NEW GASOLINE.

Press, Volume LXIII, Issue 18905, 21 January 1927, Page 5

NEW GASOLINE.

"ANTI-KNOCK" COMPOUND. (FROa OTO OV!1l COEHESPOHDSK'I.) SAN FRANCISCO, December 15. Ethyl Gasoline, a new product consistingof regular gasoline to which is added an anti-knock compound, has made its debut on the Pacific Coast. In the East, where ethyl gas has been marketed for the past, four.years, the new fuel has made a big success in the elimination.of the knocking tendencies of automobile, motors. Ethyl gasoline is a discovery of the General Motors Corporation, in conjunction with some Canadian research experts, and was evolved after seven'years of experimenting to develop a gasoline which would permit the general construction and use of high compression motors, this-type of automobile engine being gradually admitted to incorporate to the. highest degree all the desirable qualities, such as great power, snappy pick-up, and increased mileage. Development of these motors has been helci back for rears, due to the fact that ordinary petrol will not operate efficiently in a high compression motor. Early experiments conducted by the General Motors Corporation in an _ endeavour to raise the compression points have determined definitely that there was a well-defined limit to which the compression could be raised with the existing gasolines because.of the knock which developed. Efforts were accordingly made to discover a fuel in which this objectionable feature would be eliminated and over 35,000 separate tests were made before it was found that a very small amount of tetra ethyl lead, when added to" gasoline of the proper quality, produced the combination required. It is claimed that ethyl .gasoline actually turnß what carbon may be present in the motor, into an agency of power, because the carbon;reduces the combustion space and thereby increases compression. ;.; Kacing drivers are using ethyl gasoline, the new gas having been used in all the big automobile races during the past three years, but it is only now. that it has come to be served at the gasoline stations on the highways. The United States Army and, Navy, as well as the British Air Ministry, are said to have officially adopted ethyl gasoline - as the standard fuel for their aeroplanes and dirigibles. Ethyl is red in colour to distinguish it from ordinary gasoline, but the colour has nothing to do with the qualities of the_ product. It is the tetra ethyl lead which produces, the desired result.