Now that the wedding and honeymoon are over with, I can get back to working on the TTZ28..

I've decided to build a water/alky injection system rather than try and fab up intercooler pipes and stuff this summer..

First thing was to find a suitable pump.. This SHURflo pump has a built in adjustable reg to go from 0 to 60 psi and flows around 2gpm at 50psi.. Should do the trick I think..



I need to get to the hardware store and get some fittings to mount my pressure washer jets in the turbo piping.

The end goal is mid-high teens boost on 91 octane fuel and lots of timing.. Not sure how close I'll get, but we'll certainly find out..

Cheers,

 

I'm running the same pump on my setup and it works great! Cant get any hard numbers on it untill I get a new ALDL cable but I can defiantely say my detonation is gone. Set to turn on at 3psi, cant feel any change when it kicks on but she pulls a hell of a lot harder when the computer isn't pulling out a ton of timing.

 

Cool! What are you running for jets anyhow? Do you know what PSI it's currently set at? Any info you wanna give up would be appreciated..

Cheers,

 

The pump is set at what ever it came at, which should be 60 psi or so. I'm running pressure washer jets just like you. Got them online from Mcmaster-Carr. Right now the one I'm running is 9.5 gal/hr I have two smaller ones but decided to go with the larger one first since my scanner cable is toast and I'd rather be on the safe side. I'm guessing it's about the right size, cant feel it turn on and works just fine with about 10 lbs of boost. Right now I'm running a 50/50 mix of water and alcohol.

 

Excellent! Another question, did you use any check valves in the system? What size line did you run from the pump to the jet itself?

Thanks!

 

I'm using a solenoid valve from McMaster-Carr and using 3/8 line. Check out www.turbomirage.com/water.html thats the site I used to put together most of the parts for the install. You basically end up with a very simple relatively inexpensive kit that functions quite nicely.

 

I was actually thinking of using one of my nitrous solenoids, but I'm pretty sure they wouldn't like water anyhow.. Thanks for the link..

Cheers,

 

Any further developments on this?

I'm looking to build a kit myself. I was thinking a recycled intake pump should work though

 

Yea, a little bit.. I've welded the bung into the piping and got the fittings and line etc etc.. I just need to hook it up now.. I've got some pics, but I haven't posted them yet.. I'll see what I can do..

Cheers,

 

heres a pic of my kit that i went to the hardwaer shop to pic up.
you can see my simple site at
http://darcom.org

 

....

 

What pump is that?

Oh, and where are you getting these hobbs swtiches from? I've never seen on in a parts store..

 

Anyone ever consider just using straight water?

I'm piecing together a kit for myself right now. Right now i'm unsure if i want to try to just use a EFI pump with straight water or what.

I'm also unsure as to what to do for jets.

I want to add a reostat somewhere and pressure guage to help with tuning.

 

summit has a 5lb and 30 lb switch..

mcmaster carr should have them too.

 

For the hobbs switch try part #701-1575 should be under 30 bucks. Not sure what the pressure is supposed to be but mine tested out with a mity-vac at 3lbs. Seems to work perfect for my app, but it is adjustable, just not sure how far adjustable it is.

 

I finally got a chance to work on the system today.. I didn't get a chance to quite finish it, but tomorrow it should be done..





What you see is a fuel (well, water actually) rail made out of 1/2 inch copper pipe with 2 19 lb/hr injectors..

More pics to come later..

Cheers,

 

d*mn, you got the same idea i had. I went to fire it up for hte first time and the pump i used went bad. I guess 2 weeks of sitting in water screwed it up pretty bad.

I'm using 1 19lb injector.

for pictures go here

http://community.webshots.com/album/77885215Iqhcdp

 

You know what they say, "great minds think alike"

I'm almost done putting it all together.. Hopefully one night this week I'll get it all back on the car...









Cheers,

 

I hate to say it, but the way you have the injectors pointed is going to create a lot of water droplets, by slamming the spray into the far side of the pipe, not the atomization you want.

 

Just a thought but It would probably depend too on just where you inject it. Right next to the manifold and you might have an atomiztion issue, but if your farther from the intake it probably wouldn't be a problem.

 

I really don't see there being an atomization issue (going from other's experiences), but I'm sure I'll find out if it's bad...

Plus, those twin T3's push a lot of air.. Just reving the engine without the pressure pipe installed creates a lot of air flow.. Mix that with heat and I don't imagine the water will have any time to puddle or form into droplets..

Cheers,

 

There's two ways to properly introduce water into the engine.
One is thru vaporization, and the other atomization.

Vaporization will aid in dropping the MAT temps., and atom. will generally reduce detonation SLIGHTLY better then vaporization.

If you want to do vap., then you want the water introduced right by the turbos. For atomization, right by the intake valves/ plenum/ runners.

