Tuning for water/meth injection

[Paul_G]

I have been doing some research on the use of water meth. Anyone on here familiar with it?

 

[Curiousyellow71]

Engine masters had a good episode about it. If I am remembering right...No matter what they did the water mixture lost hp to methanol. Cooling the intake charger is a big help. But burning water instead of fuel has drawbacks. As far as tuning, not sure what your trying to tune? We ran a setup on a car in the 90s with a turbo.

 

[Paul_G]

My roadrunner with the Procharger will be back together this week. The 528 Hemi that was in the car when I got it wont be back from the machine shop till next year sometime. So I put my mild built 383 in it for now. Plan to start it up with Holley 670 standard carb, no blower. If the trans, 46RH, which I got back today checks out and has no issues I will put the blower belt on and switch to the blow through carb. I put a 5" pulley on the Procharger, I expect the boost to be minimal. The car has a water/meth system on it. I would like to use it to keep the intake charge on the safe side.

I saw that episode of Engine masters, and several episodes from Richard Holdener doing W/M testing.

My take away from all I have learned so far is this;

1. Water Meth does not increase horsepower, it can actually lose power when used without tuning the engine for it.
2. Water injection alone does a good job of cooling the charge temperature. Can be helpful to stave off detonation and keep the engine alive. Does not increase power at all.
3. Water meth together cools the charge temperature and raises the octane level along with fuel enrichment. Again, the engine has to be tuned, leaned out, to remedy the rich condition, and timing optimized for the higher octane level with the additional alcohol fuel.

So what am I missing there?

My system will bring in the WM at a preset boost level. Boost will likely not be enough when idling for sure, and maybe cruising to bring in the WM system. So how should I tune for it?

 

[Curiousyellow71]

We had no luck with water alone. Still pinged like crazy. No matter what we did it made no difference with straight water. It ran worse, certainly made less power, we had to pull timing. We had a old turbo book that discussed the advantage of running 50/50 mix saying they didn't see much gains from adding more methanol past 50% but it made it more affordable by adding water and matched up respectably but less then 100% methanol. In other words 50/50 was a good compromise.

Are you going to need it cruising?

I think I would do wot only, and go by what the o2 sensor says. Trying to get it dialed in for cruising and wot I suppose could be done but there will a lot going on, unless its computer controlled. What set up are you doing to control the timing?
Cooling the air with boost is a big deal if up against detonation, obviously the benefit is your not having a melt down. But it should make more power like a intercooler would because the air is denser. The guys playing on the dyno do some interesting things, but I am not sure it always translates to the street. Pulling a lot of fuel out to lean it out for the methanol sounds like a good way to melt something. The cooler air should need more fuel and the alcohol should fatten it up. I know boost systems have come a looooong way from when I messed with it.
Since it sounds like a new combination I think I would see what its like with no wm injection first. You might not need it.
The Science Behind Why Water-Methanol Injection Works So Well