An Acetone Mileage Test

I don't usually drive long distances but I had to see a doctor in a town 60 miles away so I thought I'd give it a go.

I took my '87 Mazda 4x4 truck. It has 208,000 miles on it. When it was new I used to get about 22mpg highway. Currently it gets about 17mpg.

I used a tad less then 2 ounces for 10 gallons.

And the answer is...

I got 18.9mpg or an 11% increase. Not bad since gas prices in my area are now $2.439.

Next time I'll try 3 ounces per 10 gallons and see what happens.

Todd
I

How much does acetone cost for 128 ounces?

The reason I ask is that I can get slightly better gas mileage by using premium rather than regular in my car. However, the cost per mile is still actually higher when I do that.

I'll swag a guess and say a small bottle of Walgreens nail polish remover is about a buck...

1 quart @ $5.55 plus tax at the hardware store.

I think a gallon can of acetone is a couple bux.

I can't tell you how much I paid for the acetone since I always have a variety of solvents on hand including acetone.

From my point of view, given a local gas price of $2.40 a 10% savings makes the gas price equivalent to $2.16 and well worth the price of a few ounces of acetone.

Todd

So what's the Board Consensus on using pure acetone in concentrations of 2-3 ozs per 10 gallons of regular?? Why not? If you'd use a can of Berryman's and not bat an eye, then why not a wee bit of acetone?

Heck, the risk is totally marginal at these low concentrations IMO. I'm starting a trial tomorrow. Let ya'll know how it goes within a week.....

I'm in .

Start Thursday.

Hwy. driving, 70 mph, cross the cont. divide (alt. 5600) to GFLS, return.. Eleven hours total.

1.25 oz to 10 gal.. 94 Jeep XJ, 318, K&N FIPK, MOPAR Controller, Condensator, ARB, now average 22 mpg.

Let you know Easter.

Tom

Just filled my tank 26gal and 7oz. of acetone on an 88gmc pu truck with 4.3. We will see how it fairs in this experiment .

I submit that Todd et. al. should let us know his results after a few tankfuls, as the acetone may ALSO clean out some gunk in the system. Remember the article said to add the acetone every OTHER tankful. I have some fuel system cleaner that I will put in my vehicles first, and then after another tank ful or so will start trying the acetone.

P.S. Per my above post, I suspect that at least some of Todd's 11.8% improvement is due to clean out. Also, WARNING--the article stated that PURE acetone must be used, and that SOMETIMES nail polish remover is pure acetone. For fun I looked up DW's nail polish remover last night. Acetone was only 1 of 17 ingredients! So read your labels!

I'm game. I've got an old '87 VW Jetta 4 cyl that's on its last leg and a '73 Ford F-100 6 cyl truck. I've never been able to accurately check the mileage on the Jetta because the odometer doesn't work. But I can get pretty close by conciously monitoring the distance I drive between fillups. The old truck was getting 10 - 12 mpg the last time I checked it but it had some carb problems that I've fixed since then. I keep acetone out in the shop for my leather work and also use it for cleaning kinfe blades before I etch them in FeCl. I think I paid $4.99 a gallon a year or so ago. I'll post my findings if I find anything to post about.

TP,

Could you recheck the article to find the passage where it's stated to use acetone "every OTHER tankfull"? I cannot find it for the life of me....

Sorry, it is in the article that the first article was taken from:

http://www.lubedev.com/smartgas/additive.htm

Also, as I noted in the other thread, the activity that the acetone is supposed to produce is similar to that of the ring magnets I had on my car. The mfr of those magnets listed test results on various vehicles, and I saw that the better mpg a car had before adding the magnets, the greater per cent increase was achieved with the magnets. If that will also be the case here, the article stated one could expect a 15-35% increase with acetone. Therefore, I expect Todd, starting only at 22mpg, will probably max out at 15-18% improvement after a few tankfuls...

Thanks TP - found it....

