Meth no good??

[THE-FN-MAN]

So I've heard it a couple times now but I haven't had anyone actually give me a reasonable reason, but 3 people have told me now that meth actually HURTS performance when it is already cool outside (one guy said under 60 degrees) can anyone please explain this or speak as to why this may be? I searched briefly when I was at my computer but didn't locate much.

[CPWINCH]

it is always good. Increased octane and lower iats

[THE-FN-MAN]

Exactly what I've thought. I thought I read in here somewhere just recently somebody mentioned that it can hinder performance as well.

[m3an]

Originally Posted by THE-FN-MAN

Exactly what I've thought. I thought I read in here somewhere just recently somebody mentioned that it can hinder performance as well.

there's your prob. Do some research outside of m3post.

[THE-FN-MAN]

The three people I originally heard it from actually don't even drive beemers lol. One guy is a hardcore ford guy another is a Chevy guy and my third buddy is a big wig with TRD. All who have a lot of experience in the automotive field. Appreciate your great advice though

[pbonsalb]

View the meth as adding consistency across a broad temperature range, no necessarily adding power as much as preventing power drop. If it is cold out, the meth is not helping increase power by cooling. Assuming you have a meth tune, it is still higher octane and the increased timing allowed in the tune will still be adding power -- like running race gas. Then when it gets hot out again and the non-meth cars start dropping power due to heat, the meth car will stay consistent. I have the Vishnu meth tune and like it. I run meth on my turbo E36M3 also and like it.

[THE-FN-MAN]

Originally Posted by pbonsalb

View the meth as adding consistency across a broad temperature range, no necessarily adding power as much as preventing power drop. If it is cold out, the meth is not helping increase power by cooling. Assuming you have a meth tune, it is still higher octane and the increased timing allowed in the tune will still be adding power -- like running race gas. Then when it gets hot out again and the non-meth cars start dropping power due to heat, the meth car will stay consistent. I have the Vishnu meth tune and like it. I run meth on my turbo E36M3 also and like it.

That was always how I understood meth to work but my car isn't actually tuned for meth, I use it to lower IAT's and when I explained this to a few other car guys they said they heard that it can rob power in certain situations. I had never ears of meth causing power loss or issues unless your car was tuned for it and then some sort of failure happened such as a pump went out or you simply ran out of meth. I actually just found where I saw that another member turned meth off because it robbed power in cooler temperatures. In the new world record quarter mile thread it says that 1sickM turned his meth off because off power loss. Hopefully he will chime in

[In Extremis]

Originally Posted by pbonsalb

View the meth as adding consistency across a broad temperature range, no necessarily adding power as much as preventing power drop. If it is cold out, the meth is not helping increase power by cooling. Assuming you have a meth tune, it is still higher octane and the increased timing allowed in the tune will still be adding power -- like running race gas. Then when it gets hot out again and the non-meth cars start dropping power due to heat, the meth car will stay consistent. I have the Vishnu meth tune and like it. I run meth on my turbo E36M3 also and like it.

Glad to hear the vishnu is working well for you!

[pbonsalb]

Originally Posted by THE-FN-MAN

That was always how I understood meth to work but my car isn't actually tuned for meth, I use it to lower IAT's and when I explained this to a few other car guys they said they heard that it can rob power in certain situations. I had never ears of meth causing power loss or issues unless your car was tuned for it and then some sort of failure happened such as a pump went out or you simply ran out of meth. I actually just found where I saw that another member turned meth off because it robbed power in cooler temperatures. In the new world record quarter mile thread it says that 1sickM turned his meth off because off power loss. Hopefully he will chime in

Too much meth will drop power. It may be that in the summer you can run more but in the winter you have to drop some, assuming you do not have a meth tune. On my turbo E36M3, I run it for octane safety only with no tune and run only about 10% meth to fuel. I would agree it is possible it is costing me a little power on that car. If I dyno again, I may try with it and without it. The E90M3 with meth tune won't lose any power since the meth is replacing fuel and timing is advanced and air fuel ratios are altered.

[pbonsalb]

Originally Posted by jordanE92

Glad to hear the vishnu is working well for you!

So far so good. I did a trunk mount pump and tank. At some point I may play with the settings, but they are at the default meth tune for now.

[JDM3]

I'm running the aquamist hfs 3 and it runs off injector duty cycle which has the added benefit of more accurate adaptation and accurate spray based on throttle position and fuel. For safety my ECU is not tuned. My dynos do show approximate 20 whp gains but that was in high humidity and 80deg weather. I've been running 70/30 and think I need to drop to 50/50 since we are in the fall. The last two 1/4 sessions I noticed my lowend being negatively affected with meth on but it's minor. Approx 1/10 loss in ET's. I think with cooler temps and too much meth to water my timing is affected and instead of it advancing, it's pulling timing down low. I do see the added benefit of meth in summer temps but in weather 65deg and below I would turn it off. I'm also going to try adjusting when it sprays initially and have it come on much higher in the rpm curve. I can't control it off boost but notice it comes on around 2.5psi.

