Technical Myths … or old wife’s tales about engines

Hello,

In reading @SS327 new post, the Friday/Monday thing is almost true in most jobs. Friday is looking forward to the long weekend activities, even perhaps leaving early to get a head start. Anticipation makes the workday go by fast, but it may take a toll on the details of the job. Monday, on the other hand, is being tired from the weekend’s activity of the long drive home. If one was to wait until the usual Sunday night return, when the traffic dies down, then arriving home late does not make an efficient, early Monday morning person for an 8 hour shift.

In late 1957, my brother said that his new 58 Impala was made on a Thursday. (Still a good productive day.) With no problems anywhere, other than local necessity of tuning when the modifications started. There were many happy miles of hot rod cruising all over So Cal, activities into the late night, and a simple click start on a Monday morning drive to school. Even being buried under snow for two different winter outings did not hinder the instant start up and cruising around at high mountain elevations. Reliability and longevity was built in place…

Jnaki


But the topper is/was my new 1965 El Camino. I remember the order sheet from the dealer and he assured/proved to me, the Wednesday build took place. (in Fremont, CA) The El Camino had the most miles of any car/truck/sedan delivery and even the 58 Impala ownership throughout the years. 125k miles of no problems other than a weak water pump at 120k miles. The El Camino probably knew we were going to sell it and decided to act on that decision. The local, young surfer/sailor who bought the car kept it going for another 10000 miles, but painted the, red color, a bright blue.

It is too bad we did not have a recording front facing camera for all of those 125k miles of exploration and adventures. It was the most reliable car/truck we had ever owned that was a Wednesday build for sure…

 

A few years back I was talking to my friend who had new tires put on his wife’s car. He paid extra for nitrogen. I asked why, he said they told him better gas mileage, etc.
Hmnn. I never asked how much better mileage vs the cost of he nitrogen, but I did ask him what if he had a low tire, would he air it, take the car back to that shop, then have it deflated and re fill with nitrogen? That sort of ended the conversation about it.

 

Well, as soon as you get a valve job on your 70,000 mile Chevy, the increased pressure of the better sealing valves will cause your rings to blowby and you'll start burning oil..... everyone knows this......

 

Remember cow magnets on the fuel line? For you town folk over time cows can ingest small pieces metal while grazing and can cause issues in their stomachs. The magnets hold the sharp ends away from the walls of the stomach. Any way putting the magnets on your fuel line was supposed to give you a big boost in milage.

 

I put helium in the front tires of my street/strip car to help with weight transfer. Worked great but I had to abandon the idea because the car did wheel stands at every speed bump.

 

The break in an engine at low load / speed myth has been popping up since they started making engines. At the factory there is no break in other than a run test to look for leaks and listen for noises. If that new vehicle is delivered to a police department or fire department you can't tell them not to go over 50 MPH, if you are having a heart attack and waiting for the paramedics screw the break in! If you read the owners manual for a Cummins diesel it actually says "engine break in is enhanced by loaded operation" , in other words run it hard from day one. The other myth is you can't break in rings with synthetic oil in the engine, proven wrong by all the thousands of cars that come from the factory WITH synthetic oil but seem to break in just fine.

 

The reason they told you to break it in slowly is because of all the crap in the engine until you got all of that out at the first oil change.

 

I've lived both ends of this. I had an old cop car 413 and it was trashed by 100k miles. I also have a 290ci modern engine with 210,000 miles on it and it's pristine inside, good mileage and passes Kalifornistan emissions testing.

In just compression ring and honing advancements in the last 25 years, massive advances have been made. The old 5/64 5/64 3/16 ring packs were heavy, wide and high tension. Not only did they rob HP but they wore out the cylinders. Current 1mm 1mm 3mm ring packs are light, thin and easy on cylinder walls.

If you want to geek out on honing watch this video about how NHRA Pro Stock racer Greg Anderson uses a six stone, CNC hone to get cylinders as perfect as possible in search of the last few horsepower.

 

on a new engine, get it timed ASAP. Shut it down, check fluids, get it wrapped up. If anything leave lifters a bit loose .
Next time start and run the snot out of it, it will seat promptly and not give any trouble.adjust valves a month later to exact lash.

I guess loose lifters will limit the rpms .

Believe it or not, this has worked for me forty years . I’ll not look back or believe the take it easy route.

