Thanks, Pablo I was just looking fo ra cheap alternative like discussed. I really didn't want to get anything started between people on here, lol. So can somone give me an example why Alky is better than a water meth kit?? When say Alky do you mean Methanol, what type of alcohol. i am a newbie and I don't want to make any mistakes on making a choice as to what I want to do. This is the only thing that I am "up in the air" about. I guess I can cut corners on other things to be able to afford a Razors kit. I just am confused!
Alky is just a slang term for any kind of alcohol. Methanol, Ethanol, Isopropyl are all alcohols. You will see the term "denatured alcohol" thrown around as well and that is just ethanol with something thrown in to render it unfit for drinking. Ethanol is the same alcohol in alcoholic beverages.
Running straight methanol is preferable in turbo buicks for a number of reasons.
Its relatively cheap and widely available
It has a high octane rating (on par with other alcohols)
It has a higher latent heat than other alcohols (this is the quality of a substance that is measured by how much heat it pulls from something when it changes state. I.e. when alcohol evaporates from your finger it makes it cold. Methanol is the coldest of the alcohols)
It has a very rich stoichiometric air fuel ratio (this allows you to run a whole lot of methanol, more so than ethanol and much more than isopropyl)
It has more specific energy than any of the other alcohols (very simply; specific energy is a measure of how much power is produced at a given air fuel ratio. Methanol at optimum AFR produces more power than all of the other alcohols and gasoline)
Water mixed with any alcohol was what WWII fighter planes used to run. They did this for a few reasons, first, methanol was relatively expensive and harder to get at the front than water.
Second, methanol has a lower latent heat than water. Water when turned to steam in the combustion chamber takes a LOT more heat away from the chamber than methanol. This was very important in a wwII fighter plane as the majority were air cooled and overheating was a major problem.
Alcohol was mixed with the water to prevent freezing of the water tank at high altitudes and also because it provided better charge cooling to compensate for increased supercharger boost levels.
In our case, water isn't really effective for our engines because we aren't running them at steady state WOT and we have water cooling systems. Many WWII aircraft did run stead at WOT and were air cooled. We also don't have a problem getting alcohol. Alcohol releases more energy than an alcohol/water mix. So it not only allows you to run more boost, but contributes more power in the process.
In the case of a kit claiming to be methanol compatible or not methanol compatible I would question the manufacturers as to what makes their kit methanol compatible or what doesn't make it compatible. The difference could be as simple as what kind of return rate the manufacturer is willing to deal with. Any kit will run on methanol.. the question is for how long and why.
My suggestion is to look at what everyone has to offer, see what they claim, and then compare prices. Like I said above.. this is not rocket science. Alcohol injection has been around since the late 1930s.