"The author suggests not to continuously add acetone to each and every tank of fuel, rather only to every other tankful. The slightest amount of acetone seems to be highly effective for mileage and significant emissions reduction. Most diesel fuel is oily and a tiny amount of acetone has zero effect on injectors--in case that is a worry. Any such problems would have shown up after nearly five decades. In the past we have added the Torco two-cycle G7 smokeless synthetic gasoline additive to diesel fuel to make the fuel even more slippery."

(edited for typos)

In that article, the author also states that mileage is bad in the winter, so that he doesn't even bother to test except in summer....So as spring comes, Todd's results(and everyone else's) will probably get better...

TP,

Thanks for the article link. I'll have to read it at breakfast since I'm interested in the every other tank part.

What I'm really interested in trying this on is my garden tractor. It's about 14 years old with about 1,400 hours. It gets rotten "milage". I probably use as much gas in it as I do in my truck.

From my perspective, getting some increase is better than no increase. I'd be perfectly happy getting only a 10% increase since it's, essentially, free.

Todd

Is the "every other tankfull" requirement consistent with the rest of the data and charts?? Hmmmm.....

put 4.5 oz in a 27 gal tank..... used a Turkey Baster to get it out of a 1 qt can, which was 3.59 at the local hardware store...

Someone here said they thought acetone was $5.50 plus tax--2x2, which hardware store was that?. Just went to Tractor Supply tonight; they want $10.50 for a gallon can! The quart price was about what the previous poster mentoined.. That is STILL less than 2 cents per treated gallon, though, still well worth it. I have to wonder if acetone is YAPP(Yet Another Petroleum Product). Anyone know?

I'm not a chemist so I have no idea, but I wonder if there could be any harmful side effects. IIRC, when ethanol first came on the market one manufacturer (I think it was Chrysler) said not to use it as it would damage some of the synthetic materials in the fuel line (couplings, etc.). I'm sure that ethannol is no longer a problem, and I realize a couple of ounces is pretyy small, but couldn't help but wonder.

Ogre,

Well I was a research chemist at one point in my life. Don't sweat it.

Todd

Well I screwed up! I forgot that it was about 2-3oz. acetone to 10 gal. gasoline and thought it was 2-3 oz./gal!! I am pouring a 32oz. container this stuff into one of my 15gal. pickup truck tanks, figuring the whole can ($4.97 at Walmart) would do the 15 gal. of gas just about right! Having nothing better to think about while pouring, I start to redo the math in my head. OH NO!!!. So, I have roughly 25 oz. of Acetone into 15 gal. of gasoline. Should make for an interesting test.

Starting milage is 10.3 mpg.

Yikes!!!

Twin Cougors

Go buy two 6 gallon jerry cans and a siphon hose from Wally world, pull out 12 gallons, and then fill your tank up with fresh gas. Then just use two or three gallons from the jerry cans for your next 5 or six fillups and you will have approximately the right ratio (just doing the math in my head, you should double check using a calculator).

PN

P.S. it never hurts to have a few extra jerry cans. I have seen them recently for $5 apiece, and the siphon hose for $3.

Thanks for the test TwinCougars

Well Twin Cougars...you single handidly will be able to resolve the issue of if acetone will harm rubber gaskets, fuel injectors, gaskets, fuel pumps, etc. I really do not think you have anything to worry about. The engine might run a little rough, due to the fact that the acetone is cleaning out all the lead buildup and old gunk in the engine and fuel system, but if it were me, I think I would go ahead and fill up when it got down to about half a tank. That will get you down to only about 4 times the usual amount of acetone required.

I have a 2000 Excursion with a 10 cil. engine that gets 15 mpg on the road, 8.5 mpg driving my wife back and forth to school (short 2 mile trip both ways am and pm). But usually average10.5 mpg around town. It has a 45 gal. tank, and it cost me $75.00 to fill up yesterday!

I'm headed to Wallymart tomorrow and later putting in 8 oz. of Wallymarts best acetone. Like someone else had commented earlier, if you read the ingredients of most carburator/injector cleaners, they have acetone in them anyway. Can't see how such a small dose mixed into 40 gallons could do much harm, and if I can raise my MPG's 10% to 15%, I'll be one happy guy!

