Last edited by Legend_master; 01-18-2013 at 01:04 AM. Reason: spelling
Heavy block, lots of space between the engine and the firewall, and a lot more sound deadening than you'd expect make it hard to hear in these cars. They are pretty good at masking engine sounds.
If I remember correctly, you make the most power when you are using as much water and as little fuel as possible for a complete burn. With a properly tuned WI setup, you can run a fairly good increase in ignition timing, too. Water is one of the best, if not the best, knock inhibitors you can use. It keeps everything super clean, too. Since you're installing the system on an engine that's got some miles on it, you're going to notice it running better in a few months. That's because you're steam cleaning your engine pretty much all of the time. A blown head gasket does the same for chambers. If you've ever taken one apart that had coolant leaking in, you'd see the difference between the cylinders with the leak and without, because the ones with the leak have far less, if any, deposits left.
I wouldn't tune it to kick on WI when you ping, I'd use ignition retard for that, as you can adjust that faster than you can adjust water delivery. You want to make that change as soon as you detect it, not a few seconds like I'd expect your venturi system to take.
Are you injecting vapor at the manifold, or is it still liquid at that point? I can't wrap my head around why it wouldn't be a gas and not a fluid under your conditions.
Last edited by Vanilla Sky; 01-18-2013 at 12:29 AM.
If this really improved gas mileage, I'd say build a rain scoop to collect any extra water you need. Could actually be a positive energy source.
You really want water that's cleaner than rain water. Rain is nasty in a city, or anywhere there's a lot of shit floating in the air.
Windshield washer fluid
Distilled water is the best thing to use if staying with h2o injection.
Time for an update.
I am using straigh drinking water and its being sucked liquid through the canister's port. This port pulls vacuum between 1500 and 3500 RPM only.
The heaters in the base of the TBI should be able to turn it in vapor before it gets to the inlet manifold.
I reduced the fuel table in about 10% until I saw the O2 signal flat at 0 volts. Didn't notice any difference in temp with or without water, but I'm not risking the engine too much. So my runs w/o water aren't too long just in case.
Didn't notice any fuel economy improvement yet. My measured Used Fuel still around .500 and .600 gallons over 10.5 miles, depening mainly in the weather.
I need to do the water injection in the exhaust manifold experiment and also the coil around the exhaust to vaporize the water while being sucked by the engine.
I am looking for extra 10 MPG at least. If I see something promising then I will put all the electronics required for an accurate control. But will not for 3 or 4 MPG.
I'm going to take my car for a 1000 miles trip this weekend.
I will not turn the WI on, I will be more concerned with a suspension failure than fuel economy.
Right now I am checking everything underneath the car. I recently changed the main front bearings and inspected the ball joints.
After 2 years owning the car, this is the first time I am going to run it for more than 40 MI in the same day. Plan to take some pics of the car during the trip. Hope everything goes well!
During my research for fuel economy things I found a site where they only talk about ways to improve FE. Its called gassavers. As far as I have read, they are not very technical guys, they talk more like putting magnets in the fuel line, be easy with the car, even turning the car off when in downhill (haha).
To make a long story short, if I want radical fuel savings, I need to do radical things. Keeping the tires inflated to spec will help but in the order of +1 MPG (Which I will loose in a single hard acceleration).
So, I will be more aggressive in this water injection for fuel economy project. I removed 10% of the fuel injected last time with no results. Well, I plan to remove 20, 30 40 % until the car can't longer keep the speed up and then just put a little bit more.
During my 1k trip there was a very long uphill section of the road where my car raised the coolant temperature to 95 C. (the average is 90 C) and the engine didn't get destroyed... so I learned that I can run with little overheat and little knocking for some time and still be safe.
I bought the fuel filter of our FI cars, the one in a metal case, I will use it to heat the fuel up and convert the injected water into injected vapor using the coolant lines.
Weather has been better here so I feel like I can work in the car again.
Did you realize any fuel savings?
Dr_Snooz
"I like to take hammers, and just break stuff, just break stuff." - Beavis
1989 Honda Accord LX-i Coupe, 240k miles, MT swap, rear disc swap
Shop manual downloads available here: CLICK TO VIEW
Found something that might interest you. It's a DIY for a radio shack knock light.
DIY Knock light (radio shack parts) - Miata Turbo Forum - Turbo Kitten is watching you test compression.
