In a message dated 7/27/04 2:17:10 PM, donalds1@verizon.net writes:

> About 10 or 15 years ago Edelbrock made a water injection system to prevent
> knock and it worked well. The military used water injection to boost power
> on some WW2� fighters.
> I called Edelbrock a few years ago to see if they still had this unit
> availible the nice lady that I spoke with explained that the RV crowd had
> taken to the water injection idea. They also hooked it up to the water
> supply on the RVs and turned the injection to the max. Only problem was the
> engines in the RVs would sieze up when they spent the winter with all that
> water build up in the crankcase. So when the law suits started production
> stopped
> the injection would need to be limited to higher load conditions like full
> throttle or a push button on the dash to give that extra boost. If you could
> find a way to have it feed the engine on the highway at speed that would be
> nice. a vacuum switch or an throttle switch might work
> 
> steam powered vanagons I like it
> 
> going faster miles an hour with the radio on
> I remain
> Bob Donalds
> Boston Engine
> 
Bob,

The military application is certainly true, although I always felt the water 
in crankcase stories were generated more for the enrichment of the legal 
community than for any basis in fact. 

I recall (as an impressionable young one - age 10 or so) out at our local 
airfield, when a group of former WWII Army Air Force vets had a P-51 Mustang with 
the Merlin engine chucked to the field on a testing platform to test and tune 
the engine for the then popular warplane races. I loved the sounds and the 
smell of the hot oil (vanagon content inferred) and the aviation gas, as well as 
the leather jackets everyone wore. The ground shook as they revved the engine 
up and down. Then after several hours of revving, spark plug reading and beer 
guzzling, the sound of the engine changed from the high pitch of a modulated 
turbine to the deep thunderous roar of a hard working diesel. They later told 
me that they had turned on the water injector. It was responsible for huge 
increases in power along with the compressor. In the air, they would show off 
with the plane in wide out level flight, then turn on the water injector and 
compressor and the plane would leap into the air at a higher than 45 degree angle 
climbing so fast, till it was just a spec in the sky. Memories!

But it took a good overhead cam engine   and a turbo or supercharger to use 
the system to advantage. 

During the 50's a common power add-on was the water injection system (sold in 
the backwoods of Pennsylvania by J.C Whitner/ Warshawsky) which added water 
to an insert just below the carburetor throttle body. Water and methanol of 
ethanol mix. 

Problem was -- running out of water. That point resembled the sound of a 
flame out on an acetylene torch. Then high pitched metal/metal sounds and the 
aroma of an aluminum plasma at the tail pipe. 

Anyway, this works very well with current sensors, a turbo, intercooler and a 
VW non-crossflow head. Less effective in the 16V head.

Frank Grunthaner