Call us believers (alky injection)!

Gruppe-S · 10-28-2005, 06:57 PM

Hey all,

So for quite awhile now, the rumors and facts about alcohol injection have swirled around. Is it safe? Is it one of the best bang for the buck power adders on the market? Are the gains real and consistent? We wanted to find out what all the fuss was about so we tested one of SMC's alky injection kits on Mike's 2.35L GT35R shop car. There are no completely new, earth moving, or mind blowing results or findings here but we were suprisingly impressed with the reliable gains shown by the kit.

A little background first:

Alcohol works by doing the following 2 important things:

1) It lowers the temperature of the intake charge thus creating a denser (and greater) air mass.

2) It raises the effective octane of your fuel which works towards avoiding detonation (the sworn enemy of engines).

These two factors are particularly beneficial on turbocharged cars because the effectiveness of turbocharging is dependent on having a dense and cool intake charge while also avoiding detonation. Boosted engines are particularly succeptable to detonation because they can see such high pressures and temperatures. By increasing the effective octane of your fuel, it allows you to run higher boost and also add more timing advance. As an added bonus, it also cleans carbon deposits in your engine.

Enough of that, here are the results:

+43.8 WHP and + 28 WTQ

Essentailly, alky injection appears to be like instant racegas for a whole lot cheaper. It runs on denatured alcohol which can be purchased for under $10 a gallon at places like Home Depot (the kit comes with a 1 gallon tank). If used correctly, it is safe, cheap, and effective way to gain reliable power. In fact, alcohol injection could be arguably the best bang for the buck power adding modification on the market. SMC is currently working on a failsafe that will be implented on their new kits. This will insure that when you're running out of alcohol, your car will revert to normal boost. We are very excited to be offering these kits for sale to the general public and look foward to testing them on many other applications. For more info, please check out our post in the Vendor thread.

Thanks,

Geoff

* Registered users of the site do not see these ads.

elucas730 · 10-28-2005, 07:14 PM

Geoff,
Any idea on the ETA and cost for the failsafe? My job deals heavily with redundancy management on flight critical hardware, so I am always looking for the 'backup' plan. From what I've been reading, these alcohol injection systems are 'single point failures' (i.e. where a failure of one part causes the whole system to fail - in this case, a failure of the injection system can cause catastrophic engine failure). First of all, how true is that, and second, what else can be done to mitigate the risk?

the coordinator · 10-28-2005, 08:09 PM

If there is a fueling failure, will the alcohol stop immediatly?

Big Vin

garie · 10-28-2005, 09:34 PM

aquamist has a setup that autoshutsdown if something is wrong iirc

Capt Crunch · 10-28-2005, 10:01 PM

Wow, this is pretty great, I've only started considering this recently.

SSFWRX · 10-29-2005, 02:37 AM

great results guys. Seems to be a cost effective way to skate around the limitations of 91 pump.

Ohannon7 · 10-29-2005, 09:47 AM

would this require a custom tune if you have the Cobb AP?

AK*WRX*2004 · 10-29-2005, 10:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ohannon7

would this require a custom tune if you have the Cobb AP?

I have the SMC kit and I was wondering the same. Up here in Anchorage, Alaska we only get 90 octane...

I want to run the 93 map but I'm not too sure if I can get good results with the kit.

Steve from SMC is THE MAN... He will help you out with ANYTHING... no matter what, big or small. I can't stress enough how awesome he is... MANY people from the Alaska forum will vouch for Steve and his products. -Gene

Crawford Performance · 10-29-2005, 11:50 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ohannon7

would this require a custom tune if you have the Cobb AP?

I would say yes.
We have a car in the shop at the moment that added meth injection without re-tuning the ECU.
It is in for a new motor

Meth injection is a great tool for adding power "and" increasing engine sales. But if you cannot afford to replace your motor, I would not recomend using it.

Quirt Crawford
www.crawfordperformance.com

notraceready · 10-29-2005, 11:53 AM

I just ordered the smc kit from them and it should arrive in about a week. I'll have it put on along with the sr30 and will be getting a tune later in the week. I'd love to get an increase something like you got! What kind of mixture did you run? From the post seems like you ran 100% alky.

