by Pooh Bear <rabbitsfriendsandrelations@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
>
Dec 19, 2005 at 12:35 AM
Steve wrote:
> Bret Ludwig wrote:
>
> > However, alcohols can increase engine power and act as a powerful
> > cleaning agent in engines set up for it. It also burns cooler.
> >
>
> How can alcohol "increase engine power?" It can't.
Yes it can.
It has a higher octane rating than gasoline and therefore can be used
efficeintly at higher boost pressures in a turbo.
> Either the engine is
> optimized for alcohol (and yes, you can extract a great deal of power
> from engines that use alcohol as fuel) or an engine is NOT optimized to
> burn alcohol. There's no direct comparison without changing the fuel
> system and compression ratio.
>
> Now if you do allow changing the fuel system, how do you compare?
> Probably the best way is on engine size. For any given engine
> displacement, setting it up to burn gasoline will net more horsepower
> out of the engine since more chemical energy can be pulled into the
> engine in the form of air/fuel mixture because the energy density of
> gasoline is higher. Its arguable that in the case of turbocharged or
> supercharged engines, you could run more boost with alcohol and
> therefore extract more power, but that is tantamount to simply
> increasing engine displacement anyway.
That's the whole raison d'etre of turbos.
See Saab's Bio-power 9-5. More power on E85 than on gasoline with similar
mpg. It still runs on regular gas too. Clever.
Graham