While what you have will work to some degree, having the water spray at the opposite wall like that will tend to make it puddle, if it isn't turned into steam very quickly, and unless your running alot of boost, you might not see IAT of over 200dF, or only after a few seconds in boost. So if your using a pressure switch you might be too early in the cycle for the water to vaporize.

And that 60 PSI pump is only really 40 if your running 20PSI of boost. And it's hard to atomize water well. ie on a pulling tractor they run like 250 PSI for the water on 60 PSI of boost.

Goggling for NACA will get ya to where there is some really accurate Water Injection Info., from when lives depended on it working well, ie WWII fighters.

 

Here's a pic of the injectors firing..



All installed...





Here's a small video (2.7 megs) of the injectors spraying.. >>>> here <<<<

Cheers,

 

Would you mind sharing what you used for injector bosses?

I was just going to use 1/2inch pipe hose clamed to 1/4NPT pipe nipple but you look like you found something that would work very well.

Also... i know i'm pushing.. would you mind sharing what that water rail is made of? looks like copper pipe (plumbing)

did you see my pictures?

 

I used 1/2" copper pipe for the rail and bosses.. I couldn't find any steel stock that had the correct ID so I used the 1/2" copper pipe as inserts in some slightly bigger steel stock..

Yea, I checked out your pictures.. What you're doing is a lot easier and would probably work just as well..

Cheers,

 

OK a little off topic, but where did you get your TBI hat? that would be perfect for my ram air setup. Then I would be able to look into this whole water injection setup.

 

That is an ATI carb hat for their procharger-carb setups..

Cheers,

 

I worked on my system today.

I found a 1/2 inch steel bushing in the hardware section at lowes that served as the perfect weldable injector boss. I cut the bushing at a 45 degree angle so that the injector will spray at the blades.

i'm using a old grey top fuel injector which is showing some problems. With about 45 psi of pressure (via corvette fuel pump) it will shoot a single stream about 20 feet. With my old GM injector it makes a nice 90 degree cone fog about 4 inches long.

I can't use those GM injectors, i want to save them for a rainy day or anthor project. I'll probally just have to go to the junkyard for anthor single injector.

My corvette fuel pump died (they really don't like water) so for kicks i used a old washer pump to pump water "dead headed" to a fuel injector. Believe it or not but the spray pattern was IDENTICAL to 45psi (measured/verified/regulated)

You can't argue with a back to back comparison, if figure if it doesn't preform as expected i'll use a pump like you guys.

Hey, this might be useful to you
http://www.emergent.com.au/200sx/diy_aid.html

I'll have pictures of my new setup tomarrow.

 

got my injector in the pipe today..

Boy i wish i could find a nice paint to paint htis intake.. i need a powder coater

 

welp, tried mine out tonight.. i definately need more water flow. I can't bog or even phase the idle and it seems like i should be able to.

It did manage to net about 15 hp (which is kinda wierd it would show up so nicely) on datamaster dyno. Seems smoother and less prone to detonate. I tested it the same night with and without water. (BTW. i'm using pure water)

I think i'll add anthor injector tomarrow

 

Excuse me for my ignorance, but I'd love to learn about this.

Why are you injecting water into the engine? At first when I read this thread I believed it was to cool down the turbos, but the pictures show the water going straight into the carb.

Explain? I'm more than willing to learn

 

Im betting some others that are considering this could acomplish it with a cold start injector stuff.

 

mindkiller - check this out..

B4Ctom1 - Easily, but won't provide a lot of water.. Some guys like to run 2:1 fuel to water ratio.. I'm pretty far from that still, but hopefully I will see some gains..

Cheers,

 

thanks BOTLFED:hail:

 

I must admit I am way out of the loop when it comes to water or alcohol injection , we live at such high altitude and when needed I have always run race gas.

 

It works surpizingly well.. try it

you'll like

 

well considering I intend to crank my procharger up to around 55,000 to 60,000 rpm (15-20#?) I may need to learn some about it.

 

SO far my only problem has been getting a pump to last.. I guess i need to come off the pocket and by a SHURflo

I've got a wide open switch rigged to have the system come on at about 1/3 throttle or greater.. (i've got a roots blower and 1/3 throttle is definately in the boost)

 

im sorry i realy dont understand the whole reason for behind the water injection thing can someone please explain the reason behind doin this

 

This was posted a few posts pack...
For cliff notes(aka from what i understand): a small amount of water sprayed into the engine will help cool the incoming air charge, lowering the chance off detonation. Detonation is caused when the fuel is not burned evenly or to early because of large amount of heat caused by a car that usualy has some type of forced induction. The alcohol i belive helps with the burn? Poweradder guys help me out... i guess i need to go to that link...

 

Actually, the cooling effect is rather minimal… but water has a fairly strong antidetonant effect resulting in a steadier burn with a much lower tendency to preignite.

