History Research: Whiteman-Navarro Oxygen Injection

I might have to give him a call... that would be great i saw on the net, he returned home from the hospital july last year, hope he is doing well.

 

My shop teacher is missing some of his face, the gauge exploded right in front of him, oxgyen under pressure is very reactive.

 

there are two reasons for injecing pure oxygen into a motor. one, the rapidly expanding gas from the tank will be very cold, which would allow you to put more of it into the chamber then if it was warm, and two, the air usually takes in is mostly dia-atomic nitrogen, N2, which goes right through the motor without doing anything but take up space. the idea is you put in more of the two reagents, and get out more power

nitrous oxide, N20, is something totally different. it has the two advangates of injecting oxygen, plus a third major one that blows the other two away. the N20 molecule is aranged in a straight line, with an oxygen atom in th middle of the two nitrogen atoms, like this N-O-N. during combustion, the oxygen reacts with the gasoline to form water and carbon dioxide, which lets loose a fair amount of energy. the two nitrogen atoms don't just float out the exhaust though, they combine to form N2. we all know N2 as a harmless inert gas that takes up a good portion of the air we breathe. what you might not realise is that N2 is inert because it requires a tremendous amount of energy to break apart and form compounds with other things. and it lets out the same amount of energy when it is formed. so the reason to use nitrous oxide is because of the nitrogen, not the oxygen content of the stuff. four-thirteen

 

So i have two trains of though on this....

One: Air injection- taking regular old breathable air and releasing it into the carb from a compresses cylinder or tank (rechargeable by 12volt air compressor or air conditioning pump) which would give you the same effect as a blower.

Two: Oxygen injection- actually displacing the air with oxygen to get a cleaner hotter more efficient burning mixture in the combustion chamber.

Both have pro's and cons.. both would hinge upon getting the mixture down into the chamber quickly..both would take a bunch of work to get right..

The Navarro roadster is pretty sweet, i have seen that pic before in a book somewhere. Still i haven't come up with anything on the "Whiteman" roadster or the photographer for Hop Up.

Anyone.. Anyone...

 

The basic problem as I have heard it stated is that O2 works to well. It causes the burn to be much hotter and faster, and results in melted pistons and valves.

When N2O breaks down, the nitrogen actually inhibits the burn, which in turn keeps the temps down some, which saves the pistons and valves.

I read that in a magazine somewhere a long time ago. Car Craft maybe?
-Bugman Jeff

 

I like Magnets air compressor theory. You'd have to have the discharge nozzles close to the valve though so that it didn't just blow back out the top of the carb. I'd think you'd still have to dump some extra fuel in too though.

-Bugman Jeff

 

I'm a Geek and I love this thread!
For the layman we might want to replace the word "oxidizer" with the word "Catalyst". I get visons of sheet metal rusting when I hear the word oxidize. O2 is inert by itself but can create a hyperfuel when combined with reactants, causing a hotter burn. Now my reserves on using a system like this in a normal engine would be the intense heat it would cause. The benefit of using a nitous system is one of the by products of the air fuel burn is water. No from 413's previous post in a N-O-N the oxygen is knocked out leaving tne nitrogen. when nitrogen then reacts with water byproduct of the burn and creates a temprature drop. So in essence you have a hotter more complete burn that is cooled instantly, keeping your combustion chamber from melting down (china syndrome). If you wanted to use a oxygen system I imagine you can create a creramic engine components to withstand the heat over long periods of time. It probably worked for Barry because he used the system on realitivly short runs. but if you want to see what its like hook it up to nitrous system till you burn a hole in your pistons and throw a rod
I think I just confused myself because I don't know WTF Iam talking about.

 

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Oxygen is anything but inert...hook an oil pressure gauge up to an oxgyen cylinder and turn on the valve...

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Oh dear. What can be done?



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Priceless

 

Boy, this thread died fast. I guess not enough gossip in it to keep it going. Maybe if GERM (tm) wanted to do this to his car people might be more interested.

 

Don't mean to hijck the post, but here's a bit about Nitrous oxide.

http://auto.howstuffworks.com/framed.htm?parent=question259.htm&url=http://www.idavette.net/hib/nitrous.htm

 

Isnt nitrous oxide N2O = Nitrgen 1-part oxygen 2-part?
And wasn't it the **** that first used N20 in the Zeros?
--Feder

 

Heres an angle for you run 4 large oxygen bottles[mounted facing valve to rear...] coupled to an ac***ulator[computerized of course] and plumbed to the intake.Run the motor up to a given point of 'top end" at which time the computer takes over and switches the valve that shuts off static air intake and only allows and increased fuel influx[again computer controlled],and high pressure Oxygen is added to this increased fuel flow till it reaches the maximum combustion ratio......THEN the high pressure Oxygen flow through it will wind that motor up like an air grinder on Crack....[THEN YOU LET IT ALLLLLLL- BLOW OUT ITS *** END AND IT BLOWS YA TO 300 MILES PER HOUR! :grin-Seriously it could help make it SOME faster-Huh?

