squirt bottle technique

just fired my new car for the second time and it still takes me 4 or 5 goes before it will catch on alcohol.using gas in the squirt bottle but i never can seem to get enough in to keep it running while waiting for the alcohol to come through.do i really have to squeeze hard and force lots of gas in or what????? thanks.........

 

if its warm out use alcohol give it a big drink if its cold out mix gas and alcoho in the bottle you can spin the motor over with the pump open make sure kill switch is off and watch the nozzels in the hat when the fuel starts to drip out stop shut butter flies give it a drink spin the motor hold bottle at butter flies pull the kill switch on it will start if it tries to die keep a little pressure on the squirt bottle it will pick it up and stay running

to much gas it will flood easy i would only recondmend gas if it is cold out

you could be tring to start it soon let it spin a little before you pull the switch give the alcohol time to get to the hat

good luck

 

Use a mustard bottle

First check what type of bottle your using. Most of the primer bottles sold for this are too small and the hole is too small for today’s cars. Use a mustard bottle, the one with the single hole in the top. A 20oz + size holds enough fuel for 2 or 3 starts and the hole in the top is large enough to get a good amount of fuel into the blower. Plus you never loose the top or spill fuel when it tips over, just twist to close.

Are you opening the injectors and squirting fuel directly into the blower before you crank the motor?

Open the throttle wide open and give it a generous amount of fuel into the blower, close the throttle before cranking the starter, once the motor starts tip the bottle up and put the tip of the bottle at the opening of the throttle plate at the bottom of the injector, squeeze but not real hard, the motor will take what it wants to keep running. Then when you hear the sound of the motor change it has picked up fuel from pump and will keep running on it’s own.

If the pump is slow to prime it’s self making restart necessary. (This sound like what’s happening) remove the main fuel inlet line at the barrel valve and prime the line until the fuel runs out the top, put the line back on and repeat the above steps.

Watch the headers when it first fires, you should see only a small amount of raw fuel come out of the pipes, adjust the amount of fuel you squirt in the blower by the amount of raw fuel coming out of the headers.

Hope this helps.

 

We use an 1 quart gear oil bottle and cut part of the top off leaving approx 1/8th hole. Other than that follow the above posted instructions

 

we use a mustard bottle put in a #70 carb jet in the cap cut the top bzck to the jet. squeze bottle for 2 seconds be sure to go over the butterfly. crank fof 2 seconds pull wire. soon as it starts add more fuel in at the bottom of butterflys. we only use 87 octane gas to start if it backfires you will see it with gas only. this worked well for us all year hope this helps. tasca ford

 

Does it have a fuel filter between the pump and BV these take a little time to fill as well.

 

Mustard Bottle

Good point Mike, a jet would make a real mess of the rotors.
The other thing to be careful of when using a mustard bottle, keep it away from the table with the hot dogs and hamburgers: D

 

It will prime the fuel pump faster with the throttle blades open to let the air out while spinning the engine over to bring the oil pressure up.
Give it a good hard squeeze to get wet way back in the hat.
Close the butterflies and fire it off. Dribble as needed.

Wear your gloves to protect yourself from absorbing fuel.
No loose clothing or jewelry.
Keep fuel off the starter and plug wires.
Never look into the hat while cranking the engine.
Never set the primer bottle on the car or engine.
Everybody knows where the fire extinguisher is and how to use it.
Everybody knows that you cannot see Alcohol flames in the light.
Everybody knows not to stand infront of the exaust pipes.


I like my Dawn dishwashing liquid bottle. The top pulls open and pushes closed and seals tight, it has a flat base so it stands up, is big oval shaped so it will not roll away at a bad time, has hand grips so it stays in your hand when slippery and its clear so I can always see how much is in it.

I do not use Gasoline as it colors my spark plugs.

 

staring a blown car

what tad776 said is very good info. I would also recommend an article at jim mahers good vibrations on how to start an alcohol car. very well written. I have shown it to many to help them learn to start a car.

 

I don't care for the mustard bottle idea as some of the bottles have tops that will easily pop off. You could lose parts down the hat or blow fuel all over the place.

We use the gear lube bottles on the Top Fuel car.

Also, here is the link to the previously mentioned article:

http://www.goodvibesracing.com/Starting_a_Blown_Alky_Motor.htm

EDB

 

Wild start up witnessed!!!!

I watched a promod car of a friend of mine do a start up in the staging lane one night almost hurt alot of parts due to the bottle man, or should I say kid. He had his 14 year old kid run the squirt bottle due to no crew help that night. The chain of events went like this. The engine didn't fire the first time due to not enough fuel squirted into the hat before trying to fire. Then with a lack of communication bewteen the two and the other car already fired up and running next to them the kid open the butterflies again to give it a bigger drink this time, when his dad tried once again to fire the car being impatient to go at the same time. Well the bottle was half way in the hat and half way out and the unexpected starting of the motor made the kid jump and loose grip of the bottle which the motor took off with the new big drink that the kid pour into the motor. Now with the bottle trapped between the hat and the butterflys with the return spring squeezing the bottle making it feed the motor with more fuel. Now you can imagine what and where the 14 year old kid went when the motor went to the moon and not coming down anytime soon, I recall I think it was south east was the direction the kid was running last time I looked at this amazing starting line procedure. The driver did after not knowing what was happening for a few seconds hit the kill switch and brought the engine back down from 11,000 rpm. The motor only hurt a few push rods and the kid had to change pants, but could have been alot worst.
Andrew T/D 5777

 

Hey Mark, Thats a great article. I remember guys spinning the motor with the injector blades open until they saw fuel coming from the hat nozzles. Always seemed like it took forever. Too long to spin a motor without full oil pressure and awfully hard on the starter and batteries. I like the idea of firing it with the squirt bottle covering fuel delivery until the pump primes and it runs on it's own. Dave Germain

 

Dave,...
gimme that bottle I will light it......

Vic

 

Prime the system

Hi from Norway !
We found a good way to save battery power and make sure the engine does not stall due to lack of fuel: We open the quick-release clamp that holds the fuelpump to the drive, run it counterclockwise with a cordless drill (using a 3/8 nut driver in the chuck) until we hear and feel the fuelsystem is fully primed and fuel is staring to squirt from the hat nozzles. Then the fuel pump goes back in place and after just a few turns of the onboard 24 V starter, you will see fuelfog coming out of the pipes. Ignition on, and it always fires and run smooth right away. The procedure only takes 20 seconds and you can do it in the pits before towing to the lanes.
Just the way we do it.

 

to mike canter the cut back top on the bottle is one third the size of the jet body no way it could pass into the hat. just put the above post because it works so well. ralph Tasca ford racing

 

What about a small electric pump and fine nozzle and a momentary push button for the driver. Or, just a small prime pump with button. Now the crew guy can do/check something else.......

 

wow..thanks for all the replys..yes i do have a big filter after the pump so this is probably why it takes me a while.i especially like the spin the pump with a drill idea.simple yet genius.although my main point was i thought it was possible to run the engine just on the squirt bottle with the fuel off..i'm sure i've seen it on tv etc......

 

The blown nitro guys start there cars like that. Start on gas with pump off after the engine is running then they slowly turn the pump on.

You can put what is called a flapper valve on the outlet side of the pump before the filter then that way the fuel can't drain back out of it.

But you should be able to start the car even with the filter on it, by giving it a big squirt of alky first, then just keep squirting fuel in the closed injector till you hear the engine change tone