Will Pump gas plus octane booster work on 310?

[ChvyCruzen]

I tried to buy 100LL from local airport but they wont let me. I doubt that any other local airport will allow me to get AV gas.

Will 93 octane plus octane booster work well enough? How much octane booster can I put in with 5 gallons?

Any suggestions?
Thanks,
Matt

[Aceman]

Don't use octane booster. Do a search and you will see why. Have you called your local fuel distributor? They usually carry race in 55 gal. drums or 5 gal buckets. The place near my house even sells it out of the pump!

[GPracer2500]

If there is absolutely no way for you to obtain genuine racing fuel (or 100LL) then there are only two ways I would attempt to raise the octane rating of pump fuel. First way is to get toluene from a chemical supply house or paint store (I've looked for it at Lowes and Home Depot with no luck). It's an aromatic hydrocabon and is already present in most pump fuels. Do a Google search and you'll find mixing ratios and predicted final octane ratings. Xylene (more commonly found) is another option but it seems a less popular option--not sure why exactly. If you search you'll find info on that too. The second way is to add tetraethyl lead (TEL) to pump fuel. The only TEL additive I'm aware of is Octane Supreme 130 (http://www.kemcooil.com/product_info.php?pId=61) made by Kemco. I've not used it personally, but believe it to be a quality product.

Don't bother with auto parts store type octane boosters. You'll never get meaningful increases in octane rating with those products.

[ChvyCruzen]

I called another local airstrip and they said they can sell me 100LL so I might be ok.

I forgot about toulene! I heard that it can be used to bump octane, but dont know where to find it. I am in NY so I doubt they sell that in Lowes or Home Depot.

I'll check out that Kemco company and see what I run into. If it seems like quality stuff and in the long run is cheaper than AV gas, then I might try it.

Thanks for the advice guys!

[lee37vernon]

after reading this post i've been looking all day on the net about toluene and xylene as octane boosters . looks like its really worth doing . as we have 2 stroke oil in the mix too we get the extra lube the fuel may need .
i can even see on my fuel providers website the chemival composition of their fuel , which has about 25 - 30 % aromatics in already to bump it to 99 ron / 87 mon ( about 93 pump octane number )

aromatics should be about 45 % MAX . so i worked out on safe side 10% added toluene (xylene would give slightly better results ) gives me 94,9 pon / 89 mon / 101.2 ron

not bad considering that its only £1.76 litre , about $3.50 .
and vp c12 here is around £80 / $150 for 5 US gallons .

will be trying this when i have my 330 top end on and i know the compression its at ..

anyone else done it ?

[Creech52]

First you need to know if you even need AV or Race fuel. Just because its a big bore doesnt exactly qualify it to need higher octane, and in most instances if you dont need higher octane using race fuel will not give you any benifiets other then the high price smell. Second 90% of octane boosters are useless. Look into race shops for boosters that actually work. I have heard that the NOS stuff actually works but I doubt it. Also most airports are FAA regulated and they have rules, and one of them is they are not allowed to sell AV fuel for uses other then in aircraft, so maybe if you tell them its for a hobby plane or ultralite or something they will sell it. If your worried about the price of race fuel try mixing it with 93, 50/50 mix of 94 and 110 will be somewhere in the 100 range. If all else fails switch to alchy:devil:

[christophere251]

torco fuels make a "real" octane booster that works exellent. u can boost 93 octane as high as 107. i run mine at 104 which is 16oz to 5 gal. The bottle is 20 buck and it treats 10 gallons of fuel. it also has lead in it to lower exhaust temps and lube valve seats/

[lee37vernon]

mmm .. 93 to 107 ? are you sure your reading the label right ?.

these octane boosters in a bottle will say on them something like ' increases octane number by 14 points ' well 1 point is 0.1 octane ,a bit misleading cause they make out its 1 whole octane when its not .
so in your example then maybe you are really running 94.4 octane .
i do not beleive anything in a 16 oz bottle could possibly increase the octane level a genuine 14 octane (140 points ! )

not picking a fight just going on what i read , i spent all day on net looking into this stuff after reading this thread , was very informative , i certainly learnt a few things ..

[250r4life]

i as well as pretty much my whole group uses av gas... there is nothing illegal about it. we drive right up to the pump...

[ChvyCruzen]

Thanks for all the help guys. I found a local airport about 15 miles out that sells 100LL. I called the owner/manager and he said just pull up and fuel up. Its weird cause there's no fences no security or nothing - no one even stopped to ask what I was doing.

AV gas sure smells good!