[M3PO]

I wonder if the meth/water is causing some quenching when it's cool out. If AITs are already low, it may not be evaporating before entering the cylinders and causing quenching. Just thinking out loud though...

[Malek@MRF]

Originally Posted by THE-FN-MAN

Exactly what I've thought. I thought I read in here somewhere just recently somebody mentioned that it can hinder performance as well.

Whoever that may be, shouldn't be advising people on water/meth setups.

Water/Meth won't hurt performance, as mentioned already, it cools IAT's, raises octane. Only potential "hinderance" is when meth isn't flowing.

[pbonsalb]

When my E36M3 was supercharged and had an undersized air water intercooler, I ran two nozzles and pulled one in winter. I did not have a meth tune.

The meth is being injected at 150 psi, higher pressure than the fuel being injected. It should atomize. Certainly at some point, you have too much stuff to burn. But meth is fuel. A meth tune will pull some gasoline and substitute the meth and alter the target AFR accordingly. The nonmeth tune cannot do that.

[m3an]

1sickM, makes sense why he was not fully gainign it's fully potential. To the OP, 1sickM mentioned his car is not tuned for it. It is very possible it was being counter active the other day causing the ECU (already being aggressive) to pull timing that would explain the power loss.

Controlling the meth from a % based on injector duty cycle makes sense in this case too, as I'm sure the car is on low boost, so being boost dependent wouldn't be as ideal..

Either way, I don't like all the complexities and would recommended pump gas (93) or
e85 if readily availble.

[THE-FN-MAN]

Appreciate the input guys, I feel like we're all on the same page here and I'm happy to see that my original thoughts seem to be accurate. So just to drive the point home though, the only time meth could hinder a car (on a vehicle not specifically tuned to make power on it) regardless of outside temps (I live in so cal so I won't be seeing any extremes) is when I could be running to much meth? Right now I use a 50/50 mix of VP racings meth and even if there was a power drop we are talking marginal at best, correct?

[m33]

Originally Posted by Malek@MRF

Whoever that may be, shouldn't be advising people on water/meth setups.

Water/Meth won't hurt performance, as mentioned already, it cools IAT's, raises octane. Only potential "hinderance" is when meth isn't flowing.

True to a degree ! I have back to back data proving when untuned for meth it will richen up your AFR's
Which in return causes power loss ! PERIOD , I don't care what nozzle you use or what setup you use , Meth with the above mention configuration has positive effect only when it's 80+ out , once you colder weather it works backwards ...

[nicolecoxo]

I thought I read in here somewhere just recently somebody mentioned that it can hinder performance as well

[THE-FN-MAN]

Originally Posted by m33

True to a degree ! I have back to back data proving when untuned for meth it will richen up your AFR's
Which in return causes power loss ! PERIOD , I don't care what nozzle you use or what setup you use , Meth with the above mention configuration has positive effect only when it's 80+ out , once you colder weather it works backwards ...

Damn, really? So if I'm out having fun late at night, I should turn my meth off for maximum performance? Could you elaborate on how rich the car ran and how much loss are we talking? Thank you for the input

[ArthurJGuy]

The goal of fuel is to run the LOWEST octane that you can without detonation for your desired timing. If you run a higher octane (ie any blend of race gas or meth) without any tuning you will lose power. The power gain from high octane fuel is the ability to run more timing (or boost) without detonation.

Cliffs notes.

Meth and no timing advance = power loss.
Timing advance and no meth = engine loss.
Meth with timing advance = sexy time.

The temperature really doesn't have much effect on things. The effect on IAT is minimal when n/a.

[pbonsalb]

I am not sure it is so simple. If you run a high concentration of meth to water, it is an octane enhancer and these cars will advance timing to take advantage of the higher octane. This was proven by pencilgeek running race gas and dynoing. These cars also have full time WB02 with target AFR so they can adjust the fuel to meet the target.

What I do agree with is that you would want less water in winter and probably less meth also -- after all, with significant IAT drop from the colder weather, detonation is also a little less likely. With no other changes, our cars make more power in winter than in summer, which is why dyno results are standardized to a more summer like temp for SAE. Your uncorrected results on the dyno are what you are actually making given the weather conditions.

[THE-FN-MAN]

Originally Posted by pbonsalb

I am not sure it is so simple. If you run a high concentration of meth to water, it is an octane enhancer and these cars will advance timing to take advantage of the higher octane. This was proven by pencilgeek running race gas and dynoing. These cars also have full time WB02 with target AFR so they can adjust the fuel to meet the target.

What I do agree with is that you would want less water in winter and probably less meth also -- after all, with significant IAT drop from the colder weather, detonation is also a little less likely. With no other changes, our cars make more power in winter than in summer, which is why dyno results are standardized to a more summer like temp for SAE. Your uncorrected results on the dyno are what you are actually making given the weather conditions.

In the first part of your reply, are you speaking in regards to the car being specifically tuned for it or just as a source for cooling air temps. And in your second part which is still what I'm confused about is to why I would have to run less water meth in the colder parts of the year. I always thought the colder and denser you could get the air the more power so I figured 50 degrees out with meth turned on would be like the perfect storm lol