Water Injection - Version 2.0

[KC_Nelson]

The first version failed with flying colrs, actually was never fully operational and too complicated.

This version is controlled by an MSD RPM Switch that turns on the pump at 2500rpm. The pump produces 90psi with a flow of about 2 gallon per minute.

The Nordic owners might notice that the trim pump has been relocated on my boat to reclaim the storage area.

[KC_Nelson]

The photo below shows a very simple manifold with one nozzle that directs a mist fog just above the intake butterfly. It has proven to be very simple and very effective, the draw of the engine consumes a huge amount of air and the mist fully.

I looked like a dork as I was driving around the lake with my engine hatch half way open while I dialed in the system. The engine hatch makes a very effective sail.

Water is drawn from the speedo feed, a valve is in place to turn off the flow when in the salt. As soon as the weather heats up, I'll initiate some testing and try adding another nozzle.

Bennefits should include more torque, cleaner combustion, advanced timing, and potentially cleaner oil from less carbon.

more to follow.....

[KC_Nelson]

the picture

BTW: ANY 496HO Owner

Remove the plastic engine cover so that you can see the flame arrestor.... on top of the flame arrestor, look for lint build up because the engine cover matches the curved surface of the flame arrestor and blocks flow.... on the botton of the flame arrestor, look for bits of the serpentine belt that have blocked the flow of air....

I'll collect pics of mine the next time I'm in Havasu

[kevnmcd]

Keep us informed on how it works. Looks like a lot of work and $$$....be interested if you think the benefits are worth it when you are done.

[KC_Nelson]

I'm in it for about $200, that is $140 cheaper then the first version. A few weeks ago as I was dialing it in, the intake was cold to the touch, partially due to the air temps, my engine temps were 10 degrees different with it on vs. being off - not bad for a cold day, should have better results on a hot day.

My objectives are:
- lower the ambient temp flowing into the intake
- lower ambient should result in lower engine temps
- lower engine temps should result in less oil breakdown
- lower engine temps should result in less loss of HP
- creating a dense intake charge
- the evaporating water should make the intake more dense
- not all will evaporate, leading to steam in the combustion chambers
- steam is something like 30 times more powerful through expansion than gas
- helps to control the burn, making it more efficient
- eliminates detonation, allows ecu to use max timing advance
- timing is HP
- steam clean the combustion chamber
- eliminate any carbon build up, reduced potential for detonation
- hoping for the side benefit of cleaner oil, less carbon

This should work really well along the Colorado River because the air is so hot and so dry. The next component will be to add a filter so that the nozzle does not clog. i can turn it on and off by removing the fuse for the MSD, also a valve on the pump intake to close off the water supply if I have the boat in the salt.

[KC_Nelson]

The current components came from:

Home Depot
Summit Racing
www.pumpworld.net

It may look like alot of work but it was not bad at all, but there was a significant amount of thought put into the design to keep it simple and functional.

Really wild watching the motor suck in the mist fog above 3000rpm, but then when I think about it the intake can handle over 800 cubic feet of air per minute. That is sucking in the air from a 9'x9'x9' storage shed in one minute. For me to cool that much air by 40 degrees will probably take four to six mister nozzles. The intake manifold is going to get its own misters to help eliminate heat and cool the air inside of the engine bay.

My first nozzle manifold had six nozzles that directed mist over all sides of the flame arrestor, the bench test almost soaked me because I had so much mist. I'm starting with one nozzle pointed above the intake butterfly and will gradually add additional nozzles as the temps increase - there will be four nozzles that cool the top of the intake manifold.

[kevnmcd]

I will check it out on our March 26-28 trip. You might look into marketing this kind of thing.....there are a lot of peeps out there that could probably benefit from this when the temps are pushing 115-120*.

