Fuel types (continued)
“METHANOL IS OFTEN ADDITIONALLY INJECTED AS AN ANTI DETONATION AID ON TUNED TURBOCHARGED OR SUPERCHARGED ENGINES”
Methanol
Methanol is usually reserved for drag cars, although some hardcore circuit cars, such as Indy Car racers also use it. While it’s rarely used as a main fuel, it’s often additionally injected as an anti-detonation aid on tuned turbo and supercharged engines, either to supplement, or replace water injection. Methanol fuel is very consistent, runs very cool, has a high octane rating, and is cheap compared to most race fuels, too. Unfortunately, it’s rarely suitable outside of drag racing as it’s highly corrosive to aluminium, a huge amount needs to be injected (in comparison to conventional fuels), and very frequent oil changes are required too.
E85 Ethanol
E85 is a mix of 85 per cent Ethanol and 15 per cent conventional petrol, and it’s become a popular, cheap alternative to race fuel. It’s got similar properties to LPG as it’s high octane and very cold, which drastically reduces the chances of detonation.This means forced induction engines can run higher boost pressures without the fear of damaging things. In fact, many cars running on E85 often remove intercoolers and/or chargecoolers, because the fuel alone will cool the inlet charge sufficiently. Thankfully, unlike LPG, E85 can be used in conventional fuel systems — although you will need much larger injectors due to the lower energy levels in the fuel, which means more of it is needed for any given power level.
AvGas
AvGas is aviation fuel and comes in various grades, including AvGas 100 which has an octane rating of 100 MON. It is therefore highly resistant to detonation and could be considered an alternative to conventional race fuel; and at under £2.50 per litre, it’s much cheaper too.
There are two main issues with AvGas, however. Firstly, sourcing the fuel isn’t easy, as many airfields will not sell to non-aircraft fuelers. And secondly, it’s intended for low rpm use, and in a high rpm engine it’s said to not work well at all.
Nitromethane
Rarely used outside of the world’s fastest drag cars, nitromethane is among the most power-lucrative fuels money can buy. It’s very rich in oxygen, is very cool, and due to the huge fuel flows required, it drastically reduces the temperature of the inlet manifold and the intake charge within it — all of which adds up to a recipe for massive power. Unfortunately, nitromethane is incredibly expensive and very hard to accurately control due to its huge power potential and the massive amounts of fuel flow required. And in the wrong circumstances it’s actually more explosive thanTNT! I don’t think we need to tell you it’s not really viable for anything other than the most extreme drag engines…