsihed.

When i was out with water i said to my friend who was logging that 13.0:1 felt right. Its one of those things i cant explain.

One thing that has come form the water is the fact i dont have to send the timing map into orbit which brings a certain kind of saftey with it.

Scott

If you are running 10.5-11.5 on pure methanol, then you are stupid lean. Stoich for meth runs about 6.5:1.

Rat

Not necessesary. If you use a LM-1 its does not measure AFR. It measure L. The afr is a calculation. Im sure many other top brand afr meters work the same.

Scott

Yep.

I've been considering looking for a wideband unit that displays Lambda instead of AFR. Know of any other than the TechEdge, Scott?

B

Yeah the innovate LM-1. Thats what i run.

Scott

Thank you all for the warm welcome posts. I promise to be good.

After reading many posts on this great forum, I would like to contribute something that may help clarify some myth on water and alcohol injection. Please also note that it is only my view. In some areas, I can be completely wrong, I am very willing to take in any comments to correct it so hopefully this thread becomes more meaningful as it progresses.

Water and methanol injection does the same job in different ways, they both perform in-cylinder cooling and knock suppression well. Since water has a higher latent heat value than methanol, you need to inject twice the amount of methanol by mass to extract the same amount of heat during combustion. This is why all pure alcohol injection systems require a bigger jet, you need to inject 2.5 times by volume more than water. This makes little difference in practice except you need to find a bigger container.

Effect on knock suppression is totally different:
Water suppresses knock by quenching peak flame front temperatures hence regulating the frame propagation speed – (too fast burn promotes knock). In-perfect charge distribution produces lean and rich pockets. Lean pockets burn at a higher temperature (oxygen-rich = faster) compared to fuel-rich pockets (excess CO slows down burn speed).

Alcohol suppresses detonation by increasing the knock threshold value of a given fuel grade. Since large amount of alcohol is required to control in-cylinder temperatures, air/fuel ratio will be affected significantly. Some fuel has to be removed to avoid over-rich mixture.

Power producing potentials:
In theory, more power will be produced if more charge is jammed into the combustion chamber, resulting in higher cylinder pressure and temperature. In practice, the associated components such as pistons, turbo turbine, etc has a finite operating temperature constraint. This is normally reflected by the EGT. The general accepted EGT figure is about 900C.

Power is basically a force exerted onto the piston per unit of time. Force (pressure) is generated with heated air in a confined space. If cylinder pressure can continue to increase without temperature rise, we have the ultimate power plant. Water injection and alcohol injection will be a good tool to perform this work, lets examine this in more details how each concept can help achieving this.

POWER TUNING:
(Assuming we have a powerful ignition system, a strong engine and unlimited supply of air and fuel).

For water: the task is relatively simple. First generate as much heat as possible by adding more boost and fuel. Water is then injected to absorb the excess heat until EGT is within a permitted safe level. Overall BMEP (Brake Mean Effective Pressure) is now increased due to the vaporized water. The amount of BMEP increase will depend on the mechanical strength of the engine structure. Water’s ability to push the power capability is almost unlimited.

For methanol: First consider using methanol as a fuel instead of Gasoline. Methanol’s ability to increase power is confined to the knock threshold, and available heat to increase the BMEP of an engine. Methanol has only about half of the energy content of gasoline, so twice as much methanol has to be injected to produce the same power. As twice the amount of liquid has to be injected, the cooling effect is huge, resulting in over-cooled combustion chamber, limiting the BMEP. A 100% methanol engine has to use multi-spark ignition system to ensure the mixture is constantly being re-ignited due to the cold combustion chamber. Within those constraints, there is still huge potential of power increase.

A good compromise to inject a percentage of injected into a gasoline engine. This will ensure good inlet and in-cylinder cooling effect, but how much? From reading many results form various forums, it appeared to be between 10-30% to fuel. Unfortunately, the results were not consistent, some got excellent power increase, some experienced engine knock, some misfires and some with very low EGT. Why?

4-5 years ago, AI system was very basic, at a certain manifold pressure, the pump starts and deliver a fixed amount of alcohol into the engine. In those days, results have always been very consistent and yield excellent power increase. But for the past few years, the results have been a mix bag. I could only put this down on the availability of the 2-dimensional AI controller. They are termed as an electronic progressive AI controller. Method of delivery is very similar to the mechanical rising-rate fuel pressure regulator. The flow is governed by the pump speed, the controller reads the manifold pressure via a MAP sensor, translates to a PWM drive signal to the delivery pump.

