Date: Sun, 05 Apr 1998 09:46:04 -0700
From: Robert Harris 
Subject: New fuel thoughts
To: Dave Williams 

Another one of your fiendish mind bombs exploded.  You asked what I thought
of fuel/water solutions and the only thing I could think of was blending it
with live steam just prior to injection.

Whilst sniveling about toluene being pulled off the shelf and outlawed as a
cleaner in the PDRC, I discovered that Acetone is the replacement on the
hardware shelf.  Now having an inquiring mind, I set out to discover what is
known about Acetone as a fuel. Zip Nada in net land.  Seeing how DV says
blend 5% with gasoline whenever you are adding alcohol (your Pinto Book
which I promise to return real soon - honest) because its eliminates phase
separation (water/fuel) and it aids octane.

CH3COCH3 - double bond on the oxygen.  Carbon 62.04% by weight, Hydrogen
10.41 % Oxygen 27.55%

58.08 grams per mole.  Whereas Methanol Carbon 37.48%,Hydorgen 12.58%,
Oxygen 49.93%, 32.0422 grams per mole.  Twice as much fuelish stuff for the
oxygen.  Plus, the oxygen is in a CO bond, which is a fuel in itself.
Dimethyl Ketone (Acetone) has a low 57C boiling point, high autoignition
temp 900f to 1000f depending on which reference I check, very low flash
point - 1 f, and most important - is infinitely miscible with water.

So we have a fuel hydrocarbon that is an extremely good solvent for fuels -
blends nicely with everything from motor oil to diesel to gasoline and
removes road tar - that also is infinitely blendable with water. One of the
chemistry books shows the water bond to Acetone as the hydrogen in H20
attracted to the double bonded Oxygen

O ....... H
||        |
H3 C C C H3    O
\
H

What this implies is that each Acetone drags along a water in perfect
solution through a hydrocarbon solution.  Thus one mole 18.53 grams of water
can be perfectly blended with one mole of 58.08 grams acetone (one mole to
one mole) and this can then be blended with fuel stock for a nice increase
in octane (both from the acetone and the hidden water injection).

Not all the way there yet, still looking for more data, but it appears that
a small amount of acetone blended with water could be used to stretch
gasoline by the amount of the water added.  Interested in seeing if acetone
could snag the water in aqueous ammonia and still carry the ammonia (NH3)
with it in solution.

Have just got restarted in the notes - did you do any fuel water solution
testing? So far it seems that detergent was used to "blend" the two.  Might
be worth pursuing - but I know that unless there are some very unfortunate
things acetone (and to a lesser extent MEK) are good things to blend with
water as an octane extender - maybe even in the tank!