Time: Fri Nov 01 07:45:06 1996
To: scott.bergeson@ucs.org (SCOTT BERGESON)
From: Paul Andrew Mitchell [address in tool bar]
Subject: Re: Oil and Alcohol
Cc: 
Bcc: 

I was using the term "alcohol" to 
embrace all the vegetable variants
you mention.  Am I not correct that
methanol has a higher flame velocity
than gasoline?

Lead was used extensively for retarding
flame propagation, until its health
effects were recognized.

I seem to remember that Henry Ford
wrote a lot on this subject, and
his writings were suppressed.

During his era, a large percentage
of the "fleet" was powered by 
methanol and "alcohol"-based fueld.

/s/ Paul Mitchell


At 11:08 PM 10/31/96 -0700, you wrote:
>
>On Thu, 31 Oct 1996 09:50:03 -0700 (MST) you wrote:
>
>>Alcohol is a far superior
>>fuel, because it burns so clean,
>>and has much higher energy during
>>oxidation.  Only problem is that
>>it has a much faster flame velocity, 
>>so you must use additives to retard
>>the flame, otherwise you get 
>>engine knock.  Knock occurs when
>>the flame is traveling faster than
>>the piston head, so it "slaps" the
>>piston with a shock wave, rather
>>than "pushing" on it gently.
>
>Backwards. 'Octane' is slowness of or resistance to
>burning. Alcohol burns much slower and cooler than
>petroleum ether (early version of 'gasoline') so has
>higher octane. Reformed and isomerized gasoline has
>higher octane, but only became available during the
>WWII era. Alcohol makes a good additive to slow the
>combustion of gasoline but has *lower* energy.

You mean lower "btu's" per volume, yes?
Do you have any numbers? 

BTU-content is only one factor, obviously.
Efficiency is another.  

Have you ever heard of the Pogue carburetor?


>
>An ideal automotive fuel would contain much energy
>but would still burn slowly and cleanly.

Such an ideal escapes us at the present
time, yes?


 Hydrogen
>is an exception, in that it burns rapidly, but only
>ignites at high temperature so resists pre-ignition.

Also very explosive.


>
>>go to the Indy 500, where all the
>>cars are burning very high-octane 
>>methanol hybrids!  Methanol is vegetable
>>matter, without needing to cure in the
>>ground for 20 million years.
>
>Actually methanol can be made from almost anything
>containing carbon, including vegetable matter, and water.
>
>>Since Indy cars are pushing 14,000+ rpm, their
>>pistons are moving fast enough to prevent knocking
>>due to the high flame velocities of alcohol-
>>based fuels.
>
>The main concern is the high compression ratios the
>engines in race cars use, which heats the fuel-air
>mixture more, thus increasing the octane requirement.
>Any fuel other than an alcohol, methane (CNG), hydrogen
>or ammonia would not be adequate for those very high
>compression ratios.
>
>The major reason for suppression of alcohol was that any farmer
>could make his own automotive fuel rather than needing to buy
>it from a monopolistic oil/refinery/distribution company. These
>possibilities remain for methanol and methane. There was an
>article about biogas converters in "Utah Science" about 1974.
>
>P.S. I only got parts 2 and 3 of the 7 parts of your "Traveling
>is a right" posts. Did you post the other 5 parts to L&J?
>
>
      

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