JACKPOT!!!!!!!!

As some of you know, I haul fuel when I am not detailing. Well, we just won a contract to haul AVGAS (Aviation Gasoline) which is 102 octane leaded gas!! As part of the process, I am REQUIRED to "bucket drain" all compartments into an "evap tank", or a 55 gallon drum without a lid so the fuel can evaporate. I figure I can scavenge 25 gallons a week of this high test stuff.

Question is, what do I need to do besides remove the cats do I need to do on my 96 with OBD1 conversion to run this stuff?

Leaded gas will kill your O2s almost instantly. Find someone with a classic to sell the gas to. Our cars do not need high octane racing fuel and will see no added performance from it. An old high compression big block, however, is a different story.

You can send it to me for the 67 GTO!!!

Cadet57 wrote:

Krzdimond wrote:

Question is, what do I need to do besides remove the cats do I need to do on my 96 with OBD1 conversion to run this stuff?

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That's just too damn funny!!!

jayoldschool wrote:

Leaded gas will kill your O2s almost instantly. Find someone with a classic to sell the gas to. Our cars do not need high octane racing fuel and will see no added performance from it. An old high compression big block, however, is a different story.

Did not know that. I remember the performance loss when we went from leaded to unleaded, then to this eunich-ised E-10 slop. Just figured if I removed the cats and O2's I would gain performance AND mileage.

81X11 wrote:

You can send it to me for the 67 GTO!!!

You can get this stuff at any local airport...... for a price.....

^ Yep. My dad used to run it in his Trans Am drag car back in the day.

Great idea just wont work.You need at least 11 to 1 compression and I think a much cooler
plug to see any difference!I ran that stuff every Friday and Saturday night in my 429
Cyclone and I always had to change my plugs before I filled up at my local airport way
back in 1973 and 74.Man did it make a difference in the way that motor ran hell it even
idled smoother and the throttle response was incredible.
It is also a federal offense to put that in your car if you are interested.
Hey Nick what would this leaded gas do to the valve seats in a modern car since that was
the first thing that was changed way back in the 70s?
I remember vividly way back in 74 riding my Kawasaki 750 h-2 which was a 3 cyl 750cc
giant ass 2 stroke and my buddy had a H-1 which was a 500cc 3cyl 2 stroke.I was not
going to run that avgas in my bike but Tommy had to try it and both bikes were only
available with kick starts and you had to have some weight to even start these bikes.
He was my connection to the avgas for my Cyclone.He filled up his H-1 with the avgas and that damn engine seized up right there at the gas pumps!
DONT DO IT!!!!!
Take Care
Jim Gordon aka Flasheroo

High test yes but at a price. If it is "100 Low Lead" you might get away with it for awhile but it will eventually foul up your plugs and valves. Next time your around the airport, try to find someone working on even a small piston aircraft and look at the engine. Compared to our engines, these are monstrous.

A Cessna 172 will have a four cypinder engine in it displacing 320 cubic inches in 4 cylinders. The jugs are almost twice the size of a 350 with valves the size of your fist. These engines are designed to run at 60% throttle or more all the time and are firewalled at least once every flight (take off). Real heavy breathers so they don't get much chance to lead foul.

Any aircraft with a "wet wing" needs to have the tanks drained every 100 hours to have the wing section inspected. As a result, we always had either 80/87 or 100 available for our vehicles (not allowed to re-use the gas and the pilots always seemed to fill the tanks before this inspection) but none of us ever took advantage of the free gas more then once. My 76 F100 with the 360 in it would make it to Ottawa from Toronto maybe once before it plugged up. We also maintained a DC4 M (DC4 powered with four 12 cylinder Rolls Royce Merlins) that used 140 Octane fuel. There was enough lead in that stuff to make batteries.

This was before the Low Lead stuff but there is still alot of Tetra Ethyl Lead in the 100 Low Lead. Enough to take out your cats in twenty miles. You might get 50 or 60 miles out of it in an LT1, even with the O2s and the cats removed before your plugs foul. Maybe a little further with a set of Bosch Plus 2s or Plus 4s (aircraft style plugs) but your valves will still take a beating.

Not a good idea.

Bill

Send it down to me to run in my Austin Healey. It loves 100 Octane with 11-1 compression and I'm still running the origianl heads/valves/guides/etc......man I wish you were closer!!!

The leaded gas should not hurt the valves or seats. The issue with valves and seats was caused by non hardened seats with no lead gas. The fact that we now use unleaded gas, all cars come with hardened valve seats, so should run on either leaded or unleaded. You should be able to use the same type of plugs, maybe in a different hear range, without fouling them. The cats and O2s are not made for leaded fuel, so, yes they will succum to an early death. IIRC the lead in the gas not only raised the octane rating, but also acted as a lubricant for the valves.

Older engines can run leaded fuel without harm, and todays engines are made basically the same way with the same materials. It would only make sense that you could use leaded fuel provided you removed the O2s and cats. The higher octane rating allows you to run higher compression ratings without detonation. Avgas is a little different from "car" gas, It has to survive at high altitudes, which make the gas boil at lower temperatures.

Never-the-less, as long as your car does not knock (detonate) on a lower octane rating, use that octane rating...you will usually get better gas mileage, because there is more "gas" in the mixture, and less octane boosting additive. The part of the gas that burns and has the highest BTU rating is the gas itself,

The reason we went to unleaded gas in the first place was to allow the use of Cats. The lead will contaminate the catalyst bed. At the time, they tried to make a case that it was effecting the brains of children but that I think was just whitewash to let the EPA slip in the use of cats.

The issue here is the amount of TEL used. Even back in the day, many compounds were used to raise octane, not only TEL. TEL was and still is very expensive and it was cheaper to make on raod fuel using these other compounds. As was mentioned above, some of these compounds also lowered the flash point so were effected by altitude. As a result, avgas had a much higher concentration of TEL then auto gas. Even the older engines would plug up using avgas as they were not designed to operate with these concentrations. Even the design of aviation spark plugs are different to not allow an open gap that can be bridged with carbon build up. Instead they use an enclosed gap design (google Bosch "Plus 2" or "Plus 4").

As far as the heat component, there used to be almost no difference. Subsequent to the demise of TEL though, the alcahol required to do the same job has increased significantly, thus a drop in overall power output as the octane rating increases. Even regualr gas today has less bang then its counterpart 30 years ago. TEL was mixed in at a ratio of over 1000:1 while alcohol based additives can be as high as 30%.

In short, our engines are just not designed to run with high octane gasolines containing lead (TEL). Use at your own risk. The money saved by using free gas will be quickly sucked up in maintenance IMHO.

Bill