Gas in the 80's vs Today

[Astro14]

In early fuel injection systems, you would manually adjust the mix for a base setting on fuel/air ratio. I still have a long 3mm hex key wrench that just fit a Bosch K-jetronic fuel distributor to adjust the mixture. Once in closed-loop, the fuel injection could compensate a bit based on O2 sensor readings, but the base fuel/air ratio had to be correct or it just wouldn't run right.

I think the guy has it backwards. In the 80s, gas was gas. No ethanol. Oxygenated fuels followed in later years. MTBE worked great but was a horrible groundwater poison, so everyone moved to ethanol. An ethanol mix, while higher in octane, requires just a bit more fuel in the fuel/air ratio. So, he should've been loosening that spring.

But those springs can age a bit, and perhaps he was adjusting air/fuel ratio to compensate for worn parts, while thinking that he was compensating for modern fuels...

 

[BMWTurboDzl]

1980's gas did not have the same level of detergents and contained significantly higher levels of sulphur (>300 ppm).

 

[Ed_Flecko]

Originally Posted by CR94
1980s car engines required unleaded---as did most from the late 1970s as well. They shouldn't need any mixture correction for 2020 fuel, as far as I know; if so, small. My 1981 car ran well on 2014 gasoline.

^ That reddish tint indicated presence of lead.



I *think* you mean "leaded" and not UNleaded...don't you? At least that's what *I* remember. My Uncle owned a Union 76 gas station and I used to help pump gas, wash the windshield, check the oil, etc., for customers when I was a young boy.

Ed

 

[Silverado12]

Originally Posted by Ed_Flecko
Originally Posted by CR94
1980s car engines required unleaded---as did most from the late 1970s as well. They shouldn't need any mixture correction for 2020 fuel, as far as I know; if so, small. My 1981 car ran well on 2014 gasoline.

^ That reddish tint indicated presence of lead.



I *think* you mean "leaded" and not UNleaded...don't you? At least that's what *I* remember. My Uncle owned a Union 76 gas station and I used to help pump gas, wash the windshield, check the oil, etc., for customers when I was a young boy.

Ed



Cars switched to unleaded in the mid 70s, I think 1975. Pickup trucks (4WD) switched over to unleaded in 1979. FWIW I love ethanol and use the E-15 blend in my Mustang GT. It costs less than 87, gives me 89 octane and no ping at all. It will ping a little on a cold day for some reason with 87 gas.

 

[SeaJay]

I was tooling around in the 1980's in a couple of early 1970's cars. Many, but not all gas stations sold the leaded fuel my rides needed. I think by the start of the 1990's most gas stations stopped selling leaded fuel. My early 1970's cars were in the crusher by then.

 

[toneydoc]

I think the fuel of the 80s was better for OPE as well.
I don't remember people having a lot of trouble with their carbs gumming up back then

 

[sloinker]

Originally Posted by GMguy84
Originally Posted by aquariuscsm
Originally Posted by alcyon
what else has changed in regards to Gasoline formulations then vs now ?


Gas now has crappy ethanol in it.



One of the FEW things I miss about Oklahoma was a CHOICE of non-ethanol fuel. I ONLY run non-ethanol 91 octane in my 82 Trans AM KITT


Dave


Why bother running 91 octane in that car? What is the highest CR in a '92 model year engine for that car? 7.0:1 ? You should just pour the cheap stuff into it and if it is driven regularly then the ethanol isn't an issue.

 

[Pew]

Originally Posted by Olas


The extra power on ethanol means you can get to the next gas station quicker to flll up while the guy with 20% less power can cruise by 9 out of 10 gas station sand win the race with less power.


~30% more fuel used for ~30% more power. Sucks when you have a big turbo 4 banger and the 2000cc injectors can't properly spray at idle. Can't always win

 

[WyrTwister]

Originally Posted by aquariuscsm
Originally Posted by alcyon
what else has changed in regards to Gasoline formulations then vs now ?


Gas now has crappy ethanol in it.


I was thinking the same thing . We have a 1991 Caprice that I have installed ( with help ) 3 in tank electric fuel pumps ! :-(

Running E10 .

But it has spent a lot of time , parked . Started it , most recently , about a week ago .

 

[WyrTwister]

[/quote]
I still maintain that black smoke is unburned fuel from an over-rich condition and that by adding more air the smoke would diminish. more power and less coal is win-win, right?[/quote]

I know next to nothing about diesels , but that is my guess .