 

This is one of many posts on turbobuick.com about water/alcohol injection being used to cool boosted air and as a fuel source.


CLICK HERE

 

Man, I could only read about half way through the first page of that thread before I lost interest in those morons (hopefully they eventually got to the right conclusion, but based on the answers he was getting I doubt it).

In a nutshell:
- water is an antidetonant
- alcohol is a fuel
- water has roughly 2x the latent heat of vaporization of most alcohols, so it will cool the intake charge about 2x as well
The only reasons to waste your time with adding alcohol to your water injection setup is if
- your fuel system is insufficient to feed the engine (of course, it’s a half assed way to fix that problem and if that’s what you’re doing you might as well save up some money now for a new engine for when one of the cylinders goes lean and lets go)
- to keep the water from freezing (don’t even think of using antifreeze… in the combustion chamber it will actually raise combustion temps and slowing combustion which ends up burning stuff up)

 

i was thinking the same thing (but i would have said it, in way where i dont offend everyone) and that seems to be just a poor mans NOS

 

Theres some interesting NACA papers on the subject. Based upon WWII supercharged aircraft.

The recycled system (using cooled exhaust vapor for water supply) is sweet, but impractical for street.

I'm busy chasing belt issues...

BW

 

One thing to remember if you are relying on water injection is to plug power back into the water pump after changing your headgaskets. Not that I forgot that or anything. Oh well. I needed to get a procharger and new engine anyway.

 

I've got it on my ride and I honestly think its quite worth it. ONe of the buick guys took his intercooler off in favor of water injection because he thought the intercooler worked as a heat flywheel.

I dont have a temp sensor after the blower (roots blown car) but i do have one before.. The things i've notice when i spray is that the temp drops from about 106ish to ambient in a matter of a second or two and its usually the only time i get 50+mph tire spin from a roll... instead of about a good 40mph SO i figure its working. The datamaster dyno graphs look alot better... usually a ton more power down low and about 15 more at top (i don't think i'm spraying enough that would explain why the additional power isn't linear)

I don't buy the alcohol thing either.. gasoline works much better as a fuel and water works much better as a cooler so why use alcohol... well I talked to a few guys even Steve at SMC and the ones who have tested it in high boost turbo cars have found more power with different mix's of alcohol/water than just water. Steve said its easier to spray a ton of alcohol cause the motor is less picky about it... theres a fine line with too much water before the motor dogs but its not so picky with alcohol.

I'm going to continue with my kit.. Maybe just stick it on water or a very mild water/alky mix. I'll never have to tune so hot that if the water injection fails i'll be introuble.

 

If you got the impression that I was saying that it wasn’t worth it you couldn’t be more wrong… I was just arguing with the reasoning about what it does.

That’s Bruce P. (sometimes goes by Grumpy). I think that he started posting here again recently. His point was that he’s gotten to the point where the stock IC was more of a restriction then a benefit, and the stock design isn’t great WRT placement especially. I don’t remember if he is running H2O yet (I’m pretty sure he intends to), but the initial setup was with the car converted to a 749 ECM and then running an auxiliary injector in the intake pipe triggered by the ECM, using the fuel spray to cool the intake path.

heh, here, I found the page

It would be pretty sweet if you rigged it so that your water tank had a sensor in it (like the low coolant sensors that GM uses in the 4th gen overflows) and used that to automatically switch between tunes

 

Ok, I browsed thru the topic, but I didn't see anything about using fuel injectors for water use. I can't imagine that it wont wreak havoc on the injector seeing water inside it.

I don't mean while it runs, sure it might be just fine. But let that thing sit and watch the injector rust up and destroy the pintle. Yes, this is just speculation, but I would like to see if somebody has evidence to prove wrong.

Maybe I missed the injector type and Bottlefed is using water injectors??

 

Bob Harris posted a lenghty message at DIY-EFI several years ago where he went thur the actual chemistry of the reaction in the chamber with and without water. It signifigantly changes the process.

One other item is how the water is introduced into the system. For charge cooling you want to use vaporization, and for the best in detaontion control you want atomization. Also, depending on which of the two your doing some alky might be helpful.

I'm not running water injection yet.
I have an extra injector that I'm firing full time on the throttle body to help drop the MAT temp.. And so far on the hottest of days and other then under LONG periods of boost I'm matching the oem I/C plus some.

And as a side bennie, the extra extremely well vaporized addition fuel helps with mileage.

But you need to be careful when changing a dry manifold to being partically wet. ie in my case I relocated the floor of the plenum so any large droplets of fuel that landed on the plenum floor had to be vaporized to get off the plenum floor and into a runner.

One nice thing about various ecm codes is that they have things like changing the wastgate solenoids duty cycle as a function of knock. So while you can rely on the knock sensor to trim back on timing if the WI fails, you can also use the wastegate strategy to turn on more water.