[KC_Nelson]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (kevnmcd @ Mar. 08 2004, 10:28 am)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">I will check it out on our March 26-28 trip. Â*You might look into marketing this kind of thing.....there are a lot of peeps out there that could probably benefit from this when the temps are pushing 115-120*.[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
I agree, it will not add HP but it can restore HP that is lost to the temps of Havasu. It should be very effective in the battle to combat hot dry air. There are a few boats on Havasu that run misters to create a cool air charge, but they are not telling anyone about their edge. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

[KC_Nelson]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (kevnmcd @ Mar. 08 2004, 10:28 am)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">I will check it out on our March 26-28 trip. Â*You might look into marketing this kind of thing.....there are a lot of peeps out there that could probably benefit from this when the temps are pushing 115-120*.[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
I really want to get cooler air into the motor, for me that will drop the engine temps and drop the oil temps - from an engine longevity perspective those are good concepts.

[digginfordollars]

Wouldn't a superchiller accomplish the same thing without pumping water into your engine? Or is it not as efficient as a direct mist?

[kevnmcd]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (digginfordollars @ Mar. 08 2004, 4:19 pm)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Wouldn't a superchiller accomplish the same thing without pumping water into your engine? Or is it not as efficient as a direct mist?[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
D4$ - I don't believe one of those would work without a supercharger or fit on the stock intake set up for that matter. Â*Would probably be too restrictive on the air flow in a N/A motor. Â*Also, a lot more money than what KC has into this one. Just my .02

[digginfordollars]

I thought I just seen an article on installing a chiller on a N/A engine in one of the mags. I'll have to go back through and look again, maybe it was a blown engine. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif

[kevnmcd]

You could have...that was just my uneducated guess as to why it wouldn't work.

[digginfordollars]

It was blown. 454 w/procharger. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/sad.gif

[KC_Nelson]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (digginfordollars @ Mar. 08 2004, 4:19 pm)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">Wouldn't a superchiller accomplish the same thing without pumping water into your engine? Or is it not as efficient as a direct mist?[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
A super chiller would be great - especially with a blower attached to it !! Yes, it would cool the air. They are very effective.

From what I have read and explored.....

With an unlimited supply of cold water I could use a water/air inter-cooler, about $600 plus requires air ducting and a different pump, adds weight, requires huge cubic space that could only be accomodated under the engine - now we would have to pull the motor to slide the intercooler underneith...... ouch.

On the cooling side:
- cooler air is more dense, more dense equates to more fill for the combustion chamber
- cooler air helps to lower engine temps
- cooler air helps to cool the valves

There are other benefits to getting atomized water into the combustion chamber:
- mist turns to steam something like 30 times the volume of gas, expanding steam equates to torgue
- mist turning to steam has a small by product - oxygen
- methanol has a huge by product - more oxygen
- water/steam absorbs heat way better than air and carries the heat out of the combustion chamber
- helps to control the combustion chamber burn, slowing to be more efficient and more complete
- reduces the potential for detonation
- does a great job of steam cleaning the combustion chambers

People place water injection post turbo intercooler and see significant drops in temperature for the charged air. This allows them to run their timing way advanced and extract more HP out of the motor without it self destructing. Hot air causes the ECU to back the timing way off, because the combustion chamber will detonate many degrees before it should - the knock sensor picks this up and backs off the timing. Our more modern motors compare the ambient temps coming into the intake with the absolute temp inside the manifold MAT, considering air presure as well MAP - and pre-retards the ignition before the knock sensor hears the detonation. The knock sensor becomes a backup to the calculations efforts of the ECU.

I'm trying to trick the ECU into thinking it has cool dense air so that it will not back off the timing- doing so by providing cool dense air. I'm also trying to cool down the internals of the motor, my motor runs strong when it is cooler outside and before heat soke sets in. Once the block is heat soaked my oil presure is lower, all of the 496HOs are this way.