Thanks for the link of the circuit. Its certainly easy to build. I am going to have knocking problems when the summer comes per sure. I have elevated the temperature of the fuel and air to accomplish 23 MPG during this winter.
But, I would like to drop the water injection project for some time and start calling this as "Hydrocarbon Cracking System" Project, or simply HCS.
I've been reading about this system that is very popular in Indonesia. It heats some fuel vapors up to 300-400 degrees F using the exhaust manifold, so the carbon and hydrogen atoms of the fuel molecule (C14H18) get separated, or cracked. Then mixed with the sprayed fuel of the injector, gives a better burn rate in the combustion chamber
Another long story short, I already implemented the system in my car, and jumped from 23 MPG to 35 MPG.
There are a lot of things in this system to be fine-tuned at this time, my first finding was that the fuel savings are weather-dependent.
If it is raining you might have zero gains, because the system needs heat. And the heat is dissipated away with the water getting in contact with the exhaust tube.
But in the hottest (50 F) and driest days of winter, I got 35 MPG. I can't wait to see the FE gains in summer time.
As usual, I have hundreds of pics and datalogs to probe what I have just said. If you guys allow me I'll be putting sketches, pics of my own setup and results very soon.
I might start sounding like a scam, but not, I am the same Buzo as always.
Here is a quick pic of the system. It says carburetor but it can be attached to any -venturi vacuum source- preferably.
Pics of my install are in that same flickr account, if you are interested.
This pic is worth to be posted here. Its was from my drive from work to home a few days ago.
The inclined white lines are the used fuel as calculated by the computer.
I compared the first day I used the HCS in my car vs another log from the day before.
By looking at the RPM you can say the speed was similar in both logs. But regardless, not for being easy with the pedal will save you 7 MPG, no way.
I have another chart pretty similar, but I used even less fuel for a gain of +12 MPG (35 MPG total).
Last edited by Legend_master; 02-21-2013 at 03:38 PM.
Sorry about the quality of the pic, but you get the idea.
Sorry, I'm a little confused. You're saying that you didn't really get the gains you were seeking with vaporization or water injection, but HCS provided big gains immediately? HCS, as you describe it, sounds a little like GEET, but I'll do some more reading before I say for sure.
So how much more difficult would this project be if you didn't have the Megasquirt controller? OMG! I'm starting to think that Megasquirt, EFI and EDIS are simply mandatory on these cars. My car stopped being numbers matching when I did the MT swap, so there isn't a lot of reason for me not to go whole hog with a tuneable controller and crank-fired ignition. I thought that was only for hot-rodders, but I'm starting to see the light.
Dr_Snooz
"I like to take hammers, and just break stuff, just break stuff." - Beavis
1989 Honda Accord LX-i Coupe, 240k miles, MT swap, rear disc swap
Shop manual downloads available here: CLICK TO VIEW
I'm reading now and have some questions. Are you using a venturi vacuum source and if so, which one? Are you tweaking the fuel map at all or is it happening magically on its own? Are you worried about burning up a cat? Are you still piping in hot air? Are you still using any water injection?
I'm very interested in doing this. Are you able to post pics of your setup in this thread? That would be awesome. I don't know how to look up your stuff on Flickr.
Thanks for doing all the research that I'm not able to.
Dr_Snooz
"I like to take hammers, and just break stuff, just break stuff." - Beavis
1989 Honda Accord LX-i Coupe, 240k miles, MT swap, rear disc swap
Shop manual downloads available here: CLICK TO VIEW
Thanks to Leyend Master for posting that pic, because the venturi port I am using is the one that merges with the throttle plate. Note that this is not manifold vacuum, it generates vacuum only when the pedal is pressed.
It is happening automatically. I haven't touch the fuel map at all. Indonesian guys are using it in carbed cars and stock EFI, even in diesel engines with similar results.
I don't see any increase in the coolant temp. So no, no worried about my cat converter.
Yes, hot air is still ON, also I am heating the fuel up to coolant temp using a 1/2" copper tube wrapped around the fuel filter. (haven't uploaded pics of that one)
Whater injection is OFF.
Here is my setup.
1 commercial aluminum can. I think mine is 1/2 liter (1/8 gallon) but there should be other sizes.
Some hoses 1/4" OD, 1/4" ID, clamps, barbbed connectors, some 3 ft of 1/4" copper line.
Not my best pic but you should get the idea
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