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

i found this and figured i'd see what you guys thought about it

so if my math was right (its probally not) if 16oz would raise your octane 2-3 *points* so a whole gallon of this stuff to 9 gallons would raise your octane 2.4 so from 93 to 95.4 but 3 gallons of this home brew octane booster (30%) to 7 gallons of 93 (70%) would make it 100.2 octane

a 50/50 mix of this and 93 would put you at 105oct and would end up saving you around $40 over 10gal of 105 race gas (at 7.50 a gal *rough estimate)

what do you all think?

 

Seen the toluene octane boost around for a long
time, but don't usually see recommended to add
the "cleaner" and "lubricant". Not sure that ATF
when burned, is going to be O2 sensor or cat-
friendly. And why do you need to lubricate
whatever, when regular gasoline doesn't? Ditto
the "cleaner" mineral spirits.

Xylene I've also seen recommended and it's more
commonly available than toluene it seems.

But boosting octane when you don't need to, adds
no power.

 

yeah, forget the cleaner and lubricant b.s. All that is is a marketing ploy to get people to buy the product... it's probably cheaper for them to substitute those "cleaning" and "lubricating" substances into the product rather than selling just a good octane booster that works. And we all know almost every octane booster when added gives you 0.x octane boost.

where can you buy toluene? Have you found a place that you can buy it in at least gallon sizes?

do some googling on it, if you added a decent amount it will alter the air-fuel ratio required for the engine to run. If it's late model fuel injected with O2's then it might compensate for it no problem, carbs you may need to re-jet.
toluene and xylene are the only 2 real octane boosters that are cost effective, toluene is a hydrocarbon so when burnt it only forms CO2 and H20. Not sure about xylene, and I think xylene alters the air-fuel ratio more than toluene and xylene has less energy content also. Both of which will be a waste of money regardless, cause like was said if you don't have a high enough compression to take advantage of the increased octane rating then it is doing nothing for you.

 

well from what ive read local paint stores sell it so im gonna hit up ace hardware/lowes/ and home depot to se if i can pick it up in a gallon size... and check prices.... but im building a turbo motor and more octane means more boost if the motor can handle it.... thats the reason i was looking it up and well my dad has a 377 stroker motor with 13.5:1 i guess we could use it in there as well

 

You can buy toluene from Home Depot and sometimes Wal-mart, but buying it at a paint store in 5gal drums is cheaper. IIRC toluene and xylenes are both additives found in gasoline.

This is not really an advanced engineering topic.

 

I went thru a phase on my head/cam ls1 car where i would put in 1 gallon of xylene to a full tank of 91 octane gas...i dont know if it was a placebo effect but it seemed like it helped it rev cleaner and quicker. Odd side effect is when id change spark plugs they would have a redish tint to the electrode and surrounding area...

 

well im just thinking i could help save a little cash instead of running $7.50 a gallon 104 and run something that comes down to $2.75 a gallon but then again you get what you pay for and idk if this is good enough to run in a motor thats got a decent amount of $ in it

 

One local street racer has been adding Xylene to his gas tank before nitrous runs. Haven't really talked with him about how much he is adding, but I've seen him do it a few times at the local meets and he hasn't blown up anything... yet anyway.

 

It's a shame you can't get toluene in bulk where I live. Unfortunately Oklahoma is like in the top 3 of Crystal Methamphetamine manufacturing states. I believe toluene is one of the primary ingredients in Meth. :-( My car could use it, my compression isn't anything too high, but with over 11.3:1, and nitrous I think mixing a 100 octane would be a bit better, or at the very least cheap insurance against detonation. The highest pump gas here is 91. :-(

 

I used to mess around with toluene when I was into dsm's. The cheapest way I found to do it was open a contractors account at Sherwin Williams. You can buy it in 5 gal buckets at discounted price.

I never ran into any issues running it on my dsm and a/f looked alot better at higher boost.

 

Have you looked into running the motor on E85?

 

Try this stuff if you can find it.... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propylene_oxide

 

did you consider running meth ?

 

You're making this far too difficult.

Just add 3 gallons of E85; at 105, that'll raise your octane rating to 96 [(0.75 x 93) + (0.25 x 105)] = 96, simple!

: )

 

i know a guy that used to put in 10 gallons of 93 and put in 4 gallons of e85 and he loved it.....he sprayed the crap out of it on a stock tune and bone stock everything it ran like a beast...

 

Be real carefull with this stuff.It's like NOS and can hurt your motor if used in the wrong mix.It also dissipates in about 45 minutes in your gas tank.A lot of class racers used it(cheating) and by the time the tech guys got around to checking their mix it had dissipated.You need at least a 20% mix to be effective.
Good luck.

 

lot of the LC2 guys keep it simple, just add toluene in calculated amount, theirs couple thousand posts on turbobuick.com in relation.

 

How do you calculate octane? Very intrested in this! Does toluene or Xylene work?!

 

No.they are out of work just like the rest of us

 

Yeah funny.
Any proven? Dyno sheets? ect.