 

100% Nitrogen is not affected by heat so your tire pressure doesn't go up as you drive. NASCAR and I imagine all circle track racers use Nitrogen for this reason.

 

Lol. Nitrogen not being affected by heat at all is another myth.

The Ideal Gas Law (PV=nRT) say that nitrogen is roughly half as much affected by temperature than air, as it has a lower molecular weight. (roughly 14:29).

So the NASCAR guys are right, nitrogen doesn't increase pressure as much as air would as it heats up. Helium would be even better, but then the "I lightened my front end" myths would start

Cheers,
Harv

 

The reason nitrogen was used to inflate tires at races was because it was impractical / not allowed to have an air compressor in the pits, so a high pressure nitrogen tank was a good substitute.
That's one story I've read.

 

They do!

I haven't need to fill my tank since 1988!

 

I moved to very thin rings a few years ago.

None of the predicted failures happened.

 

AFAIK the thing you want to get away from is the moisture content in the air. Water changing between liquid and gas state when the temperature changes will change the pressure far more than just the air/gas contracting/expanding could.

 

Does anyone remember a product called “Slick 50”? It was a snake oil additive. I was once told that once an engine was treated with it, it was not possible to hone the cylinders because they were so hard and slippery.
I was buying spark plugs for a POS O/T Ford Escort that used platinum plugs as original equipment. Being a Cheapshit, I wanted copper plugs, and the person working the counter told me the car will not run without the platinum plugs.

 

The federal trade comission deemed Slick 50's advertising claims "false and unsubstantiated", and that cost them $888000 back in 1996. I'm thinking it would have been cheaper to prove the product works than to pay that, and it would have made for even better advertising if they had the proof it works. The fact that they paid and changed their advertising to less clear and less promising says a lot about how well it works.

About the spark plugs, it should run just fine with the standard type plugs, just not nearly as long. Probably fine in a beater, while maybe not a good idea in a car with lots of life left where changing the plugs is a major job (on some modern cars it takes major disassembly to reach all plugs).

 

Well, then by all rights as regular compressed air heats and expands, he’d have gotten better gas mileage than using Nitrogen

 

Keep in mind the air we breathe is 78% Nitrogen...

 

Air compressors will typically compress air to 100 psi or more, and a certain amount of water will then drop out to collect at the bottom of the tank, whence it will occasionally be drained. When it is delivered to a car tire at say 30-40 psi, it will expand and have extra capacity to absorb water, so there shouldn't be a problem with condensation in tires.

That's not the case with the horrible, tankless coin operated rattly compressors that have become ubiquitous at gas stations in my area. I have seen water spitting out of those things when running. So instead of getting decent air for free like in the old days when a station would have a proper air compressor, we are now paying for wet air.

 

In the U.S. we elect our hot air and send it to Washington D.C.!

 

Not on a humid day

 

There's actually a grain of truth in this one....

'Back in the day', battery cases were made of a sort of hard rubber that would resist reaction with the acid. These were the old 'tar top' batteries. To dye the rubber black, carbon black was commonly used (that's also what's used to make tires black). Carbon is conductive, so the cases weren't perfect insulators. And concrete can 'wick' moisture in the ground onto whatever is in contact with it, and added to the mild conductivity of the case, the moisture would supply the current path. So yes, those batteries would go dead if left in extended contact with concrete or dirt. Depending on the amount of carbon used and moisture present would affect how quickly they would go dead.

Plastic replaced the rubber in the '60s and eliminated this issue, by the end of the decade rubber-cased batteries became a rarity and this problem disappeared. I doubt if you could find a rubber-cased battery anymore, at least one that is still good.

 

All aircraft tires are serviced with nitrogen. It’s drier and doesn’t fluctuate in pressure.

 

Yes and that pressure/temp thing is important when rapidly changing from 30k ft to airport level.. -48deg to airport temp. tires need to stay pumped up!

 

Higher octane fuel burns slower than lower octane.....

 

I tend to avoid old wives, giving way to younger gals with tails.

 

Tried to avoid my old wife once...didn't get any dinner.
So, I went and made a ham sandwich, went to the bathroom, came back and the cat had eaten the ham out of my sandwich...went to bed hungry. Lesson learned

 

"It's a high nickle block"- jeezus...

 

Higher octane is harder to ignite that is why it reduces pinging (pre-detonation)