Diesel is a hydrocarbon . Again , guessing , in an oxygen poor environment , the hydrogen burns " easier " leaving excess carbon to go out the exhaust .

Guessing , adding more air , via supercharging / turbocharging , adds more oxygen , decreasing carbon in the exhaust .

 

[Cressida]

The kids from the mid 70's had many, many times more lead in their blood than those kids in Flint Mich. did in 2014.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by CR94
1980s car engines required unleaded---as did most from the late 1970s as well. They shouldn't need any mixture correction for 2020 fuel, as far as I know; if so, small. My 1981 car ran well on 2014 gasoline.

^ That reddish tint indicated presence of lead.


Leaded gasoline was still available though at the time. I remember a label on my dad's 1974 Buick Apollo said that leaded or regular unleaded were both OK for the car.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by Astro14
I think the guy has it backwards. In the 80s, gas was gas. No ethanol. Oxygenated fuels followed in later years. MTBE worked great but was a horrible groundwater poison, so everyone moved to ethanol. An ethanol mix, while higher in octane, requires just a bit more fuel in the fuel/air ratio. So, he should've been loosening that spring.

There were definitely some places that had "gasahol" sold back as far back as the 70s. I remember watching some thinly veiled commercials for ADM in between my Saturday morning cartoons. Something about how corn could power a car. My reading of the history was that there was interest in an alternative after the various oil embargoes of the 70s. I don't know if it was anything more than regional distribution, but definitely that was being done. I even recall my 1989 Acura Integra owner's manual said that 86 octane regular unleaded was acceptable with up to 15% MTBE, 10% ethanol, or 5% methanol (but only with adequate corrosion inhibitors). I'm pretty sure the methanol recommendation went away after experience showed that it would still corrode fuel systems.

MTBE itself isn't really all that poisonous/toxic. Certainly no worse than the gasoline itself. The biggest issue with MTBE was that it leaked easily and when it got into water sources it left a foul odor/taste in very small concentrations.

 

[alcyon]

Originally Posted by Astro14
In early fuel injection systems, you would manually adjust the mix for a base setting on fuel/air ratio. I still have a long 3mm hex key wrench that just fit a Bosch K-jetronic fuel distributor to adjust the mixture. Once in closed-loop, the fuel injection could compensate a bit based on O2 sensor readings, but the base fuel/air ratio had to be correct or it just wouldn't run right.

I think the guy has it backwards. In the 80s, gas was gas. No ethanol. Oxygenated fuels followed in later years. MTBE worked great but was a horrible groundwater poison, so everyone moved to ethanol. An ethanol mix, while higher in octane, requires just a bit more fuel in the fuel/air ratio. So, he should've been loosening that spring.

But those springs can age a bit, and perhaps he was adjusting air/fuel ratio to compensate for worn parts, while thinking that he was compensating for modern fuels...


Imagine that you are living in a country that does not sell any ethanol blend fuels, we have RON 95 and RON 97 , UK standard.
Seeing that the octane of RON 97 is higher than whats available in the 80's would this advice of tightening the spring now make sense ?

 

[CR94]

Originally Posted by Silverado12
Originally Posted by Ed_Flecko
Originally Posted by CR94
1980s car engines required unleaded---as did most from the late 1970s as well. ...
I *think* you mean "leaded" and not UNleaded...don't you? At least that's what *I* remember. ...
Cars switched to unleaded in the mid 70s, I think 1975. ...
Generally true, but a bit oversimplified. 1975 was the year most new cars switched to using catalytic converters, therefore required unleaded. However, some could subsist on unleaded earlier (back to about 1970), and a few could use leaded later (up to about 1979).

 

[KneeGrinder]

Originally Posted by Olas
Originally Posted by KneeGrinder
No smoke means lean on a diesel and you have limited out on power, unless you have some alcohol. Not a single other truck in the division can run anywhere near that clean, and Gail is no genius.

They don't need oxygenated diesel but they could use it, they use NO2, as much as they want, its an unlimited class. there is no rule against spraying alcohol either. But putting it in your fuel tank and entering in a diesel class is a little unscrupulous.
Trust me, he mixed alcohol in his diesel.



