Posted by Sherman in Idaho [72.47.153.112] on Monday, January 27, 2014 at 13:10:11 :
In Reply to: Re: What octane level do y'all run in your six? posted by Howard [74.4.34.52] on Monday, January 27, 2014 at 08:51:39 :
I have a 1940s mechanical engineering textbook that lists "fighting grade aviation gasoline" at 84 octane. I'm going from memory here, but I think "training grade" av gas was 3 or 4 points less, and standard pump gas was in the high 60s.
The flip side of this question, though, is now that pump gas is 87 octane, what's the best thing a guy can do to let an old 230 take good advantage of our modern "high-test" gas? Raise the compression, obviously, but other than milling the head, what's available to do that? I assume the crank could be ground different, but you'd need under-sized bearings too. Are there specs and parts available? Would a different cam help? Are they available? I do the only thing that's easy to do -- advance the timing until it starts to knock and then back off a bit. But it would sure be nice to get more power and less fuel consumption now that we have better gas.
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