Lucky for some, the availability of stand-alone, piggyback type of engine controllers give user a high degree of control, changing fuel and ignition timing is a merely rapping a few keys on the laptop. In my view, I think this is the reason for the inconsistent result – user’s interpretation of quite a complex ratio of methanol and fuel. Taking fuel out of the factory ECU to accommodate a methanol delivery system that has no reference to RPM, is a tall order. There are a few guys on this forum have managed it, I take my hat off to them.

My personal view on this relatively new concept requires a great deal of patience, dyno result means very little compared to logged data. Dyno-graphs always cause argument. I would really hope to see more logged graphs with AFR, Methanol flow rate, and EGT. If possibly include a second to fourth gear run-up so we can spot the afr change due to Methanol. For those who has just embark on the WAI, tune with 100% water - W50:M50 - 100% methanol and lastly 100% for ultimate power.

Sorry for submitting such a long post.

NOT if your meter is set to *Petrol AFR* scale, like most of them are ;)

There is a thread started up in single turbo section for *everyones benifit* go have a read of it :)

Peter

Great read, Richard. Mind if I copy this over to another forum and quote you on it?

B

Can anyone tell me how to edit post? I have made a few typos and would like to correct it

BDC, I have no objection but please correct my typos before posting to another thread, it was quite late at night when I wrote this.

Welcome Richard...

on the way to get some fuel this morning i decided to put my money where my mouth is ( so to speak ) I have been wittering on about the fact people dont go lean enough.

I have leaned out my fuel map in my full boost cells.
so I now have in afr ( for the masses )

P18
--------N11--N12--N13--N14--N15--N16--N17--N18--N19--N20
-AFR--12.5--12.4-12.3--12.5-12.4-12.8--13.2-13.0................
-EGT--683---717--724--702--736--766--781--664.................
KNOCK 21---31----32----40----40---39---40----38..................
INJ------53---57----64----69----74---76---76----77.................
IGL------17---19----21----21----20---20---21----23..................

This is with 50:50 so far. This fuel map will also save me some time on the water map.

The egt's are the result of about 4 full pulls. Im not talking 3rd gear full pulls. I mean from 2000rpm in 2nd gear up to 5 th gear n18.
I cant take the tuning any further till my plugs come from RX7.com. My current ones are playing up.

Scott

Very informative post richard! I was wondering if you could go more in depth with 50:50 ratios or any ratios for that mater. I guess what i really would like to know is that obviously by mixing the two substances the properties of the two change correct? So what exactly is the benefit to having a 50:50 mix? Does the fuel when diluted with that much water even burn? Also I'm no tuner by any means and I'm sure wherever I go to get my car tuned is not going to sit there and tune for an 80-20 mix of meth so that is one of the problems i have with going full meth. So my question is for tuning with strictly water is it easier? What are the right monitoring tools to use (ie egt guage, wideband etc...) and I'm having an issue with your statment about when tuning with watet. you say to add as much heat as possible (aka cylinder pressure/boost) and then once your at that peak then you add water to drive the egt's and AIT's down. So is this like a stair step effect? You just keep doing this process over and over until you reach your desired power or until you just can't grab any more heat out? Thanks for any help you can give this newb.

I may be able to help answer some of these.

Methanol has a very low vaporisation point. Methanol will also mix with water. Once it has mixed with water it will not seperate. The only way to seperate it is to either distill it or add it to petrol which will displace the water.
Im not an expert in the chemistry but i think the benefit you mention is in the fact the liquid will atomise quicker and also in a lower temperature. Howeva the down side of this will be the extra amount you will need to inject.

It will also give you a colder air charge. in effect you will be getting a 2 part cooling effect because there is 2 chemicals. The meth will cool the air charge and the water will help to improve the BMEP conditions to enable you be stick more boost into the cylinder.

I run a egt which i log on my datalogit with a LM-1 wb02.

I dont think he means that you peak out the incylinder conditions more raise the flow with the boost and reap the gains.

Scott

scott,

what boost is p18 and where is your egt sensor.

i should be testing monday at 20 psi and have removed another 5% fuel.

howard coleman

16.5 psi. The egt is in the former 02 sensor hole.


Scott

thanks for explaining that to me it's a big help. So do you run any sort of knock box or anything? I've going to be logging afr as well as egt's and was wondering if I should take it a step further and monitor knock.

go away Peter, I have had enough of you and your condescending attitude. You dont know me, so take your petty judgements somewhere else.

Basically i run the fc datalogit software so i can log knock etc while i tune the car. I have set the heat light to warn me if the knock goes up. Other than that i dont need to monitor much.

Scott

I run the MSD knock box, seems to work fairly well!

thanks guys. I've been looking at the msd box and it looks pretty good as well as it seems to be priced pretty well. I'll put it on my list of things to get. When does the spending stop!!!!!!!!! ;)

It dosent!!! :wallbash:

What doesnt?