diesel engine water injection

shocker · Sep 3, 2011

Having always had it hammered home to me that water in any form was deadly to diesels, I have been surprised to read about water mist injection being used.Now I realise that the 1930s rolls royce and harry ricardo experiments were with petrol engines initially,and used methanol also,as a charge cooler,but there is a long history of its use in diesels too ....apparently.

I have been reading about people using water spray misting into the air just before the manifold as a method of steam cleaning the engine of polymerised gum build ups from veg oil blend fuels.Obviously there is a little more to it than that ,rev levels and boost pressures etc.However, it still seems to me that the risks and potential for damage outweigh the possible benefits.....but I would be glad to be wrong !

Anyone have any experience of this ? I have done various searches but have not found any, nail on the head, first hand experience answers....

ed.poore · Sep 3, 2011

The benefit of adding water into the injection mixture is that water will expand far more than a comparable quantity of diesel (after all steam engines are still in use in some of the most advanced pieces of equipment - nuclear subs for example, albeit a slightly modified version of the steam engine but none-the-less an engine powered by steam).

The problems are, well, it's water - because water doesn't compress that well if you inject too much then you end up with the same effect as flooding the engine (i.e. cylinder can't compress and the weakest point of the engine breaks, probably the push-rods). You've also got the issues with rust forming etc.

My father years ago mentioned some company (Catepillar or someone similar I think) that built a glass cylinder head and block to eliminate the problems but was a little too fragile for general use - but you could see exactly what was happening inside the engine.

Fur Trapper · Sep 3, 2011

shocker said:
Having always had it hammered home to me that water in any form was deadly to diesels, I have been surprised to read about water mist injection being used.Now I realise that the 1930s rolls royce and harry ricardo experiments were with petrol engines initially,and used methanol also,as a charge cooler,but there is a long history of its use in diesels too ....apparently.

I have been reading about people using water spray misting into the air just before the manifold as a method of steam cleaning the engine of polymerised gum build ups from veg oil blend fuels.Obviously there is a little more to it than that ,rev levels and boost pressures etc.However, it still seems to me that the risks and potential for damage outweigh the possible benefits.....but I would be glad to be wrong !

Anyone have any experience of this ? I have done various searches but have not found any, nail on the head, first hand experience answers....

Go over the pond and lnto the big pickup diesel trucks, ford ,gm .dodge. Just noticed the other day that they are up to 1200hp on the diesel motor with just bolt on stuff and most use water injection as a coolant for the combustion, which enters the cylinder on the exhaust side of the 4 cycle as a coolant

I think the mag was diesel 4x4 or high performance diesel , something like that just do a search on goggle and you should find, but look in USA

shocker · Sep 3, 2011

Good stuff,thanks lads....anymore ?

diesel engine water injection

shocker

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ed.poore

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Fur Trapper

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shocker

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