TheMadScientist · 10-29-2005, 12:09 PM

I have been a beliver since earlier this year when we installed an SMC kit on Amazake's car. With a few hours of tuning he went 12.94@104, after a retune he went [email protected] lastnight on a smoked clutch all on the stock turbo. As long as you can accept the risks involved with runing WI it is well worth it.

TMS

Crawford Performance · 10-29-2005, 12:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by TheMadScientist

I have been a beliver since earlier this year when we installed an SMC kit on Amazake's car. With a few hours of tuning he went 12.94@104, after a retune he went [email protected] lastnight on a smoked clutch all on the stock turbo. As long as you can accept the risks involved with runing WI it is well worth it.

TMS

Well put, I will agree 100%

Quirt

jabbott · 10-29-2005, 01:35 PM

I've been using alky for many years now and on many different cars. There is no easier or cheaper way to get that much power gain.

Also an fyi about alky.

Do not use any type of fuel cut (boost cut, rev limiter, etc).
When your injectors shut down you will still be spraying alky which cause an extreme lean condition.

Quote:

I have the SMC kit and I was wondering the same. Up here in Anchorage, Alaska we only get 90 octane... I want to run the 93 map but I'm not too sure if I can get good results with the kit.

You can run the 93 map with no problem, but it will probably be really rich up top.
You should really only use injection (alky or water) with a tunable engine management (utec, street tuner, etc).

quadturbowrxgtr-s · 10-29-2005, 02:41 PM

By tuneable you mean end-user or could I have this with Ecutek when I get my tune. doesn't the SMC unit come with some sort of controller? also how effective would this be with a VF30 setup? I have seen insane results from extreme setups but not many from the "average" guys setup (vf-22,30,34,39,16g etc.)

TheMadScientist · 10-29-2005, 02:49 PM

TD04 traps 105.5mph. Sorry has never been on a dyno.

TMS

quadturbowrxgtr-s · 10-29-2005, 03:57 PM

can you give some comparative data, I don't have much experience in guaging things by trap speed. I understand fully what it is and what it means but just don't know what stock and others run as references. thanks.

ride5000 · 10-29-2005, 04:56 PM

105+ is pushing what i would consider ~270 whp. i would also consider that ~370 chp.

jm2c
ken

Gruppe-S · 10-29-2005, 05:07 PM

Hey guys, just wanted to have everyone keep in mind that alcohol injection is NOT race gas, the tuning philosophy is a bit different, so please don't go applying your 100 octane maps to pump gas + alcohol injection.

Quad - On a VF34 2.0 car you should expect to see about a 20-25whp difference with alcohol injection. It's about the whp difference you'd see going from 91 octane to 100 octane. That being said the turbos are pretty much operating at maximum potential at these powerlevels.

Ride5000 - I would consider 270 dynojet numbers.

Most of the cars doing about 270whp on our dyno (VF34 cars) are trapping around 108mph and in the low 13's depending on 60'.

Cheers,

Gary
Gruppe-S

Davenow · 10-29-2005, 05:25 PM

Gruppe-S

From what I have seen the turbo buick gusy are making more power on methanol injection+93 pump gas than they were from race gas...

Also, The TD04 car that trapped 105.5, has already beaten low 13's. He has a 12 sec time slip from that setup. Had his clutch held he may have beaten quicktimes record. Oh yeah that too, he ran 105.5 with his clutch burning though first and second

bren wrx · 10-29-2005, 05:26 PM

mmm 25 whp on vf34 setup, does that with 93 octane?

Davenow · 10-29-2005, 05:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bren wrx

mmm 25 whp on vf34 setup, does that with 93 octane?

Yup.

Al gained like 49whp on an evo with no other mods. It was an evo with some sort of em, they added the SMC kit (buscher, smc makes it for buscher) and retuned and gained like 49whp.

bren wrx · 10-29-2005, 05:53 PM

what do these alcohol kits cost and what are the downsides of them?

you can make 18g like power with a vf34, im all over it

Gruppe-S · 10-29-2005, 07:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by elucas730

Geoff,
Any idea on the ETA and cost for the failsafe? My job deals heavily with redundancy management on flight critical hardware, so I am always looking for the 'backup' plan. From what I've been reading, these alcohol injection systems are 'single point failures' (i.e. where a failure of one part causes the whole system to fail - in this case, a failure of the injection system can cause catastrophic engine failure). First of all, how true is that, and second, what else can be done to mitigate the risk?

