Advanced Engineering Tech - home brew octane booster

http://www.gnttype.org/techarea/misc/octanebooster.html

i found this and figured i'd see what you guys thought about it

MAKE YOUR OWN OCTANE BOOST

How to make your own octane booster (this is the basic formula of one of the popular octane booster products). To make eight 16 ounce bottles (128 oz = 1 gal):

100 oz of toulene for octane boost
25 oz of mineral spirits (cleaning agent)
3 oz of transmission fluid (lubricating agent)

This product is advertised as "octane booster with cleaning agent *and* lubricating agent!". Diesel fuel or kerosene can be substituted for mineral spirits and light turbine oil can be substituted for transmission fluid. Color can be added with petroleum dyes.

Toulene
R+M/2...114
Cost...$2.50/gal
Mixtures with 92 Octane Premium
10%...94.2 Octane
20%...96.4 Octane
30%...98.6 Octane
Notes: Common ingredient in Octane Boosters in a can. 12-16 ounces will only raise octane 2-3 *points*, I.e. from 92 to 92.3. Often costs $3-5 for 12-16 ounces, when it can be purchased for less than $3/gal at chemical supply houses or paint stores.


so if my math was right (its probally not) if 16oz would raise your octane 2-3 *points* so a whole gallon of this stuff to 9 gallons would raise your octane 2.4 so from 93 to 95.4 but 3 gallons of this home brew octane booster (30%) to 7 gallons of 93 (70%) would make it 100.2 octane

a 50/50 mix of this and 93 would put you at 105oct and would end up saving you around $40 over 10gal of 105 race gas (at 7.50 a gal *rough estimate)

what do you all think?

Seen the toluene octane boost around for a long
time, but don't usually see recommended to add
the "cleaner" and "lubricant". Not sure that ATF
when burned, is going to be O2 sensor or cat-
friendly. And why do you need to lubricate
whatever, when regular gasoline doesn't? Ditto
the "cleaner" mineral spirits.

Xylene I've also seen recommended and it's more
commonly available than toluene it seems.

But boosting octane when you don't need to, adds
no power.

yeah, forget the cleaner and lubricant b.s. All that is is a marketing ploy to get people to buy the product... it's probably cheaper for them to substitute those "cleaning" and "lubricating" substances into the product rather than selling just a good octane booster that works. And we all know almost every octane booster when added gives you 0.x octane boost.

where can you buy toluene? Have you found a place that you can buy it in at least gallon sizes?

do some googling on it, if you added a decent amount it will alter the air-fuel ratio required for the engine to run. If it's late model fuel injected with O2's then it might compensate for it no problem, carbs you may need to re-jet.
toluene and xylene are the only 2 real octane boosters that are cost effective, toluene is a hydrocarbon so when burnt it only forms CO2 and H20. Not sure about xylene, and I think xylene alters the air-fuel ratio more than toluene and xylene has less energy content also. Both of which will be a waste of money regardless, cause like was said if you don't have a high enough compression to take advantage of the increased octane rating then it is doing nothing for you.
http://www.mypicx.com/uploadimg/213987795_04292009_1.jpg

yeah, forget the cleaner and lubricant b.s. All that is is a marketing ploy to get people to buy the product... it's probably cheaper for them to substitute those "cleaning" and "lubricating" substances into the product rather than selling just a good octane booster that works. And we all know almost every octane booster when added gives you 0.x octane boost.

where can you buy toluene? Have you found a place that you can buy it in at least gallon sizes?

do some googling on it, if you added a decent amount it will alter the air-fuel ratio required for the engine to run. If it's late model fuel injected with O2's then it might compensate for it no problem, carbs you may need to re-jet.
toluene and xylene are the only 2 real octane boosters that are cost effective, toluene is a hydrocarbon so when burnt it only forms CO2 and H20. Not sure about xylene, and I think xylene alters the air-fuel ratio more than toluene and xylene has less energy content also. Both of which will be a waste of money regardless, cause like was said if you don't have a high enough compression to take advantage of the increased octane rating then it is doing nothing for you.
http://www.mypicx.com/uploadimg/213987795_04292009_1.jpg
well from what ive read local paint stores sell it so im gonna hit up ace hardware/lowes/ and home depot to se if i can pick it up in a gallon size... and check prices.... but im building a turbo motor and more octane means more boost if the motor can handle it.... thats the reason i was looking it up and well my dad has a 377 stroker motor with 13.5:1 i guess we could use it in there as well

You can buy toluene from Home Depot and sometimes Wal-mart, but buying it at a paint store in 5gal drums is cheaper. IIRC toluene and xylenes are both additives found in gasoline.

This is not really an advanced engineering topic.

I went thru a phase on my head/cam ls1 car where i would put in 1 gallon of xylene to a full tank of 91 octane gas...i dont know if it was a placebo effect but it seemed like it helped it rev cleaner and quicker. Odd side effect is when id change spark plugs they would have a redish tint to the electrode and surrounding area...

well im just thinking i could help save a little cash instead of running $7.50 a gallon 104 and run something that comes down to $2.75 a gallon but then again you get what you pay for and idk if this is good enough to run in a motor thats got a decent amount of $ in it

One local street racer has been adding Xylene to his gas tank before nitrous runs. Haven't really talked with him about how much he is adding, but I've seen him do it a few times at the local meets and he hasn't blown up anything... yet anyway.

It's a shame you can't get toluene in bulk where I live. Unfortunately Oklahoma is like in the top 3 of Crystal Methamphetamine manufacturing states. I believe toluene is one of the primary ingredients in Meth. :-( My car could use it, my compression isn't anything too high, but with over 11.3:1, and nitrous I think mixing a 100 octane would be a bit better, or at the very least cheap insurance against detonation. The highest pump gas here is 91. :-(

I used to mess around with toluene when I was into dsm's. The cheapest way I found to do it was open a contractors account at Sherwin Williams. You can buy it in 5 gal buckets at discounted price.

