My turn at the original question
My wife has a bottle of "average" nail polish remover. The description begins-- "Non-acetone ..."
The ingredients begin-- "Ethyl acetate, alcohol, water, blah, blah, ..."
I think the original, "average" nail polish remover was pure ethyl acetate and that would dry out hands, so they added some junk later. I didn't know they ever put acetone in.
Now, let's ponder this question one more time-- does acetone (or other volatile organic) add anything to mileage, i.e., engine efficiency?
Hmm, does ANY additive work? How about Power Service, does that improve mileage? ---Well, maybe. It contains ethers that raise cetane a lot. So, some additives will raise cetane, and that can improve mileage for an engine that injects fuel a little bit late. We think that biodiesel can improve mileage at low percentages, and I think that may be connected with a faster burn as well as a slight increase in cetane.
Hydrogen gas injected at low percentage into the intake air is reputed to boost mileage, and some people are certain that "humidifying" the air improves mileage.
Most of these benefits are probably real, and they generally add no extra energy. We know that diesel engines have combustion efficiency of about 98% or better, so no chemical additive can improve combustion efficiency enough to notice. The remaining factor is
timing.
Remember that increasing injector nozzle size also tends to improve mileage by allowing the burn to complete earlier, with a slight reduction in combustion efficiency. Smaller nozzles improve emissions by increasing combustion efficiency but sometimes hurt mileage.
So, I think that's the tentative answer: If your engine is set to inject a little late, then any fuel additive that shortens ignition delay (raises cetane) or allows combustion to complete earlier will improve your mileage. A timing advance may also improve mileage. Engine experts in the forums could give more info on this topic.
Ernie Rogers
eb2143 said:
I already posted this at the end of the huge acetone thread, but realized it wouldn't get as many views as this. So, I am wondering, what percent acetone is your average nail polish remover? The one I found laying around was, "Nail Polish Remover enriched with Protein!!" It seems to have a lot of other stuff in it besides acetone, including water. Thanks.