Im going to a rather remote part of the country on my Low Rider this summer(northern Newfoundland),having been there before I know there is no hi test gas available. When I was forced to run regular my 88 Twin Cam didnt like it,lots of pinging(spark knock)on hills. Was wondering if anyone here has used some type of octane booster in their bike,and how did it work?

 

I use it every other fill up. I just get normal "high end" booster and add appropriatly based upon the gallons the bottle can treat, and what I have in my tank.

Makes a huge difference in performance, as well as the smooth running of the bike, IMO.

 

I like amsoil injecter cleaner with octane booster. run it every oil change.

 

The ONLY Octane booster that I have SEEN work is N.O.S. brand.

I have a Pontiac Grand Prix street car that I drag race and we scan the engine's ECM every run to see what is happening during the pass. Normally, at the track, I'll increase timing and run race gas to keep Knock down. This one particular time I was in Pheonix, hadn't planned on racing, and my buddy wanted to go to the track. I scanned my car and found it to have 2-3 degrees of timing being pulled from the ignition because I was seeing a slight bit of knock.

I went to the store to try some octane booster. Normally I don't put much faith in this stuff and look at it like a bunch of snake oil. Most bottles will PROUDLY claim it raises your octane level by up to 10 POINTS! However, if you read the fine print 10 points = 1 octane number so if you're running 91 octane this stuff, at best, makes it 92. Not a huge help.

Then I saw the N.O.S. stuff. It claimed to raise you fuel up to 6 NUMBERS! So that 91 octane now could be 97 octane. Okay, too good to be true, I thought but since it looked the most promising I'd try it. If I regained 1 degree of timing I'd be impressed.

I made my first pass that night and upon getting back to the pits downloaded my log and looked to see if the stuff made a difference. It did but not the one I was expecting. I had NO knock! It had raised the octane level of the fuel enought to get rid of ALL of it. So next pass I cracked up the timing to what I normally run with race gas. STILL no knock...and I didn't see any for the rest of the night. Next day, when I refilled with pump 91 and did another scan, the 2-3 degrees was back.

So while 99% of that stuff I wouldn't use because it's a waste of money, the N.O.S. brand stuff that claims to raise your fuel 6 octane NUMBERS (that's 60 octane points) does work.

Oh, and one more thing...make sure you get the N.O.S. octane booster and NOT the N.O.S. engergy booster that you drink...LOL
http://www.gixxer.com/forums/showthread.php?t=226570 (Be sure to read up through page 2)

 

Thank you very much Robotech,Ill be looking for that.

 

This is very interesting info and I am a bit surprised that a stock TC engine would need a high octane. I guess the mountain roads create more heat on the engine.

I too use to drag race (many yrs ago) and I had to burn Hi Octane fuel in my old muscle car since it had a 10.5:1 compression ratio. Back then most all cars had at least 10:1 compression. But after fuel emissions came onto the scene in the 70s they started lowering compression ratios to get more complete fuel use. With my TC running only 9.2:1 OEM compression I never have a problem with ping on regular. Course I'm not climbing mountain roads either.

The Octane makes the gas inite slower. Regular gas is actually more flammable than Hi Test gas. By slowing down the ingition occurance it stops the pre-ignition that occurs from the high heat of high compression.

Of course there are other fuel additives (like in Shell gas) that are in regular also that help clean the engine. Anyhow this information was educational to me and I will have to keep travel conditions in mind on what type gas I buy.

 

stp makes a good octane booster too but the nos brand is one of the most potent ones youll find. i run it in my vw gti turbo and it makes a big diffrence. marvel mystery oil is great stuff i know a guy that puts it in his lowrider every fill up, mechanic said its the cleanest motor hes worked on, ive got in the habit of doing it too

 

I was having the same "pinging" when going up hills and when I really cranked on the throttle (usually when the RPMs were in the low end) as soon as the RMPs rose the "pinging" stopped. A tech suggested I try some octane boost to see if it would make a difference. I tried the N.O.S. octane boost and then went out to try to make it ping. I ran the RPMs down going up hill, pulled as much throttle as I could and not one ping. I find it odd that I have to use this stuff, but with the heat that my bike was generating and the compression even with 93 octane wasn't enough... It worked and I am convinced. So will be using it on a regular basis (especially when it is warm out). Oh and it did produce a bit more pep in the bike (not a bunch but it was noticeable... maybe it was just the lack of knock and the appropriate direction of power on detonation).

 

good to know i have a 95 build with over 10 comp, and the highest test we have here is 91 but never had any ping

 

Try using a lower gear on hills. The pinging will go away when the load and gear are correct.