ANOTHER NEW PETROL SUBSTITUTE -ETHOL.
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Need for Other Fuels.
'When considering the question of fuel supply for internal-combustion-engined vehicles, it has to be . borne in mind that the available mineral spirit is limited and, although at present we are able to get as much as we need, the enormous and ever-increasing consumption is certainly bringing closer the time when the. world's stock will he so diminished that users will he faced with the necessity of finding other supplies of fuel. The actual provision of a suitable alternative, is, of course, no new problem. There have been many attempts of recent years to do so, and we have from time to time in this journal attracted attention to these efforts and to their degrees of suitability. We have also, in conjunction with our sister journal " The Motor," bent our efforts to encouraging the manufacture of benzole for this purpose. At the beginning of the war, although the supply was even then comparatively small and certainly quite insufficient to meet the needs of motorists, even supposing the petrol supply had ceased, the available quantity was rapidly increasing, and, in all probability, would have continued to do so.
Limits of Alcohol.
Considerable attention has been paid also to the possibility of alcohol as a fuel, and great hopes are held in certain quarters as to its use in this connection, stress. being laid on the possibility of its being manufactured from vegetable products, and that i therefore the supply is, n a manner of speaking, inexhaustible. The use of alcohol, however, is accompanied by many difficulties, and it has been laid down that, in order to secure the best results from this fuel, engines must be specially designed, and larger carburetters, inlet pipes and valves provided. The problem of securing adequate heating, both of the incoming mixture and of the cylinder walls, is also c requiring careful attention, owing to the fact that the latent heat of alcohol exceeds that of petrol and also because too cool a cylinder results in imperfect combustion and the produetien of acetic acid or aldehyde, with a consequent loss of efficiency and a corrosion of the cylinder walls.
A new fuel, the basis of which is alcohol, has recently been produced in South Africa and subjected to very thorough tests, from which, we are informed., it has emerged successfully. The difficulties to which we have referred above; are overcome, it is stated, by the addition of sulphuric ether, which is itself a pro
n48 duction from alcohol, but much more volatile. The addition of this substance renders the starting up a simple matter. Apparently also the risk of corrosion has been proved to be due in great degree to the use of 10 per cent, of crude wood spirit as a denaturant. The new fuel is denatured by the addition of 2 per cent. of benzole and only 1 per cent, of wood spirit. This denaturant, we understand, has been accepted by the South African Union Government as effective.
To be Known as Ethol.
It was found in the course of the test which was made on an ordinary touring-ear four-cylinder petrol motor that no structural alterations Whatever were required. The only alteration made was that of increasing the size of the petrol jet. It is at once owned that, owing to the difference in the calorific value of the alcohol as against that of petrol, the actual weight of the new fuel required was greater ; this, however, is discounted almostiz entirely by the economy gained in respect of price, and we are further informed that the thermal efficiency is considerably increased by the use of the fuelthis notwithstanding the fact that the same compression pressure was used for Ethol, as it is called, as was used for petrol. It is, of course, a well-known fact that alcohol will stand a much higher compression with consequent further . increase cf thermal efficiency.