Isopropyl Alcohol as a Fuel

Methyl alcohol (methanol) was used as a fuel for racing cars in the 1930s. It is not too expensive in small quantities, about €6 a litre here. It allowed cars to run at high compression ratios.

Yes, it's poisonous but only if you drink it or inhale a lot of the vapour. It's main danger when used for racing was that it burns with an invisible flame. When I used to marshal at VSCC race meetings cars running on methanol were clearly marked to warn marshals to be on the lookout for blistering paint as a sign of fire!

Russell

Of course methanol remains the principle ingredient of the fuel used in model glow engines; in which the other ingredients of circa 30% Nitro-Methane plus Lubricating Oil etc. are dissolved.

Edited By Brian Oldford on 21/07/2017 11:04:42

Thanks Dave.

That seems like a good explanation, particularly as the machine had not been used for some time, (my own mower seems to be in almost constant use).

The Carb cleaned up well with a small wire brush in the Dremel plus some elbow grease and new gaskets, so all is well (for now).

Edited By V8Eng on 21/07/2017 11:21:30

Methanol is also still used in "top fuel" dragsters

My dad used to muck around with outboard motors a bit and would always say that if a motor would not start he would whip out the plug and look at it. If there appeared to be something like water condensation on the plug he would dip it in metho and put it back in and nine times out of ten the engine would start on the next pull of the cord.

A mate of mine also used to put a 1litre bottle of metho in the fuel tank of his car every time he filled up, as the metho would absorb any water in the tank and it would pass through the engine as the fuel was used up.

In Australia there is strong support push for use of fuel containing a percentage of ethanol as an alternative to straight unleaded fuel, as the added ethanol (usually 10%) raises the Octane rating of the fuel, so providing better combustion and prevention of pre-ignition.

The more I read about the problems with Ethanol I begin to wonder if the headlong rush to put more of it into our road fuel ( the EU want us to up the amount from 5 percent to 10 percent ) , I fear we will be suffering more and more problems, it already dissolves certain polymers used in older vehicles.

Dave

Edited By JasonB on 21/07/2017 18:20:02

I'm not sure this is the correct forum to express your point of view on that subject. Many might jump to disagree with you. Whether or not I agree with you I respect youe opinion but must ask you to keep it to other more appropriate fora.

Edited By Brian Oldford on 21/07/2017 17:51:26

Indeed, no politics please.

My apologies to Brian Oldford and to Neil Wyatt I shouldn't have made a political comment on this website, I will ensure that in future I only discuss model engineering and relevant issues, No Politics !!! Apologies to anyone else who I may have offended I should keep my views on other issues to myself.

A suitably humbled Dave.

Another thank-you to Adrian for the pointer to Aspen, which I'd not heard of but sounds ideal for my chainsaw which gets only intermittent and unpredictable use.

I'm not sure if it's relevant to the OP, but as meths has been discussed, it may be useful to know that Industrial Denatured Alcohol (as HMRC call it) is readily available at reasonable prices (eg £22 / 5 litres from Astor and Windsor) should it be wanted. This is 99% ethanol 1% methanol v/v. It does require a licence from HMRC, but that is not difficult to obtain. When I applied I was interested in fomulating home-brew wood dyes and finishes, and they accepted that as sufficient reason for a 10 litre/year licence without question. Of course pure ethanol is hygroscopic and will eventually dilute itself to around 96% if left exposed to air.

This discussion also reminded of a common chemistry lab solvent known as petroleum ether, which is available in various bp ranges, the most volatile being 40-60. I believe this to be a refined mix of alkanes, but I have no idea as to the proportion of straight-chain to branched isomers, which would presumably influence it's usefulness as an IC fuel. Might be worth an experiment for those in the IC world tho?

Rob.