luminous green flames from exhaust?

[Davi]

Last night, on the way home, I was treated to quite an amazing pyrotechnic display from an RX7. As we pulled off from the lights it firstly left me as though I'd forgotten to select a gear, and secondly every gear change, both on clutch in and clutch off, was emitting HUGE luminous green flames?! I've seen blue flames, I've seen orange flames, I've seen nitro flames, but I've never seen luminous green before?!

Any idea's? This car stupidly quick away, just trying to work out what they were playing with!

[docevi1]

is that not just nitrous oxide injections?

[baSkey]

nos?

there's prob some sort of chav flameout kift fitted rather than overrun flameouts i reckon if they were that big and more importantly consistent... might be wrong though!

[vetteheadracer]

Smoking in the car after eating Sprouts?

[Davi]

baSkey said:

nos?

there's prob some sort of chav flameout kift fitted rather than overrun flameouts i reckon if they were that big and more importantly consistent... might be wrong though!

Suppose it could have been a combo of the two, some Nos and a chav attachment for extra flameyness! All Nos flames I've seen are bluer than this was and more subtle.

[grumbledoak]

vetteheadracer said:

Smoking in the car after eating Sprouts?

I was about to say, "That sounds cool, how can I get mine to do that ?", but I don't think I'll bother now.

And anyway, sprouts sound cheaper...

[Moose.]

Perhaps the exhaust was anodised yellow on the inside which would give the illusion of a green flame if it was actually a blue flame?

[NDT]

time to remember chemistry GCSE... what kind of metal produces a green flame?
copper?
are there any copper compounds in the sintered rotor tips?

(or were there, as it sounds like they're disappearing down the exhaust......)

[Pulsatingstar]

RX7's throw flames out like theres no tomorrow anyway, but no idea what would make it green. Ive not seen too many with a flamer kit, especially fast ones. Id think that unlikely.

[FourWheelDrift]

And Boron, that burns with a green flame.

"Boron is detected by converting the material under analysis to Borax by heating with concentrated nitric acid and then heating with concentrated sulphuric acid and ethanol to form ethyl borate, which burns with a green flame."

Ethanol, that's used as a fuel, do road legal dragsters or special show cars use it? If so it could it have been running on that and then dumping the additional stuff in?

[Davi]

moose and NDT - both very good points!

NDT, not sure if copper is used in the RX7 engine, will have a look into that. The rate the car shifted I can well believe it was being pushed to (and probably past) the very limit.

[baSkey]

chemistry - what about titanium..?

rx7s do produce flames a bit more than a 'conventional' car you're right - it was just a suggestion it had a chav kit. a few do seem to be getting a bit fast and furious'd..

[The GMan]

My N20 doesn’t cause my car to flame out. It happens all the time on overrun though.

As for the flames being green not sure why? Might be some crap kit.

[_deano]

is this not illeagal?
Naked flames coming out of a car. A chav close by with their cheap shell suit joggers will go up in flames, not that i'm complainning. But one would have thought that some pompus Lord or Lentil eating maggot would have brought out some type of ban on this.

[cptsideways]

_deano said:

is this not illeagal?

Better not get too close behind my Soarer in the dark then, its like someones lit the afterburners & reheat on high rpm gear changes, lights the night up rather well & his handy for frightening off the follow up your ass numpties

[Mark Bailey]

We use to run a v8 in an historic motorsport series. One of the quicker competitors always had green flame during over run. Turned out he was mixing Aviation fuel with pump fuel. Aside from the power increase the flame was the give away.

Possible he was running this or a fuel additive.

[NDT]

courtesy of www.creative-chemistry.org.uk:

metal: flame colour

barium: light green
calcium: brick red
copper: blue/green
lead: blue/white
potassium: lilac
sodium: bright orange

Does aviation fuel still have tetraethyl lead in it?

[Andy Mac]

RX7's have no need whatsoever of flamer kits! They flame stock more than any car I've seen!

[sadako]

One of the MR2 owners stated that he could get the flames to change colours if he used washer fluid in his water injection tank, different brands would make slightly different colours

I dont get that fun though, as fas as I am aware you cannot get a 4A-GE to flame whereas the larger 3S-GE, even in n/a form, requires only a decat

[R1 GTR]

Cant you get kits that colour flames produced by nitrous? Possibly an explanation