Club Cobra - Alcohol fuel on the street ?

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Alcohol fuel on the street ?

I'm just curious.

We raced 360/410 winged sprint cars and of course used methanol.

With a high HP motor,........ have any of you tried using alcohol fed by a carb on the street ? Besides the many advantages of this fuel, it does have it's disadvantages also, like getting old and gummy fairly fast, separation etc,....and, if you're traveling a bit, where do you find a location to refuel.

What's your thoughts ?

I don't know of anyone running methanol in their street car around where I live, but plenty of cars are running E85 with great success. With alcohol compatible fuel lines and a custom built E85 carb, they are running high comp race-style engine combinations without a problem.

E85 has 105 octane. Above some of the current racing fuels. It is also cheaper than 87 octane thanks to government subsidies. I am converting my motorcycle to run on it. My buddy that drag races bikes says a lot of guys a the track are switching. Can't beat the price or performance you get out of it even if it does burn faster.

not in my Cobra, but I ran the meth injection on my 99 Vette with a Supercharger. Really liked it. Although it had a tendency to eat through rubber grommets on the meth tank/feeder line. On the street I ran a mixture of 60 meth and 40 distilled water. Was concerned about fire in the event of an accident, not an issue with the meth/water mixture.

I run e85 in the summer. The car really runs well. Mileage isn't too bad either.

Finding it can be tough, though. In the local area I know where the pumps are, and it's not an issue. But if I go out of town, it can be tough to find. I was in Utah a couple of weeks ago, and it was not available. Outside of SLC, there doesn't seem to be any. You just have to google it and find the stations near where you're going.

Here is a link that talks a lot about sprint engines and fuel:
Sprint Car Engines

Don't confuse the Ethanol in E10 and E85 fuel with Methanol used in racing. E85 will give you about 25 to 33% less mpg than old 100% hydrocarbon fuel. E10 will give you about 3.5% less mpg.

Many racers use straight Methanol, simply known as alcohol. The engine tuning is important when switching fuels. You can't set up your engine to run on street premium and start using Methanol and expect optimum results. The correct A/F ratio would be much different between the two fuels. Also, Methanol based fuel is very corrosive and would need to have correct fuel system hoses and gaskets to last.

Most of the country has 92 octane or better octane available. California switched to 91 premium because of an oil company patent lawsuit and the 91 premium spilled over to Arizona and Nevada. Just about all of the fuel across the country is 10% Ethanol or E10. Ford actually claims more HP in their F-150 when running E85. You can't always tell when you are getting E10 because some states (CA) don't require the pump to be labeled as E10.