Neil Hopcroft

A digital misfit

“This project page was created as an adjunct to the following article by Louis LaPointe, which we recommend as an introduction to the subject.

* Acetone In Fuel Said to Increase Mileage (http://pesn.com/2005/03/17/6900069_Acetone/) – Up to 35% increase reported. Acetone said to improve the fuel’s ability to vaporize completely by eliminating the surface tension that causes an increase in particulate vaporization temperature. (PESN; March 18, 2005)

A growing number of people are reporting their results, as tabulated here. Most have noted increased mileage, more power, more stable idle, faster start-up, cleaner emmissions. Part of that is likely to be from the cleaning of the engine that the acetone accomplishes. A few have not seen an increase in mileage at the concentration of acetone they tried. Too much acetone decreases mileage. Alcohol in the fuel tends to negate the positive effects of acetone. No one has yet reported damage to their engine from acetone being added to the fuel. Several have soaked fuel components in pure acetone for extended periods and have not seen substantial effect other than some minor swelling.”

Looks interesting, with significant improvements shown from Ford and Honda engines, among others. Not sure how well these kinds of results will translate to UK vehicles, where we’re getting far higher octaine petrol and compression ratios to match. I’d be interested, for instance, in results for using higher octaine petrol in the same engines, instead of acetone. Any ideas what this’ll do to your engine or fuel delivery system?


Categories: Memories.

/ 9 Comments

9 comments

  1. aperrott

    Some UK test results here.

    I remember that the last lot of injector cleaner I added to the fuel smelled strongly of acetone, so it may even be safe to try it. :-)

    Reply
    • neilh

      Yeah, I’m a bit nervous, more because it doesn’t seem to have hit the mainstream but has been around for a long time, which kinda suggests it isn’t really that great…..but if its being sold as injector cleaner then its probably fit for purpose….wonder if my car needs injector cleaner…not sure how I’d be able to tell.

      Reply
      • aperrott

        A good point that somebody made is that injector/carburettor cleaner is only supposed to be used in one tank every n thousand miles, so there is no guarantee that continual use of acetone would not degrade the fuel lines or other rubber/plastic components.

        Given that my car has a big old smoky engine, I’ll probably try adding a few teaspoons of the stuff next time I fill up and see whether it makes any difference.

        Reply
          • aperrott

            My only concern is that it would slightly lower the octane rating of the fuel and my car already suffers a bit from pinking at high revs.

            My car was designed to run on 4 star petrol (97 RON) and I think that standard unleaded (95 RON) isn’t ideal for it.

            So there are a few things I can try:

            1. Add 40ml acetone to my next tank of fuel. At the very least it’ll probably clean the injectors.

            2. Try the car with super unleaded (98? RON)

            3. Try super unleaded plus acetone.

            It’ll probably have to wait until I have a regular commute again and can spend a week or two assessing each option…

          • neilh

            That all sounds like rather a project. I just wish I understood more about it all, the explanation of RON being resistance to pinking seemed somewhat over my head….I assume its something to do with volatility and flashpoints but I don’t understand enough to really be comfortable with it.

  2. pjc50

    I didn’t know the US used lower octaine fuel and compression ratios. If I understand the physics correctly, higher compression ratios == better economy; this is why diesels achieve good economy.

    But the acetone guy talks about using lower octane fuel because the vehicles there don’t have high compression ratios, which is an odd suggestion.

    Also, he’s talking like a conspiracy theorist looney: “Questions asked of someone in the petroleum industry regarding ACETONE will often automatically trigger a string of negative reactions and perhaps false assertions. We may have heard them all. The mere mention of this additive represents such a threat to oil profits that you may get fabricated denials against the successful use of acetone in fuels.”

    Reply
    • neilh

      Ah, its not as simple as that (is it ever), the US use a different way to give octane ratings – they use AKI which is an average of RON and MON, where we just use RON.

      So it could just be that they measure everything differently but its actually the same….certainly their gallons are a different size to ours which cancels out around 3mpg when when your talking about fuel economy (depending on the numbers, of course).

      I know petrol gets more watery as you head east across Europe ‘cos a friend of mine was having some grief with his sports car as he headed further east, so I’d assumed that petrol was just different strengths around the world (makes sense ‘cos crude changes depending where you go).

      But yeah, seems a little odd that the petroleum industry would want to discourage something that did good things for the use of their product. I could understand that kind of reaction to something like biodiesel, though, so I suppose they might be like that.

      Reply
  3. casilda

    Hi Neil. Tickets have arrived for Ladytron this morning and I wondered if you were still interested in coming? We’ll probably be driving to Camden on the night, so if you want to lift with us you are more than welcome.
    I know you don’t like to plan things :) but the date of the gig is Friday 21st October. Hope to see you soon!

    Reply

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