 

While I find this post quite interesting . . .

1) You'll never get a 12v compressor to put out a significant amount of air for this application. It'd have to be a high pressure bottled source.
2)But even then we already have an oxygen bearing fuel ... Nitromethane.
From my very basic understanding lets look at blown alcohol dragsters. From what I've heard PSI twin screws are running somewhere in the neighborhood of 50 lbs of boost on alcohol. Now NSRA wont allow twin screws on fuel cars cuase they're afraid of what would happen if a fuel car backfired, at 50 psi. BOOOOM to the moon.but in the blown alcohol dragster cl*** you are now allowed to run an unblown fuel car. So that NSRA considers a 6.5:1 static fuel car equal to 14:1 static + 50 pounds of boost alcohol car.
Or something like that.

as a history lesson this is interesting, but as far as speed goes might as well look for a $20 electric supercharger on ebay.

 

Morrisman, please correct me if I am wrong.
A gas such as Argon is inert, and if Oxygen is inert as well, why do we need Argon to displace Oxygen for Tig welding?
I thought inert ment it is not capable of reacting with another substance.
Pure Oxegen does not burn, but in combiation with heat, can make all kinds of things burn.
Normal fuel, but also human skin ( my old welding teacher had a nasty accident with a Oxygen bottle ), and maybe even the insides of a Hot Rod engine.

 

this is a big problem with the oxygen bar scene on the west coast... haha... i can just picture it.

 

My thoughts...right or wrong...
Wafting a little regular "air" towards the carb isn't gonna do anything. The engine will just use what it can draw without pressurizing the mix any further than it would without the additional air supply.

Wafting a little Oxygen toward it will increase the power due to its enriching the mixture...IF you add additional fuel to keep the mixture at the right ratio. BUT you still haven't pressurized the intake tract beyond atmospheric.
You wouldn't need to...the extra oxygen is there without the additional volume. Inside the engine would still see the extreme conditions of a blown engine however, so reliability is likely out the window regardless.
If you had a carb backfire in the presence of enough oxygen you just might turn the car into a torch. DON'T play with Oxygen.

Putting a pump in the trunk to pressurize a heavy cylinder WILL boost the engine beyond 1 atmosphere of pressure ( for a short time) IF a sealed carb bonnet is used to prevent the additional air from leaking out. But this would mean ALL air would have to be supplied by the pressurized (AND regulated!)tank. A VERY LARGE, HEAVY tank!!!!
Totally redundant.
Put the pump on the motor and pressurize the engine with good old reliable, basicly inert, "air" directly. It's called a BLOWER and it works without the tank or the resulting weight penalty...and you won't have to worry about oxidizers, catalysts or FLAMING DEATH(tm) as you enjoy it.
There's a fine line between experimentation and suicide ya know!
Ya won't find that line around here however! LoL

Bill

 

Hmmm...Just thinking!
MAYBE Navarro was installing the worlds first "Onboard Welder" and wasn't souping the mill at all!

Bill

 

hehehehe.... onboard piston welder

i think maybe Mr. Navarro was just wafting oxygen down into the carb... maybe not pressurizing the manifold with it.. maybe displacing some of the the "Air" coming in the naturally aspirated motor with oxygen.
But, you never know what he was doing.. it was hard to tell from the picture...

 

During WWII, allied engineers experimented with both nitros and oxegen meterd into the airbox of fighter planes at high al***udes to maintain performance. They were fully aware of supercharging but that was just another thing that required alot of maintainance. Electromagnetic clutches for as needed use of blowers was probably not an optoin as planes were using carburators. A pilot could be trusted to add oxegen to the incoming air charge to keep the exhaust tenp in a desired range. Our miltary found nitrous, with its lower oxegen content easier to control in the heat of conflict. The performance advntage was not an increase but a less deterioration of power.
With technological advances, supercharging was found superior for practical reasons. Mr. Navarro was in our military and certainly made himself familiar with all the tech he could. All those vets leaving the military with a ton of knowlege is what made the golden era of rodding sparkle so brightly.

 

NITROusoxide, NITRO-methane, hydrazine, tri-NITRO-toluene, NITRO-glycerin, what do these all have in common? they all have nitrogen in them. nitrousoxide and nitro-methane we use to make cars go faster, we use hydrazine to send stuff to space, and we use tri-nitro-toluene and nitro-glycerin to blow stuff up. it's that triple covelent bond between di-atomic nitrogen that makes the power.

i don’t know where that stupid rumor about the nitrogen cooling the burn came from, but it’s 100% pure ********, perpetuated by useless magazine writers who don’t do their research. four-thirteen

 

hate to thrown a wrench in the cogs, but anyone ever think Barney just s****ed NOS sticker off and replaced it with an O2 sticker?? he KNEW all the military stuff, right??? i've known many racer types who intentionally try to mislead the compe***ion...

every racer cheats or loses (that's the history part).

just speculating, sorry...

 

Interesting old thread. The thought crossed my mind today...