Octane booster question

ccronald

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The midwest zone rendezvous is coming up next weekend, and several suppliers are running out of premium fuel. Does anyone have an opinion on using regular fuel and octane booster if we cannot find premium during the caravan and at the event?
 

Paul Hawker

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Octane booster is a poor substitute for premium fuel. Remember...when an octane booster claims to boost octane 2 points, it means from 89 octane to 89.2 octane.
I would expect that the word will get out at the Rendezvous where the good stuff can be purchased.
 

29OUTLAW

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The "good" octane boosters are basically just over-the-counter “heavy” naphtha. One of the functions of “heavy” naphtha in the petrochemical industry is to raise the octane of “light” naphtha (gasoline). There’s a wealth of info on the Internet regarding naphtha and it’s ability to raise octane. You might want to research it. One would have to think that over-the-counter octane booster (heavy naphtha) would be set at the correct mix by really smart petrochemical engineers who supposedly know what they’re doing but who knows. Anyway – do an Internet search on “naphtha” and you can find out lots.

Use octane boosters at your own peril but if you do, at least check the ingredients and get a good one. The good ones will have only 1 or 2 ingredients with “heavy” naphtha being the main ingredient. The cheap ones will list alcohol as one of it’s main ingredients.
 

Skip White

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Amsoil makes one of the best on the market. To add one can to 15 gallons of premium, it will actually only raise you up one point, but adding the same amount to 15 gallons of regular, will raise you 3-5 points. This is what the tech dept. at Amsoil told me. It is most effective when added to reg. fuel.

It would stand to reason that a company like Amsoil is not going to put a bad product on the market, but I think much of whats on auto supply shelves is poor quality, especially if the cost is low.

Some octane boost formulas, leave a dylectric coating on the plugs, and can cause the plugs to not fire properly.

I have used this in my old Chev PK that has the timing set for premium, and will ping and clatter when using regular. One can of this to a tank of regular stops the ping and clatter completely, so this tells me it doe's work in that sense. So should premium become more scarce, this would allow you to atleast run the car, safely. The Viper will run on 91 octane so that tells me the timing is not very aggressive. Supercharged cars be carfull. As Paul said it's a poor substitute for Premium, and I think this to be true. You can loose an engine on forced induction cars from lack of octane. Hyperutectic pistons are not as forgiving as forged ones.

Warning 04 and back Vipers do not use knock sensors, to the best of my knowledge. I think 05's are running them. Reg. fuel on a heat soaked engine, could damage the engine. If your running a comp. upgrade, such as VEC2 the timing is advanced more than stock, and you will have a problem, so watch out.
 

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