Octane boosters (toulene/xylene)

[IggDawg]

I posted this on NASIOC in an octane booster thread, and thought it could do some good here:

Well, I threw some xylene in the tank yesterday. It was somewhat of an adventure actually. The problem was: I needed a funnel. My tank was near the E mark, and I estimate I had as much as 3 gallons left. It takes 12 gallons to fill from E, and I have a 14.X gallon tank. I wanted to pour in the xylene and then fill up so the turbulence mixes the stuff up nicely. well, the gas station had no funnels. nor did home depot. or sears. I ended up getting a bottle of drygas, pouring out the contents (Sorry, nature !), and cutting a hole in the bottom so I could pour through the bottle. worked great .

Anyways, by my calculations I was running between 95 and 96 octane. I was boosting from 93 octane. The car didn't have much more pull off stock boost. 8.7 PSi non-intercooled just isn't pushing things enough for higher octane to really help. I did notice better throttle response though. and best of all, ZERO hesitation at part throttle. Even with the boost controller on, running 11-12 PSi non-intercooled, I got ZERO hesitation at part throttle/full boost.

Speaking of the boost controller, that's where this stuff made the most difference. She pulled harder than she ever has before under higher boost. I set the MBC (bleed type ) to around 11-12 lbs as I mentioned. usually this gives me a decent performance increase. It's not usually very consistant though. if I get timing pulled because of part throttle hesitations it usually takes a while for it to advance the timing again. The intake charge is just too damn hot since I have no IC. This xylene made all teh difference in the world. It drove hard, consistant, and very willing. I'm very happy with this stuff.

So yeah. I thought legacentral could get some good out of this. without intercoolers, octane boosters are a good way to stabilize up'd boost from time to time. Here are some links on the subject:

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

http://www.gnttype.org/techarea/misc/oc ... ained.html

I definitely reccommend any of you with MBCs and no IC to try this stuff out.

[boostjunkie]

Hmmm, maybe I should try this?

[IggDawg]

for the lazy,

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Toulene
114 Octane, ~$8 / gallon

Xylene
117 Octane, ~$8.50 / gallon

Methanol or Ethanol
101 Octane, ~$4 / gallon

Typical T&X content of 92 octane pump gas.
Toluene 9% by vol. Xylene 8% by vol.

Total T&X 17%

Typical T&X content of race gas.
Toluene 27% by vol.
Xylene 1% by vol.
Total T&X 28%


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So, as you can see, this stuff isn't dangerous in reasonable amounts. it's already in gasonline. Until you get to pretty high concentrations (above 20-30%), it's not bad at all to run occasionally. People reccommend adding a couple ounces of tranny fluid to lube things up since T&X dry things out. Xylene is a little harsher on plastics than Toulene. it softens plastics to a greater degree. The octane of toulene is a little lower, but it's easier on engine components. It's also a little harder to find. Most people around here run Xylene since it's higher octane, easier to find, cheaper, and only run occasionally.

And best of all, it'll clean your injectors and carbon deposits soooo much better than any crap you buy in a cheap plastic bottle at Wal-Mart

[Js92Tru]

Here is some more information on Toluene, geared more for Audis but still helpful.

http://elektro.cmhnet.org/~charlie/phot ... luene.html

Jay