Hello,

I do not currently have an ETA on the failsafe but I know they're trying to get it done as soon as absolutely possible. I'll definitely be in contact with SMC on Monday. It is true that a failure of the alky injection system could potentially blow up your motor as it would cause extreme and instant detonation. The only way to truely mitigate the risk would be to have a fail safe or to not run it at all. Unfortunately, this is true for the vast majority of working parts on a car, performance or otherwise.

Quote:

Originally Posted by the coordinator

If there is a fueling failure, will the alcohol stop immediatly?

Big Vin

A fueling failure is highly unlikely but the progressive pump ensures that the amount of alcohol being injected is proportional to the amount of air and fuel being injested into the motor.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ohannon7

would this require a custom tune if you have the Cobb AP?

This would definitely require a custom tune. The benefits of alky injection allow you to run higher boost and more timing advance which can only be done with a tune.

Quote:

Originally Posted by quadturbowrxgtr-s

By tuneable you mean end-user or could I have this with Ecutek when I get my tune. doesn't the SMC unit come with some sort of controller? also how effective would this be with a VF30 setup? I have seen insane results from extreme setups but not many from the "average" guys setup (vf-22,30,34,39,16g etc.)

You could definitely have this tuned with your ECUtek. The SMC kit comes with a controller for the pump. Like many other performance mods, the gains seen from alky injection are proportional to your mods; there is no flat WHP and WTQ gain that are shown. Again, expect to see gains of 20-30%.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Davenow

Yup.

Al gained like 49whp on an evo with no other mods. It was an evo with some sort of em, they added the SMC kit (buscher, smc makes it for buscher) and retuned and gained like 49whp.

Because 4G63s are much more efficient than EJ2XXs, Evos respond to alky injection better than Subarus do. Static compression is higher on the Evo and at peak torque, an Evo might only run 1 degree of timing advance. A Subaru might run 14-15 degrees of timing advance at peak torque. If you then advance timing a couple of degrees on both motors when adding alky injection, the results will obviously be more dramatic on the 4G63.

-Geoff

cdvma · 10-29-2005, 10:00 PM

^^^

One thing I'm always jealous of is the VE of the 4g63. Same power but they run 10 to 15* less timing to make the same power.

jmussetter · 10-29-2005, 11:44 PM

What I want to know, is now that the UTEC can do PWM output to it's spare solenoid... what are the MINIMUM parts that are needed for a complete system.

I've seen the SMC kits before, but their progressive controllers were put on the market before the UTEC had the PWM capability and only had a simple on/off switch. The SMC progressive controller filled the gap and allowed the spray to stay consistent with the boost.

Is the progressive controller still needed? Also, a boost sensing on/off switch would also not be needed either correct?

What else would still be required in addition to...
SMC tank
SMC pump
spray solenoid (controlled by UTEC PWM output)
spray nozzle
tubing

Again, this is considering the new UTEC 5.0 firmware capabilities for control?

-jason

10-28-2005, 06:57 PM	#1
Gruppe-S Former Vendor Member#: 23216 Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Lake Forest, CA \| 949-457-1234 Vehicle: 2006 949-457-1234 949-457-1234	Call us believers (alky injection)! Hey all, So for quite awhile now, the rumors and facts about alcohol injection have swirled around. Is it safe? Is it one of the best bang for the buck power adders on the market? Are the gains real and consistent? We wanted to find out what all the fuss was about so we tested one of SMC's alky injection kits on Mike's 2.35L GT35R shop car. There are no completely new, earth moving, or mind blowing results or findings here but we were suprisingly impressed with the reliable gains shown by the kit. A little background first: Alcohol works by doing the following 2 important things: 1) It lowers the temperature of the intake charge thus creating a denser (and greater) air mass. 2) It raises the effective octane of your fuel which works towards avoiding detonation (the sworn enemy of engines). These two factors are particularly beneficial on turbocharged cars because the effectiveness of turbocharging is dependent on having a dense and cool intake charge while also avoiding detonation. Boosted engines are particularly succeptable to detonation because they can see such high pressures and temperatures. By increasing the effective octane of your fuel, it allows you to run higher boost and also add more timing advance. As an added bonus, it also cleans carbon deposits in your engine. Enough of that, here are the results: +43.8 WHP and + 28 WTQ Essentailly, alky injection appears to be like instant racegas for a whole lot cheaper. It runs on denatured alcohol which can be purchased for under $10 a gallon at places like Home Depot (the kit comes with a 1 gallon tank). If used correctly, it is safe, cheap, and effective way to gain reliable power. In fact, alcohol injection could be arguably the best bang for the buck power adding modification on the market. SMC is currently working on a failsafe that will be implented on their new kits. This will insure that when you're running out of alcohol, your car will revert to normal boost. We are very excited to be offering these kits for sale to the general public and look foward to testing them on many other applications. For more info, please check out our post in the Vendor thread. Thanks, Geoff * Registered users of the site do not see these ads. Last edited by Gruppe-S; 10-28-2005 at 07:19 PM.

