Bad news upon pulling motor today

you do know about "opinions" :p:biggrin:


....Back to the thread.. Fix it an move forward.. Don't be like an old fart (like me :eek:) an dwell on it.. Damage is done. I know $$$ doesn't grow on trees.. :redface:

That's why I posted that line;)

And the day you can't post your opinion on this board is the day it isn't useful anymore.
 
29.4 means the 3 bar was pegged. It could have been 37 PSI for all you know.

Its like seeing 85 mph on a Buick speedo.

You didnt have a problem at Richards place where the car made a great number. You probably never had it tuned for 30+ psi. The motor went there and booom it went. The problem happened when the boost controller failed. Period.

Those talking BS here about alky.. C16/Q16 would of blown up as well on those boost levels un-tuned. What like TSM cars dont blow up? Or TSO cars dont blow up?? They run C16, Q16.. and stuff happens. Especially when playing on the street and distractions really high.

I feel for ya Bryan.. I hate to see carnage and hardship. If your going to have a racing engine making a lot of power.. you need to be on top of things and have safeties wired in..

If the TEMP went down from 111 to 62.. the meth system was doing its job. But it cant save every imaginable condition that can pop up. Example 37 PSI.

Funny how some of the alky haters know all about being able to weld aluminum heads ;)

Julie, if you look at my post #23 I put the blame on the controller but at this stage of the game I am going to take ALKY out of the equation. You are correct about the 3 bar map being maxed out, I made reference to that in another thread. The XFI can only see what the 3 bar can produce , who knows how high it actually went but in my mind I think it would have fared better on C16, just my opinion, I could be wrong.
 
If you are over 120fwhp per hole and running auxiliary fuel such as alky without a 6 channel egt you are in for some surprises like this unfortunate one. I've done this 3 times myself and it was the front cylinders everytime. Once the car is making enough power to run 140+ there is no room for error. A/f will be fine and no knock yet it will melt cylinders.

Do you have any logs of any 6 channel EGT temps of a buick on Methanol vs C116?
 
I have build many cars that have made lots of power on Alky. I am going to share my findings.

I have had the same issues with alky engines that self destruct #1 or #2 cylinder for no apparent reason. Tuned on the dyno and tune was right on. Get the car out to the track and hurt it on 1st or second pass. The way I would tune an alky car was to spray as much alky as I could and pull out fuel to get my curve correct. Engine makes a lot of power this way. I would spray as much as 60% at WOT full boost. Made 768 RWHP on a 234" aluminum head 70HPQ street car using this strategy. I found out later there was a flaw in my plan. While we made impressive numbers on the dyno and car ran flawless. We would Get it out on the street or track and blow the car up. I went threw many headaches with this car. After installing 6 EGT probes the flaw was revealed. When the car would accelerate the EGT probes on 1-2 cylinder would start to heat up and 5-6 would cool down. Run the car on the dyno and we would have very consistent EGT numbers. The long story short Methanol has a specific weight and when the car would accelerate the g-force of the acceleration would plant more of the volume of the alky to the rear of the intake causing the front two cylinders to go lean. Sitting on a dyno there is no acceloration to deal with. Like it or not it’s a fact.

We changed our strategy. We removed the dual nozzle and went back to a single. We tuned the car with 116 and light spray of alky for cooling affect maybe about 10% and still hit our 760 numbers. Now we could race the car and keep the heads on it. We also did the same with pump gas and alky. Not too put the car on kill but to extend the range of pump gas for street driving and it worked nicely. When testing with EGT we would see very little change in temps. We were on the right track.

OPINION TIME : Alky is a great tool if used correctly. If you are using it to extend the range of pump gas or cooling affect with race gas its great. If you are putting a car on kill with it to up your HP numbers you can expect to have issues.

I don’t consider myelf an alky hater but you can come to your own conclusion.
 
I have build many cars that have made lots of power on Alky. I am going to share my findings.

I have had the same issues with alky engines that self destruct #1 or #2 cylinder for no apparent reason. Tuned on the dyno and tune was right on. Get the car out to the track and hurt it on 1st or second pass. The way I would tune an alky car was to spray as much alky as I could and pull out fuel to get my curve correct. Engine makes a lot of power this way. I would spray as much as 60% at WOT full boost. Made 768 RWHP on a 234" aluminum head 70HPQ street car using this strategy. I found out later there was a flaw in my plan. While we made impressive numbers on the dyno and car ran flawless. We would Get it out on the street or track and blow the car up. I went threw many headaches with this car. After installing 6 EGT probes the flaw was revealed. When the car would accelerate the EGT probes on 1-2 cylinder would start to heat up and 5-6 would cool down. Run the car on the dyno and we would have very consistent EGT numbers. The long story short Methanol has a specific weight and when the car would accelerate the g-force of the acceleration would plant more of the volume of the alky to the rear of the intake causing the front two cylinders to go lean. Sitting on a dyno there is no acceloration to deal with. Like it or not it’s a fact.

