Crude, cracking, avgas, WWII
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Dan Thomas
Touchdown! Greaser!
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Dan Thomas
They don't give the details as to how the airplanes performed better by simply feeding them higher-octane gasoline. Such gasolines don't contain any more energy and don't burn faster; they are simply able to take more heat and pressure in the cylinder without detonating or pre-igniting. The airplanes would have needed a high supercharger boost pressure, or the compression ratios would have had to be raised somehow.
PaulMillner
Line Up and Wait
Thanks for that, Dave! I didn't know all that history about Houdry. We were dismantling the Houdry crackers in Southern California when I started in the oil business in the '70's... some of the gasoline blending and process details are a bit off, but I'm guessing the author is a better historian than process engineer, and I'm grateful for the additional history! I used to bore the young'uns with stories of the history of our company, and our refineries... hard to appreciate where you are, and why it's quite the way it is, without understanding the evolution.
Dan Thomas said:
I think it was as simple as turning up the boost, as allowed by higher octane, without destructive detonation. As an example of slightly dodgy science in an otherwise great article, increasing octane rating of a gasoline mix typically *decreases* energy content slightly, despite Ernest Borgnine's exclamations to the contrary in some B movie I recall... but it certainly allows significantly more chemical energy to be converted to mechanical energy, so all is well!
Paul