I put some in my tank today. Didn't kill it anyway.
Acetone, according to my my Materials Handbopok (first edition 1929, latest 1944!) is an alcohol, comes from grain. Is that right Todd?
And I got a quart from Tractor Supply, $3.75.
Fred

I can't wait to give it a try the 74 Scout II's best milage yet was 13.5.

Today acetone is usually made from propane. Propane is usually extracted from natural gas, though it can be cracked from heavier hydrocarbons, such as pentane and hexane, and also as a byproduct gas from crude oil processing.

PN

Thanks PN. Still looking for advice on the cheapest buy for it....

Todd,

Do you feel that by using a different name-brand of gasoline you can increase your MPG up to 30% *without* even using acetone to start with? Personally, I think that's bull-phucky and all gasoline is pretty much the same chemically.....

Here's a beauty supply store you can buy pure acetone for $12.60 per gallon (128 ounces).

http://www.nataliproducts.com/nailaccess.html

Lonewolf,

There is a "gasoline" standard set by the feds. All the majors do is put some additives into the standard gasoline. So, no, I don't think it really matters which brand you buy.

Todd

LONEWOLF said:

Todd,

Do you feel that by using a different name-brand of gasoline you can increase your MPG up to 30% *without* even using acetone to start with? Personally, I think that's bull-phucky and all gasoline is pretty much the same chemically.....

Click to expand...

Hey LW,


Not meaning to speak for Todd.

The article where all this came about from said to stay away from gasoline that has ratios of Ethanol at 10% or greater. The lower the ethanol ratio the better, as the alcohol attracts water molecules which then will not burn.

The article stated the best places to fuel up are Texaco's and Chevron's for that reason alone.

Again, you'll have to back to that article but from the homepage that contains the Acetone article the author also lists several other things one can do to greatly improve gas mileage, such as installing a thermostat where the engine runs at 195 degrees allowing the fuel additives to work properly, and also using only oils marketed for motorcycles as they have loopholed around industry standards for oil additives that take away from fuel efficiency and less engine friction.

Please verify these from the website though as that was from memory retention and I might have misstated a couple of those. I'll go find and post the main website for everyone's convenience. Be back in a minute.

You can find the better fuel mileage stuff at www.smartgas.net

lotsaloans,

Thanks for the recall, but.... I was just noticing a few "quirkisms" in this fellow's research.

I've done mileage per gallon comparison between most all the major and minor gas stations in my area, and despite massive price differences and no doubt, formulation differences, I have no personal evidence that the habitual using of one brand over another makes *any* real-life difference in what my average MPG is. My evidence is not scientific, but good enough for me (YMMV).....

LONEWOLF said:

lotsaloans,

Thanks for the recall, but.... I was just noticing a few "quirkisms" in this fellow's research.

I've done mileage per gallon comparison between most all the major and minor gas stations in my area, and despite massive price differences and no doubt, formulation differences, I have no personal evidence that the habitual using of one brand over another makes *no* real-life difference in what my average MPG is. My evidence is not scientific, but good enough for me (YMMV).....

Click to expand...

Understood. I'm still going to try the Acetone test this weekend on a 6 1/2 hour round trip.

A long 4 part report on gasoline.A must read,everything you want to know about gasoline.