10-29-2005, 05:53 PM	#22
bren wrx Scooby Guru Member#: 59454 Join Date: Apr 2004 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: Worcester Vehicle: '10 E92 M3 M-DCT brentuning.com/blog	what do these alcohol kits cost and what are the downsides of them? you can make 18g like power with a vf34, im all over it Last edited by bren wrx; 10-29-2005 at 06:09 PM.

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10-28-2005, 07:14 PM	#2
elucas730 Scooby Specialist Member#: 42714 Join Date: Sep 2003 Chapter/Region: Tri-State Location: Apalachin, NY Vehicle: '07 BMW 335i E90	Geoff, Any idea on the ETA and cost for the failsafe? My job deals heavily with redundancy management on flight critical hardware, so I am always looking for the 'backup' plan. From what I've been reading, these alcohol injection systems are 'single point failures' (i.e. where a failure of one part causes the whole system to fail - in this case, a failure of the injection system can cause catastrophic engine failure). First of all, how true is that, and second, what else can be done to mitigate the risk?

10-28-2005, 08:09 PM	#3
the coordinator Scooby Newbie Member#: 99448 Join Date: Oct 2005	If there is a fueling failure, will the alcohol stop immediatly? Big Vin

10-28-2005, 09:34 PM	#4
garie Scooby Specialist Member#: 26607 Join Date: Oct 2002 Location: socal Vehicle: 2002 wrx wagon	aquamist has a setup that autoshutsdown if something is wrong iirc

10-28-2005, 10:01 PM	#5
Capt Crunch Scooby Guru Member#: 10852 Join Date: Oct 2001 Chapter/Region: MAIC Location: Cleveland / UMD College Park Vehicle: Then : JDM Ver 7 STi Now : E46 M3 / MKVI GTI	Wow, this is pretty great, I've only started considering this recently.

10-29-2005, 02:37 AM	#6
SSFWRX Scooby Specialist Member#: 31789 Join Date: Jan 2003 Location: Bay Area, CA Vehicle: Now with 100% more V8 Spec C and 6MT	great results guys. Seems to be a cost effective way to skate around the limitations of 91 pump.

10-29-2005, 09:47 AM	#7
Ohannon7 Scooby Specialist Member#: 63824 Join Date: Jun 2004 Chapter/Region: South East Location: Da Butt Vehicle: 05 WRX WRB pearl Cobb II+	would this require a custom tune if you have the Cobb AP?

10-29-2005, 11:53 AM	#10
notraceready Scooby Newbie Member#: 64556 Join Date: Jun 2004 Location: Carbondale, Illinois Vehicle: 2003 Stg 4 WRX sedan silver	I just ordered the smc kit from them and it should arrive in about a week. I'll have it put on along with the sr30 and will be getting a tune later in the week. I'd love to get an increase something like you got! What kind of mixture did you run? From the post seems like you ran 100% alky.

10-29-2005, 12:09 PM	#11
TheMadScientist Scooby Guru Member#: 23717 Join Date: Aug 2002 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: Beverly, MA Vehicle: 2005 Big red	I have been a beliver since earlier this year when we installed an SMC kit on Amazake's car. With a few hours of tuning he went 12.94@104, after a retune he went [email protected] lastnight on a smoked clutch all on the stock turbo. As long as you can accept the risks involved with runing WI it is well worth it. TMS

10-29-2005, 02:41 PM	#14
quadturbowrxgtr-s Scooby Specialist Member#: 57515 Join Date: Mar 2004 Chapter/Region: South East Location: WGV Vehicle: 04 WRX Ver. 8 swap /87 FJ60 /Hewes Redfisher	By tuneable you mean end-user or could I have this with Ecutek when I get my tune. doesn't the SMC unit come with some sort of controller? also how effective would this be with a VF30 setup? I have seen insane results from extreme setups but not many from the "average" guys setup (vf-22,30,34,39,16g etc.)