I've read that water injection on a non-asperated motor does not have any significant benefits under normal operating conditions. To me, the heat of Havasu far exceeds normal operating conditions. I've also read that the major manufacturers are well aware of the benefits of water injection, but they do not think people will fill the gas tank and the water tank - no concerns about the water tank on the boat. Saab is now installing water injection on their motors.

Also hoping that the steam cleaning of the combustion chamber will help to keep the oil cleaner.

Something to think about.....

[KC_Nelson]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (digginfordollars @ Mar. 08 2004, 4:44 pm)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">I thought I just seen an article on installing a chiller on a N/A engine in one of the mags. I'll have to go back through and look again, maybe it was a blown engine. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/confused.gif[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
Find that!!!

[digginfordollars]

Water injection has been around for years but something about sending it down my carb gives me the heebie-jeebies http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wow.gif You're right though, Havasu would be an ideal place to utilize its benefits. That article was in Family and Performance Boating, March 2004. Good luck KC.

[TooMuchFun]

I've been asking around and investigating putting a superchiller only on my EFI engine, as mine clearly performs better in the cool weather. What I am hearing from all the mechanics is the same as kevnmcd, that it cannot be done without adding the blower as well, and/or changing out some things. Something about it not being compatible as a bolt on alone part.

Any info. would help here, for I agree with diggin for $$, want to find a superchiller/intercooler system without the blower add-on (expense + I would have to buy a new beefed up drive to handle the hp) and I don't have the techno. savvy to keep up with a misting system down my engine ports.

TooMuchFun

[digginfordollars]

I think KC has a pretty good system going but where I see the problem (I'm probably wrong) is keeping the misters shooting mist and not water drops with the hard water in our lakes. My mist system at home, which uses the same misters, will clog up from calcium deposits within a week of non-use. If you don't get an atomized mist then you are adding water to your fuel without the cooling effect. KC, maybe adding a tee fitting to drain the system when the boat is laid up during the work week or better yet, a port to add conditioner to keep the misters and the manifold from developing calcium buildup. Maybe I'm making more into this than needs to be, but I like the idea if it works. It's free horsepower in the summer months when you really want it. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif

[KC_Nelson]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (digginfordollars @ Mar. 08 2004, 8:29 pm)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">I think KC has a pretty good system going but where I see the problem (I'm probably wrong) is keeping the misters shooting mist and not water drops with the hard water in our lakes. My mist system at home, which uses the same misters, will clog up from calcium deposits within a week of non-use. If you don't get an atomized mist then you are adding water to your fuel without the cooling effect. KC, maybe adding a tee fitting to drain the system when the boat is laid up during the work week or better yet, a port to add conditioner to keep the misters and the manifold from developing calcium buildup. Maybe I'm making more into this than needs to be, but I like the idea if it works. It's free horsepower in the summer months when you really want it. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/biggrin.gif[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
Your concerns regarding hard water are valid. At Home Depot they sell a charcoal based water filter that removes the minerals, I have one in the garage but it is not on the boat yet. A drain valve is a great idea that I had not considered, easy to add to the water system. The nice thing is that everything from Home Depot is rated for 110+ psi with standard fitting - easy to add onto my system.

As far as a marine intercooler.... five or six months ago there was a great write up in HotRod magazine regarding adding turbos to motors, they listed some great resource for intercoolers that included water/air marine applications. Using cool lake water is far more efficient than ambient air, but one of the intercoolers was easily $600 and outside of my project budget. An intercoole capable of dropping air temps down from ambient to the temp of the water would have to be 100 percent efficient, it would be huge to support 800 cfm - larger and more expensive than I care for at this time.

There are multiple types of misters available, the high end are pure foggers that require 240+ psi, then the ones like mine that require 70+ psi, other ones like arizona misters that require only 27+ psi - the difference will be the droplet size, the higher the presure the smaller the droplet size. The 240+ psi is used for commercial meat packers, the fog is so cold that it almost freezes in the atmosphere, requires stainless steel manifold to deal with the preasure and cold temps. The 70+ psi misters will work with any materials that you buy at Home Depot - my biggest supplier.

