| while now. I've leaned the mixture out to ~16.5 - 17.5 during cruising condition and have seen as much as 30MPG on some trips. I'm hesitant to run it any leaner, however, I have been playing around with the idea of installing a water injection system using small misting nozzles installed into each intake runner. Each nozzle will have its own solenoid valve triggered by the injector circuits (using the injector signal simply to trigger a transistor connected to the solenoid so as not to impact the injector circuit). With a very small amount of water mist being drawn in during the intake stroke and the air/fuel mixture run in a lean condition, the water droplets will quench the heat of combustion and prevent excessive thermal loading on the engine components. In just the right quantity, the water wont excessively quench the combustion tems so as to reduce power output - I am inclined to think that in the correct quantity, it will absorb just enough heat to maintain reasonable combustion temperatures but in the phase conversion of water from liquid to vapor, there is an expansion ratio of ~1700:1. The expansion of this water will further increase cylinder pressures, producing more torque/power for a given quantity of air/fuel burned. The engine will be a sort of gasoline internal combustion / steam engine where the temps of a lean burn are quenched by the addition of atomized liquid water, and in the change of phase will produce higher cylinder pressures. I need to install a set of EGT probes to get some baseline numbers and once the water injection system is installed, get to playing with even leaner mixes. Only issue I forsee is the difficulty in igniting a lean air/fuel mixture. I have intentionally tried to run the engine leaner than 18:1 just to see what it would do (in cruising condition only) and around 19:1 the engine will start to misfire. Increasing the spark plug gap and increasing the coil dwell duty will produce a larger and more intense spark to get things fired up. So, ideas are abound....
[ ashspecz.com ]
[ agpowers@bellsouth.net ] Enthusiasts soon understand each other. --W. Irving.
Are you an enthusiast? If you are out to describe the truth, leave elegance to the tailor.
Albert Einstein
|
