Engines are simply an air pump. The more air you can get in and the more exhaust you can move out, the more power you can make. Superchargers are one way of packing more air into an engine. Superchargers or blowers as they are sometimes called have been around for a long time and are still currently being used on some production vehicles. There have been many different types of superchargers made but I will focus on the two most popular versions. One being called positive displacement or roots type and are generally referred to as blowers. These are the style most used on muscle cars due to the ease of setup on a v-8 with a carburetor. They are also widely used on drag cars for street and professional racing. Some of these cars make insane horsepower in the thousands. The blower has an advantage, because it compresses air even at very low speed it also creates alot of torque. This gives the engine very good response and power from idle up. That is why drag racers like them so much, they are very predictable from launch and have almost no lag time.
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Bio-diesel is a type of diesel being blended as an alternative fuel. Generally vegetable or animal oils can be used. Many different mixes of bio diesel are used. With no modifications to vehicles some people use up to 20 percent and from 50% to 70% on modified engines. First the bio diesel has to go through a chemical separation process where the glycerin has to “fall out” of it. This is called transesterification and is done with the use of methanol and lye. Neither chemicals are great to work with but it can be safe with pre cautioned use. Generally clean oils are used to avoid the acidic state of used cooking oil. Some people don’t mind the extra work to cleanse used oil, because the oil can be extremely cheap and many times is free. Fast food places use alot of oil and are glad to get rid of it. Water and acid will need to be removed from the used oils. A washing of the fuel will also need to be done to remove excess methanol, soaps and other contaminants.
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An alternative to gasoline as fuel is needed badly. Many technologies exist, but most development has begun so recently, that much more time and money is needed to replace gas. In prior gas shortages people have used one technology not often talked about, called woodgas. Woodgas is a gas that is made by heating wood until it chemically changes into a clean burnable gas and a solid coal. Vehicles can be run off of woodgas as well as very clean burning heaters with no smoke. One downfall with the setup is the need for a “furnace” to “cook” the vapor out of the wood. Placement of the wood inside the furnace is very critical as is the way the air enters and exits the device. The airflow is usually throttled to control the rate of conversion into the gas. Many people used trucks or small trailers for the room to process the wood. Due to the efficient gas, a piece of wood can last for quite awhile longer than a burning piece of wood.
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Auto air conditioning can easily be changed from old R-12 to new R-134 refrigerant. The new style R-134 refrigerant can be used in R-12 systems as long as the oil is included with the installation of the new refrigerant. No new seals or any other components should need to be replaced. Your car’s system should be completely empty of the old R-12, which is supposed to be contained and removed by a certified refrigerant technician. When doing anything with ac you should first understand that there are two sides of the system. The high pressure side will be the side with the smaller diameter lines, this side is very high pressure and should be avoided. The low pressure side will have the larger diameter lines and will have the condenser. The condenser looks like an aluminum canister of about 4″ in diameter and appx. 6″ long. The fill port will probably have a plastic cap on it. The port is a valve that looks like a air fill on your car tires. You will need a kit composed of an adapter and the hose used to fill the system with. Some types of cars need different adapters.
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Jet-ski troubleshooting can be broken down into a few groups. If the ski will not start or run at all, the ignition should be the first place to start. The carburetion or fuel system could also cause this problem if it hasn’t run in awhile. A spark plug check is a good place to start for either problem. Remove the spark plugs and look at them to see if they are wet or dry. If they are dry and light brown color the fueling is correct. If one plug is wet, either that carb has a problem or the ignition on that cylinder isn’t working. Use the starter and spin the engine over with the spark plugs in the plug boots. Lay the plugs on a unpainted metal part of the engine. As the engine spins the plug should be sparking. If the spark looks weak or both plugs are wet and black the plugs may need to be replaced. NGK spark plugs should be used because they work very well for two stroke engines. If one spark plug isn’t sparking the ignition coil may be bad. Refer to the ignition coil story to learn how to check a coil. If both plugs are good but are still wet you may have a carburetion problem.
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Nitrous is a cheap way to make a lot of power. Nitrous comes in kits and can increase your power anywhere from 50 hp to 400 hp. The nitrous is limited by the engine’s ability to handle the power. A 200 horsepower engine is not meant to handle 400 hp of nitrous. An engine built correctly can handle massive amounts of nitrous. On a standard engine the ignition will need to be retarded. The fuel will also have to be increased either by the fuel map or a fuel nozzle. Nitrous was first used in aircraft to help the plane gain alot of altitude very quickly. Soon after people realized the potential and set up systems on cars. Unfortunately at this time there were not many good ways to control fueling verses nos being sprayed. Many people blew up there engines because of having a lack of understanding of nitrous. Today kits have come a long ways and have the setup down to a science. Nitrous can be very reliable as long as it’s not used excessively per engine setup.
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Small engine timing is completely mechanical. The coil is mounted closely to the flywheel. The flywheel is the large circle with cooling fins. The flywheel is on the opposite side of the engine from the output shaft. The flywheel has magnets mounted in it. As the flywheel magnets pass the coil they induce a current. The coil then discharges to the spark plug. The relationship of where the coil sits and where the flywheel magnets are, dictates the timing. The coil can be moved slightly to change the timing. Move the coil in the direction the flywheel moves and the timing will be retarded and opposite to advance timing. The only other factor that affects the timing is the flywheel. Occasionally the flywheel can shear it’s key on the crankshaft. The key locates the flywheel in the correct rotational spot to insure correct timing. If the key is sheared the timing can be anywhere, and the engine may spark but not run. The key is square and can be viewed from the end of the shaft. The key will have a cutout in the shaft and the flywheel. Offset keys purposely rotate the flywheel to advance timing.