I never ran into any issues running it on my dsm and a/f looked alot better at higher boost.

Have you looked into running the motor on E85?

Try this stuff if you can find it.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propylene_oxide

did you consider running meth ?

You're making this far too difficult.

Just add 3 gallons of E85; at 105, that'll raise your octane rating to 96 [(0.75 x 93) + (0.25 x 105)] = 96, simple!

: )

http://www.gnttype.org/techarea/misc/octanebooster.html

i found this and figured i'd see what you guys thought about it



so if my math was right (its probally not) if 16oz would raise your octane 2-3 *points* so a whole gallon of this stuff to 9 gallons would raise your octane 2.4 so from 93 to 95.4 but 3 gallons of this home brew octane booster (30%) to 7 gallons of 93 (70%) would make it 100.2 octane

a 50/50 mix of this and 93 would put you at 105oct and would end up saving you around $40 over 10gal of 105 race gas (at 7.50 a gal *rough estimate)

what do you all think?

i know a guy that used to put in 10 gallons of 93 and put in 4 gallons of e85 and he loved it.....he sprayed the crap out of it on a stock tune and bone stock everything it ran like a beast...

Be real carefull with this stuff.It's like NOS and can hurt your motor if used in the wrong mix.It also dissipates in about 45 minutes in your gas tank.A lot of class racers used it(cheating) and by the time the tech guys got around to checking their mix it had dissipated.You need at least a 20% mix to be effective.
Good luck.

Try this stuff if you can find it.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propylene_oxide

lot of the LC2 guys keep it simple, just add toluene in calculated amount, theirs couple thousand posts on turbobuick.com in relation.

How do you calculate octane? Very intrested in this! Does toluene or Xylene work?!

How do you calculate octane? Very intrested in this! Does toluene or Xylene work?!


No.they are out of work just like the rest of us:lol:

Yeah funny.
Any proven? Dyno sheets? ect.

Ya it works.Hundreds of guys have been using it for years.Do a search on the GN forums.I've used it myself.I've run as much as 23#s of boost with this mix.Motor pings on 94 octane and you add the mix and it stops pinging.That's proof enough for me.Don't need a dyno.

Im 64 yrs old and back 60s we used to put moth balls in a qt. can of gas ,let them disolve add to a full tank of gas ,it was like rocket fuel . Not a joke i did .

I'm curious on the gas/e85 mix. Can anyone show proof that mixing the grades like that really helps with octane boosting? Where I'm at, premium is ~2.80 and the e85 is like 1.35

BUMP for some more LOVE on this subject! I am in Florida (JAX) and there are no e85 pumps for civilian use, and the Sunoco's 110 is lead base as well as $$$. A cheap alt is greatly appreciated ;)


DM

local place says i can buy pure ethanol for around .85 a dollar. then i figured i could mix it to what ever i want

Try this stuff if you can find it.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propylene_oxide

You must hang out with the go kart racers, that's their trick, they mix it in the oil and it vaporizes up past the rings, and since they don't tech your oil, they don't find it.

so for every 10 gallons of 91 oct I should put in _____ gallons of E85? Just trying to get a dummy proof answer. ahha

^^^^ Bump what he said!

also, if one were to add to fuels together in equal amounts, would the new octane be an average of the two fuels?

also, for the E-85 adders, doesnt E-85 take about 3X% more fuel to run, so adding e-85 to your tank, would that not make your fuel less powerful?

AFR for E-85 is 9.8:1 where as gas is 14.7:1.It takes more E-85 to reach the same as gas.

Ethanol has less energy than gasoline. Gasoline has 117600 BTU per gallon, ethanol 67000 BTU per gallon.

Anyone who tells you they actually picked up MPG by using E-85 is full of Shit!. When it was first advertised in our area I remember comercials with people actually claiming the increase in MPG or major gains in power. My 07' Avalanche was OK on gas and an absolute hog on E85.

So, back to the OP, is it a a no bs formula that can be used on a non-sensor equipped engine(gen-1) sbc? Just wondering if anyone on here has tried this formula, the ATF part kinda scares me. I'm really curious about this topic as well!

-SS

Bump, for an interesting topic, wanting more info. Thanks.

-SS

I agree with 94zgreenmachine.

If you are going to do e85, you will need bigger injectors and a good tune. But expect to get 1/2 of your mileage. The flip side is your getting 105 octane for $2 instead of $6. So even if you used 2x as much, your still saving money. But its also hard to find.


You could also do like the flex fuel cars, and add a ethenol sensor so you could just mix whatever you wanted and it would adjust the tune accordingly.




How much boost are you planning on running? Your going to do this on top of meth?

I run E85 in my Grand National and as said above you will use more fuel while running it. I had to go up about 30% on fuel flow BUT was able to go from 15# boost to 24# with no knock. Keep in mind my GN is an 85 so no intercooler there...just lots of hot air forced into the motor. Not only does the E85 have a better octane rating but will decrease the temperature of the engine at the same time. There's not many downsides other than decreased fuel mileage and slights harder starting in cold temperatures. You also wouldnt want to store the car with a tank full of E85 because it will attract alot of moisture into the gas tank.

bump & subscribed

so if I don't have a F.I aplication this formula for home made race gas isn't going 2 work well in my car? I figured it should do something or why would they sell it in the stores for every1 to buy? I have read 100's of threads on this topic 2day & still not sure on this. I am thinking of makin formula #2 since its higher octaine