industrial methanol and racing methanol

Is there any real world difference between industrial methanol and racing specific methanol?

The industrial stuff I have access to is 99.7 clean.

 

There is no fuel check, no money, no sponsors, no payouts etc etc .. well you get the picture, in the class i race in, it is purely for fun.

So the incentive to use the cheap stuff is most definitely there.

If however i where racing competitively there is no doubt i would buy the good stuff.

the difference is indeed noticeable, it is 1.25$ for a liter of the industrial stuff and 3.25$ for the racing grade methanol.

 

I bought a couple of 5 gallon pails once from Van Waters just to start the car, like was mentioned FILTER IT WELL. I didn't run the car down the track with it but it ran fine.

Funny, up in Canada the industrial methanol is actually more money than the racing stuff. At least where I bought it from, weird they make it in town here but it costs more.

 

hi all!
living in france and about to race on methanol,i understand looking at industrial methanol as an option for my drag car:VP M1 is about 630 us $ a 50 gallon drum at the track,when i can get the same drum for roughly 150 $ in industrial form...
here,the biggest part of the budget for a week end of racing is the fuel to get to the track(without breaking parts),and at 8$ a gallon,unless i have deep pockets or a generous sponsor(none of which i have),as far as i m concerned,a 0.15% difference in purity will only make a difference in the number of races i can go to throughout the year.
one question i m asking myself is:
why does nhra or any other sanctioning body ban any methanol that is not as pure as VP M1,as the "lack" of purity in industrial methanol does not give any performance advantage.it is up to the racer to choose how much he is willing to pay for his ET/SPEED..

 

NHRA, IHRA etc. could care less if your fuel is dirty or has water in it. What they are concerned about is use of nitro or some other chemical to increase performance. Some of the chemicals people have added over the years are some pretty mean shit. Standard fuel tests only check for purity so anything added will show up whether or not it actually helps performance.

 

We raced at a track in Canada in the heart of oil country. They brought a tanker truck load of methanol for the alcohol racers.....such a nice track!!! The car didn't slow down one bit......

 

Sorry Will, I should have been more specific. I know that water will cause you to fail a fuel check....so will butter, milk or any other inert fluid that gets in methanol. They only care if the added compound adds ( or is thought to add ) performance. But insted of checking for the presence of specfic chemical compounds (there could be dozens) they just check the specfic gravity. If it is anything but pure methanol it will be different

 

A bunch of guys got industrial methanol given to them last season, a few got lucky and had no problems, but MOST of them had plugged fuel filters after one run.

 

I work in the oil and gas industry and have easy access to it and I run it in my car all the time. $100/drum.I filter it into the drum then filter it when I pump it into my fuel cans then again when I fill the car up. All I use is the filter built into my funnel. I've had it tested at a national event and test good. We go though alot at work so that helps on the quality. Ken is right it can be dirty.

 

We ran it for years with no issues. Never failed a test. I filtered it going into the car, but I think you should do that no matter what you run. The only reason I quit is because its easier to just get it at the track

 

Top Lube

Does the VP have top lube? Do you have to add it to the industrial?
JODY

 

Industrial fuel

We use industrial alcohol, have for years and will continue to do so. Always filter as it goes in and we run a good filter after the pump to make sure we dont plug a port nozzle, our ports are very small to most standards also, .025-.028. Havent had problems....yet. I've bought VP at tracks before and never seen a real diference in performance or tune, but again we dont push the envelope either.

 

what kind of filter

When you guys are talking about filtering, what is this, simply the metal screen that is in the funnel or a painters strainer funnel or something else?

 

The one in our funnel, I'm not sure what micron it is but its a fine SS screen, a hell of alot finer than the system 1 oil filter we use.

 

We use the paper filters you use for painting they have a very fine screen, and fit nicely in a funnel

 

I use the one in the funnel, then I have a cloth folded up a bunch of times on top of that

 

We use industrial, buy it off a group of guys who make their own bio diesel. Always use a paint filter in the funnel and have zero problems as long as we drain the system between races. We have clogged a couple of nozzles with jelly if we don't drain and let it stand a while, talking a couple of months here though.

Alan

 

Is there any other way to check for methanol purity other than specific gravity?
What is an allowable range of the specific gravity from good to using it for weed killer?

Has any one heard of the test of mixing methanol with distilled water and if the mixture turns cloudy
the methanol is bad?