10-29-2005, 02:49 PM	#15
TheMadScientist Scooby Guru Member#: 23717 Join Date: Aug 2002 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: Beverly, MA Vehicle: 2005 Big red	TD04 traps 105.5mph. Sorry has never been on a dyno. TMS

10-29-2005, 03:57 PM	#16
quadturbowrxgtr-s Scooby Specialist Member#: 57515 Join Date: Mar 2004 Chapter/Region: South East Location: WGV Vehicle: 04 WRX Ver. 8 swap /87 FJ60 /Hewes Redfisher	can you give some comparative data, I don't have much experience in guaging things by trap speed. I understand fully what it is and what it means but just don't know what stock and others run as references. thanks.

10-29-2005, 04:56 PM	#17
ride5000 Scooby Guru Member#: 32792 Join Date: Feb 2003 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: lincoln, ri Vehicle: 2003 GGA MBP 12.9 / 105+	105+ is pushing what i would consider ~270 whp. i would also consider that ~370 chp. jm2c ken

10-29-2005, 05:07 PM	#18
Gruppe-S Former Vendor Member#: 23216 Join Date: Aug 2002 Location: Lake Forest, CA \| 949-457-1234 Vehicle: 2006 949-457-1234 949-457-1234	Hey guys, just wanted to have everyone keep in mind that alcohol injection is NOT race gas, the tuning philosophy is a bit different, so please don't go applying your 100 octane maps to pump gas + alcohol injection. Quad - On a VF34 2.0 car you should expect to see about a 20-25whp difference with alcohol injection. It's about the whp difference you'd see going from 91 octane to 100 octane. That being said the turbos are pretty much operating at maximum potential at these powerlevels. Ride5000 - I would consider 270 dynojet numbers. Most of the cars doing about 270whp on our dyno (VF34 cars) are trapping around 108mph and in the low 13's depending on 60'. Cheers, Gary Gruppe-S

10-29-2005, 05:25 PM	#19
Davenow Scooby Guru Member#: 23676 Join Date: Aug 2002 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: de_dust and Orgrimar Vehicle: .	Gruppe-S From what I have seen the turbo buick gusy are making more power on methanol injection+93 pump gas than they were from race gas... Also, The TD04 car that trapped 105.5, has already beaten low 13's. He has a 12 sec time slip from that setup. Had his clutch held he may have beaten quicktimes record. Oh yeah that too, he ran 105.5 with his clutch burning though first and second

10-29-2005, 05:26 PM	#20
bren wrx Scooby Guru Member#: 59454 Join Date: Apr 2004 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: Worcester Vehicle: '10 E92 M3 M-DCT brentuning.com/blog	mmm 25 whp on vf34 setup, does that with 93 octane?

10-29-2005, 10:00 PM	#24
cdvma Scooby Specialist Member#: 21980 Join Date: Jul 2002 Chapter/Region: NESIC Location: Central MA Vehicle: 2002 PSM WRX (Sold) 2017 BMW X5	^^^ One thing I'm always jealous of is the VE of the 4g63. Same power but they run 10 to 15* less timing to make the same power.

10-29-2005, 11:44 PM	#25
jmussetter Scooby Newbie Member#: 15350 Join Date: Feb 2002 Location: Bay Area, CA Vehicle: 2002 WRX Sedan Midnight Black	What I want to know, is now that the UTEC can do PWM output to it's spare solenoid... what are the MINIMUM parts that are needed for a complete system. I've seen the SMC kits before, but their progressive controllers were put on the market before the UTEC had the PWM capability and only had a simple on/off switch. The SMC progressive controller filled the gap and allowed the spray to stay consistent with the boost. Is the progressive controller still needed? Also, a boost sensing on/off switch would also not be needed either correct? What else would still be required in addition to... SMC tank SMC pump spray solenoid (controlled by UTEC PWM output) spray nozzle tubing Again, this is considering the new UTEC 5.0 firmware capabilities for control? -jason