http://www.faqs.org/faqs/autos/gasoline-faq/part1/


Subject: 2. Table of Contents

1. Introduction, Intent, Acknowledgements, and Abbreviations
1.1 Introduction and Intent.
1.2 Acknowledgements.
1.3 Abbreviations.
2. Table of Contents
3. What Advantage will I gain from reading this FAQ?
4. What is Gasoline?
4.1 Where does crude oil come from?.
4.2 When will we run out of crude oil?.
4.3 What is the history of gasoline?
4.4 What are the hydrocarbons in gasoline?
4.5 What are oxygenates?
4.6 Why were alkyl lead compounds added?
4.7 Why not use other organometallic compounds?
4.8 What do the refining processes do?
4.9 What energy is released when gasoline is burned?
4.10 What are the gasoline specifications?
4.11 What are the effects of the specified fuel properties?
4.12 Are brands different?
4.13 What is a typical composition?
4.14 Is gasoline toxic or carcinogenic?
4.15 Is unleaded gasoline more toxic than leaded?
4.16 Is reformulated gasoline more toxic than unleaded?
4.17 Are all oxygenated gasolines also reformulated gasolines?
5. Why is Gasoline Composition Changing?
5.1 Why pick on cars and gasoline?
5.2 Why are there seasonal changes?
5.3 Why were alkyl lead compounds removed?
5.4 Why are evaporative emissions a problem?
5.5 Why control tailpipe emissions?
5.6 Why do exhaust catalysts influence fuel composition?
5.7 Why are "cold start" emissions so important?
5.8 When will the emissions be "clean enough"?
5.9 Why are only some gasoline compounds restricted?
5.10 What does "renewable" fuel or oxygenate mean?
5.11 Will oxygenated gasoline damage my vehicle?
5.12 What does "reactivity" of emissions mean?
5.13 What are "carbonyl" compounds?
5.14 What are "gross polluters"?
6. What do Fuel Octane ratings really indicate?
6.1 Who invented Octane Ratings?
6.2 Why do we need Octane Ratings?
6.3 What fuel property does the Octane Rating measure?
6.4 Why are two ratings used to obtain the pump rating?
6.5 What does the Motor Octane rating measure?
6.6 What does the Research Octane rating measure?
6.7 Why is the difference called "sensitivity"?
6.8 What sort of engine is used to rate fuels?
6.9 How is the Octane rating determined?
6.10 What is the Octane Distribution of the fuel?
6.11 What is a "delta Research Octane number"?
6.12 How do other fuel properties affect octane?
6.13 Can higher octane fuels give me more power?
6.14 Does low octane fuel increase engine wear?
6.15 Can I mix different octane fuel grades?
6.16 What happens if I use the wrong octane fuel?
6.17 Can I tune the engine to use another octane fuel?
6.18 How can I increase the fuel octane?
6.19 Are aviation gasoline octane numbers comparable?
6.20 Can mothballs increase octane?
7. What parameters determine octane requirement?
7.1 What is the Octane Number Requirement of a Vehicle?
7.2 What is the effect of Compression ratio?
7.3 What is the effect of changing the air-fuel ratio?
7.4 What is the effect of changing the ignition timing
7.5 What is the effect of engine management systems?
7.6 What is the effect of temperature and Load?
7.7 What is the effect of engine speed?
7.8 What is the effect of engine deposits?
7.9 What is the Road Octane Number of a Fuel?
7.10 What is the effect of air temperature?.
7.11 What is the effect of altitude?.
7.12 What is the effect of humidity?.
7.13 What does water injection achieve?.
8. How can I identify and cure other fuel-related problems?
8.1 What causes an empty fuel tank?
8.2 Is knock the only abnormal combustion problem?
8.3 Can I prevent carburetter icing?
8.4 Should I store fuel to avoid the oxygenate season?
8.5 Can I improve fuel economy by using quality gasolines?
8.6 What is "stale" fuel, and should I use it?
8.7 How can I remove water in the fuel tank?
8.8 Can I use unleaded on older vehicles?
8.9 How serious is valve seat recession on older vehicles?
9. Alternative Fuels and Additives
9.1 Do fuel additives work?
9.2 Can a quality fuel help a sick engine?
9.3 What are the advantages of alcohols and ethers?
9.4 Why are CNG and LPG considered "cleaner" fuels.
9.5 Why are hydrogen-powered cars not available?
9.6 What are "fuel cells" ?
9.7 What is a "hybrid" vehicle?
9.8 What about other alternative fuels?
9.9 What about alternative oxidants?
10. Historical Legends
10.1 The myth of Triptane
10.2 From Honda Civic to Formula 1 winner.
11. References
11.1 Books and Research Papers
11.2 Suggested Further Reading

I did some checking last night on price per gallon:

Home Depot: $13 and change
Meijer: $12 and change
Walmart: $11.47
Tractor Supply $10 and change

Once again, where is that hardware store where it is $5.50 plus tax?