Maybe its a cultural thing - ethanol in diesel is common hround here.. Etamax-D is an ethanol-diesel blend used in all the diesel engined public transport vehicles. Not unscrupulous or disingenuous, just cheaper.
I still maintain that black smoke is unburned fuel from an over-rich condition and that by adding more air the smoke would diminish. more power and less coal is win-win, right?


Your 100% correct in your statement of black is unburnt fuel, but please keep in mind I was referencing an unlimited modified 7 second race truck, its going to spit out some unburned fuel, nature of the beast. His truck blows out clean as a compressor air hose line! It has alcohol in it, everyone knows it!

As for ethanol in diesel, at that time pump diesel did not have any ethanol in it, and its pretty doubtful that Gail used ethanol, most likely he used Methanol, and he pre mixed it at a desired ratio and poured it into the tank and raced in a diesel class. It is unscrupulous, in the fuel tank, Diesel. You can inject diesel thru your injectors. You can spray what ever you want which is where the problems begin. What ever is sprayed is not controllable in a COMPRESSION motor. Kaboom! That's why he mixed it, and injected it. NO2 is not a combustible, its an oxygen enhancer. But it helps things go Kaboom too.

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by KneeGrinder
NO2 is not a combustible, its an oxygen enhancer. But it helps things go Kaboom too.

Anything that puts more oxygen in

I've heard of some experiments in liquid oxygen, although that's kind of tough to store/use unless you're NASA. Not sure exactly what it would do compared to N2O which apparently also cools the charge and becomes N2 gas (mostly) when it goes boom. Ethanol of course adds a little bit and can supposedly improve power (even with the same octane rating).

All any engine really does is function like a pump. Of course we've thrown everything at engines to try and move more air in/out including forced induction, less restricted exhaust, intake cooling, etc. Oxygenated fuel and N2O do that too.

 

[Benzadmiral]

Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by CR94
1980s car engines required unleaded---as did most from the late 1970s as well. They shouldn't need any mixture correction for 2020 fuel, as far as I know; if so, small. My 1981 car ran well on 2014 gasoline.

^ That reddish tint indicated presence of lead.


Leaded gasoline was still available though at the time. I remember a label on my dad's 1974 Buick Apollo said that leaded or regular unleaded were both OK for the car.

My '75 Ford Maverick clearly was labeled Unleaded Only, as most of my cars have been. The leaded fuel went away sometime in the '70s . . . though I remember an indy gas station in the suburbs of Denver around 1998 that had a separate pump labeled "Leaded Fuel." Curious, I walked over to look at the nozzle. It was clearly too big to go into the filler tube of my '84 Mercedes (which required premium unleaded anyway).

 

[y_p_w]

Originally Posted by Benzadmiral
Originally Posted by y_p_w
Originally Posted by CR94
1980s car engines required unleaded---as did most from the late 1970s as well. They shouldn't need any mixture correction for 2020 fuel, as far as I know; if so, small. My 1981 car ran well on 2014 gasoline.

^ That reddish tint indicated presence of lead.


Leaded gasoline was still available though at the time. I remember a label on my dad's 1974 Buick Apollo said that leaded or regular unleaded were both OK for the car.

My '75 Ford Maverick clearly was labeled Unleaded Only, as most of my cars have been. The leaded fuel went away sometime in the '70s . . . though I remember an indy gas station in the suburbs of Denver around 1998 that had a separate pump labeled "Leaded Fuel." Curious, I walked over to look at the nozzle. It was clearly too big to go into the filler tube of my '84 Mercedes (which required premium unleaded anyway).

My parents had two cars for years. Their other car was a 1975 Chevy, and that one clearly stated unleaded only. It was also an early attempt at emissions controls, with a 5.0L V8 generating a whopping 125 HP.

I do remember leaded gas was available at almost any gas station in my area well into the 80s. It didn't get completely phased out from road fuel until 1996, although by that time it was a bit hard to find. The one place I recall that specialized in it was 76 stations which advertised a leaded premium.

 

[AC1DD]

Back in the mid to late 1980s the EPA pushed MTBE as an additive to reduce vapors from gas escaping and reduce emissions, however it was DANGEROUS enough that the industry warned those working around it and people working in auto shops to AVOID breathing vehicle exhaust as much as possible because it could cause cancer quickly and could cause serious liver and nerve damage without a lot of exposure! It was also discovered that it wouldn't dilute if it leaked into water and the ground easily contaminating water sources. It was
gone from US gasoline by the end of the 80s.