SO I'm back to these misters due to cost, availability and compatability of components for my application.

You'll have to come for a ride on my boat with the engine bay opened up a little bit. I watched a single mister on a cold day and it was impressive - consider that on a cold day the droplets are going to stay together and there is going to be much less atomization/evaporation then on a hot day. My initial fear was that the mister would drown the motor at idle, so I programmed the MSD RPM Switch to turn on the water pump at 2500rpm - at that rpm there is excellent air flow across the throttle plate (about 400cfm) - the motor literally sucks everything it needs. After throttle shut down, the MSD turns off the pump and there is still presure in the mister manifold, it fogs for a moment and then trickles droplets that do not get sucked into the intake since the mister is pointing over the throttle plate. After my initial tests on the motor I'm comfortable having multiple misters going above 1500rpm, below there simply is not enough air being sucked into the motor for the mist to get past the throttle plate without turning into larger drops of water on the throttle plate.

When you think about the motors in our boats, the motors are not used for out of the corner acceleration - you go from idle to almost full throttle to get the boat on plane and then settle the rpms into a good cruise, your looking at 1/2 to full throttle to keep the boat on plane. This is the operational boundaries that I'm aiming towards with the wate rinjection.

With the 496HO, anything less than 2500rpm and my boat sits back into the water, so I want to set the water injection to provide as much mist as the motor can handle while it is keeping the boat on plane.

The first version had a computer with 3-d mapping to control the amount of water being injected, unfortunatly it did not work - reality is that we do not need that much sophistication for our application.

With this version, I want to get enough misters running that i can manually turn them on or off individually base dupon ambient temps - a light bulb just turne don in my brain!!

I have a three dollar plastic ball valve that controls the water inlet, if I add a few more three dollar ball valves between the pump and the misters then I have the ability to manually control the amount of mist based upon ambient temps.

So I'm thinking two misters for temps in the 90s, three for temps in the 110s, and four for temps above 110 degrees. That is very manageable in Havasu. May June is two misters, July August is three misters, Sept October is four misters and so on....

Thanks for the contributions to the thread and the design!!

[KC_Nelson]

Also, the design does not point the mister at the thottle plate, it points the mist across the throttle plate - so the intake must suck the mist into the intake manifold. This eliminates water flow into the manifold caused by a clogged mister or poor flow. Lots of thought and good ideas, thankfully the mister components are very inexpensive and lend themselves to change/re-design - all I need is more PCV pipe and Cristies glue!!

[Essex502]

When I was still drag racing...we used to use a "boxed" intake manifold with dry ice to chill the air going into the motor. Take it from me - it worked! No doubt that cooler air makes more power.

Keep up the R&D, KC!

[Red Horse]

Sounds very impresive KC. It is neat to take an idea and plan it out, engineer the hell out of it and then put it to production and have it work.


Have done the dry ice thing on the intake as well.

Something else to think about. Cooler fuel. Maybe you could run the fuel line near a mister and help cool that as well. But doesnt the 496 have a cooler to prevent vapor lock. Maybe you could improve that.

Or you could get a jet. My engine runs about 120 on a hot day. LOTS of water. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/cool.gif

[its all good]

[QUOTE]Or you could get a jet. SOUNDS LIKE BEST IDEA YET.

[kevnmcd]

</span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td>Quote (Red Horse @ Mar. 09 2004, 07:45 am)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE">....It is neat to take an idea and plan it out.....[/QUOTE]<span id='postcolor'>
I think you meant to say something like rad or bitchin' or cool or awesome......but neat? Don't want peeps to get the wrong idea about you. http://www.lasvegashotboats.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/wink.gif

[KC_Nelson]

It is fun, I'm heading to Home Depot to buy the ball valves tonight. If this heat keeps up I might have to head for Havasu this weekend to conduct some testing !