PETROLEUM — FIELD 



237 



per hour and will have practically no high-gear acceleration at lower 

 speeds. 



Figure 2 is the same basic plot with one additional curve, the de- 

 veloped-power curve for the same car with the same engine modified 

 only by an increase in compression ratio from say 5.0 to 1 to a ratio 

 of 6.0 to 1 — a minor design change. Now the car has a top speed of 

 TO miles per hour on the level road and has good acceleration in the 

 broader range of 10-60 miles per hour. More important, its hill- 

 climbing ability is tremendously improved. On the same hill it can 

 maintain a top speed of 55 miles per hour and below this speed shows 



20 30 40 50 



CAR SPEED -MPH 

 Figure 2. 



acceleration characteristics approximately as good as the previous 

 model showed on the level road. Here was a direction for the engine 

 designer to go and he started off that way and moved rapidly until he 

 was stopped short by the fact that at the higher compression ratios his 

 engines began to knock badly under load, particularly after the com- 

 bustion chambers became fouled with the carbonaceous deposits which 

 inevitably appear after several thousand miles of operation. 



Now let us look at what was happening in the refinery during this 

 time. Initially, gasoline was the very volatile hydrocarbon material 

 "topped" from crude oil prior to running for the kerosene fraction used 

 extensively for cooking and illuminating purposes. The demands of 

 the automobile for this gasoline rapidly took it out of the byproduct 

 classification and the refiner was seeking ways and means of increasing 