We changed our strategy. We removed the dual nozzle and went back to a single. We tuned the car with 116 and light spray of alky for cooling affect maybe about 10% and still hit our 760 numbers. Now we could race the car and keep the heads on it. We also did the same with pump gas and alky. Not too put the car on kill but to extend the range of pump gas for street driving and it worked nicely. When testing with EGT we would see very little change in temps. We were on the right track.

OPINION TIME : Alky is a great tool if used correctly. If you are using it to extend the range of pump gas or cooling affect with race gas its great. If you are putting a car on kill with it to up your HP numbers you can expect to have issues.

I don’t consider myelf an alky hater but you can come to your own conclusion.
Good info. It took me 3 melted holes in the front before i figured this out. I now also spray the minimum alky needed. I've noticed on hot days more is ok. But when air inlet temps dropped to the 40's on the street/track and the engine was making 700whp or more it got ugly in about 7-8 seconds. Another thing about using c16 out of a sealed drum is that you are throwing the pump gas variability away and no longer need to leave room for it. Timing can be maximized without worry. It only takes a little alky to drop the inlet air temp. If you're injecting more and the temp isn't dropping much more it's not vaporizing. That's when you get in big trouble.
 
OPINION TIME : Alky is a great tool if used correctly. If you are using it to extend the range of pump gas or cooling affect with race gas its great. If you are putting a car on kill with it to up your HP numbers you can expect to have issues.

.

I would like to take a moment to point out how true I feel like this is...

I hate when a newb comes up here and someone says just put a 49 plus alky and set it on kill:mad:

Alky is a good aid but you have to realize what it is their for, Bryan I am sorry I know this has nothing to do with this thread;)

Lonnie, call a brother btw:biggrin:
 
I have to agree with bison on that alky for cooling and 116 at the track race fuel never let's you down!!!!!!!!!!
 
Definitely some interesting info in here...Really sounds like making sure your alky vaporizes is important...Any one come up with a good way to preheat the alky??
 
I have to agree with bison on that alky for cooling and 116 at the track race fuel never let's you down!!!!!!!!!!

It totally depends on the powder the engine is making. My blue car is fine at 30+psi on pump 93/alky but it only makes a little more than 500whp. Lots of room for error with alky distribution. Trying that with a 700whp setup leaves you with melted cylinders and thousands of $ lost.
 
Definitely some interesting info in here...Really sounds like making sure your alky vaporizes is important...Any one come up with a good way to preheat the alky??

I dont think optimal vaporization with help. The alky would still need to defy the laws of gravity and make a turn and drop to the front of the intake while the car accelerates.

Use the alky as was intended and have some fun.
 
Bison, Lonnie.


I have noticed that when tuning on a dyno that you tune to a livable A/F and the motor is happy and the XFI is showing very very little corrections. Then take the car to the track the same day and have the o2 sensor commanding like 10-15% extra fuel to stay at the same A/F.

I think that tuning a car tothe ragged edge on a dyno and then hitting the street/track is a problem due to the fact the load goes way up due to other forces like wind drag. I may be wrong on my thinking. but this is what i have observed on my car and on a few others. I have noticed this on alky and non alky powered GN's. ( this is really a problem if the needed fuel goes beyond what the ECM can correct to.)



Alky is a great tool as mentioned before but everything has a limit. Using the alky to get a few more psi on pump gas or to help deal with $hitty pump gas blends .But for all out racing the higher octane with alky helping the IAT's is the way to go. I know guys have went stupid fast of pump gas/alky I'm not a alky hater.


I have often thought about how well does the alky mix and get distrubuted evenly in all of the cylinders due the obvious ram effect in the plenum and also from nozzle placement.


As mentioned before opinions are like A$$holes every body has one. here is mine (.) :D
 
Ive been running a mix of pump and race gas and alky,just incase something go's wrong.which i have had happen before.Im not saying i dont like alky or it might of not happened,but it alittle safegaurd just incase.
 
I dont think optimal vaporization with help. The alky would still need to defy the laws of gravity and make a turn and drop to the front of the intake while the car accelerates.

Use the alky as was intended and have some fun.

1st I would like to admit I'm not a very educated man, but in my head the following makes sense to me.

In droplet form I can see exactly what you are talking about occurring, but if the alky had totally vaporized I would think it would flow with the air as it gets shoved into the cylinders.

My car doesn't make near the power of the ones you guys have been talking about, but I have seen no signs of unequal distribution anywhere. I did just hurt it recently, but it was number 3 and all my plugs were identical (doesn't look like it went lean, I think I forgot to prime the alky and at about 29 psi it didn't make it far on straight pump gas). I don't know how much fuel I'm replacing, but I don't think it's anywhere near the car you were talking about considering it made 570 and my DC% is in the high 80's with 72's (actual AF ratio about 10.6).

Any one know what ratio of alky is needed to get C16 octane out of pump gas?? or if it's even possible??
 
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