i need methanol for making nitro fuel maximum 5 ltr is the quantity that i can buy
please suggest me a shop that is selling it in mumbai
thank you

dont know of a shop per se, but look for industrial chemists, those who sell to school and college labs... You're looking for LR grade methanol or lower... HPLC is very expensive

I am looking for methanol to make fuel for os 50sx engine
Now i am newbie in the feild of nitro engine so dont know head ir tail about it
Will have to ask the seller
Anyways thank you

if you are new, better buy ready made fuel and mix a little castor around 10% and go fly.
And worry about fuel mixing later on.
Explosives handling is pretty dangerous, and may get contamination by water without proper handling.

Edit: setup your plane engine and buy fuel lastly. fuel go bad in few months.
Ready made fuel is available with rotor/sphere hobbies/Ethiraj sir from Chennai.

Ashok.P

i hope you learn this hobby safely, dont hurt yourself, take some expert advice

Well Chintal and others.... the so called "NITRO" fuel needs Nitro methane to be used and it is basically a petrol engine fuel.  SO to mix it for yourself... OK.. Buy methanol from any chemist shop who stock chemicals for school and labs... call Just dial yellow pages and ask for the dealer in your area.  Methanol may be sold as cleaning material at these places as some states have a restriction of sale of Methanol in large quantities.  You may buy half a litre at a time. Also buy commercial Castor Oil.  If the engine is new make a mixture of 75% methanol and 25% castor oil.  SKIP the Nitro methane.  You can do without the nitro content of the fuel for your general use.  I have never used it (other than some competitive flying or show flying) for regular flying.  Just mix the two liquids well together in a bottle and go fire your engine....
Happy Flying... Be Safe

I didnt quite agree, petrol engine is different, its not glow fuel. hope its a typo.
also methanol is banned in most states, and its not available in any form except for industrial cleaning agent for molds.
and dont call just dial for methanol. they will give altogether some chemist address who seldom sell it. they just use some algorithm to widen their search terms.

Ashok.P

Dear friend,

well your take not mine...

If you guys don't know your a** from your elbow desist dispensing expertise

You will also need castor oild. Can be found at local clinical chemist...in 100ml or 400ml quantities

Dear Sanjay,
we all know how to use foul language... but decency dictates that we being responsible people... be as polite as we can possibly be... Do please resist from using foul language here....

Guys please stop this we are here on the forum just to share knowledge. Not to prove anyone wrong
Please help me now
I appreciate all you people for helping me
But just need a final answer or gist from the above discussion that where can i get methanol in mumbai
If some one has purchased it please provide details
The reason i am going for this mixture is because it is a used engine and 80/20 ratio of methanol and castor oil was used to run this engine all the time
Any suggestions and advices are welcome
Thank you guys

One source of Methanol that i know (which undoubtedly is not an easy source for many) is distilleries. People who have visited a sugarcane factory or if they have lived nearby one might recognize it.

Sugar factories makes sugar out of sugarcane. But at the same time, a lot of by-products also gets produced. Like Bagasse, fertilizer, etc.
One of the by-products of the manufacturing of Sugar is molasses which is a dark viscous liquid. The smell that you get near a sugarcane factory actually is the smell of molasses.

Molasses is further distilled in a distillery (that's the name of the factory).
Basically they ferment molasses and prepare various types of Isotopic Alcohols. Ethanol and Methanol are few of the examples of isotopic alcohols.

Now, Ethanol and Methanol looks quite similar but they indeed are quite different from each other.
Where Ethanol can be consumed (Govt. Desi Pouch Daru is 20% Ethanol and 80% water), various medicines like Pudin Hara, Cough Syrup, etc is made out of Ethanol.
On the other hand Methanol is poisonous.

Methanol should never be ingested, inhaled, or be allowed to come in contact with your skin. Even a small oral dose, less than half a teaspoon, can cause blindness and less than four ounces is consistently fatal.
Be safe guys while working with them.

BTW, many of of the poisonous alcohol death news that come in media from time to time is actually Methanol accidently being produced instead of Ethanol (illegally in small home run factories usually in villages.)
When it comes to their chemical formulae, Ethanol and Methanol are amazingly close to each other and an unmonitored distillation in these home run factories at times creates disaster for village boozers.

One more problem however is that the molasses generated from one sugarcane factory is not enough to run a distillery. So usually there is one distillery for every 4-5 sugarcane mills (Usually within or near the premises of a sugarcane factory itself)

Now if you can manage to find a contact in a distillery through some way or the other, there are chances of getting Methanol at dirt cheap price.
You'll have to contact someone who works there.

Hope it helps.

Source: My Dad was once posted in a Sugarcane mill operated by Birla Group in north Bihar which had an in house distillery. Been there, seen everything.

Thanks for that but i guess that wont be any where in the city
And that means if i need it i will have to travel a lot

@chintal, instead of buying methanol and caster oil go for Tornado Flight 1 fuel its 1% nitro methane, 16,5% synthetic oil, & 81,5% Methanol. your engine will be clean and no mixing hassle. Its available in www.beyondtoyz.in  just for Rs.1295/- (4 Liter tin ) 

There is a wholesale Chemical Market in Bombay (South Bombay, City)

You get Methanol in various grades : Commercial, GR (Guaranteed Reagent) LR (Lab Reagent)

If you get a good quality Commercial Grade, it will be excellent. Methanol is hygroscopic, and absorbs moisture from the air. So always keep the jar tightly closed. Mix only as much as you would use in less than a month

Tornado fuel 1% is also a very good quality product.

Methanol is NOT a Petrol Engine fuel. The methanol/Castor mix, with or without Nitromethane has a much lower flash point and much higher calorific value than Petrol - Gasoline, which is primarily Octane, with various amounts of Septane and Nonane and other trace substances.

Wrong statements on a public forum are dangerous, as they mislead people, especially newcomers

Nitromethane is also available in the Chemical Market, basically as a Lab Reagent. It's use helps in getting a better combustion (increases the calorific value of the fuel) and therefore power and gives a better idling

Unfortunately it is pretty expensive, and has an unwanted side-effect: it leaves traces of nitric acid post combustion. This effect can be partly offset by proper cleaning after each flying session with methanol or even gasoline, and then adding a few drops of after-run oil into the engine (through the plug hole, and hand cranking for a few turns to spread throughout.) If not done, you will get corrosion in the engine

But model engines work fine with straight methanol fuel.It is only in competition or car races you need the extra power. Although the engine manufacturers recommend Nitro, take that with a pinch of salt 

so if i dont use nitro methane will the engine still need after run oil ?

It is better. Spent castor oil gums up the engine

didnt get you
spent castor oil gumps up the engine ?

Chintal: when the fuel ignites ONLY the methanol (and nitromethane if used) combust. Castor Oil does not

So, after you finish flying, there will be a residue of Castor Oil, with a little Carbon in it (from the burning)

Also, due to the heat there is a certain degree of polymerisation of the oil.

The net result, in short, is after some days the oil residue thickens like gum. In some months, this can become so hard you cannot crank the engine.

After every flying session, clean the engine and carburettor. Introduce a few drops of after-run oil through the glow plug hole and turn the engine over by hand a few times. Watch the engine's long life

Thank you for the details really appreciate it

Found the place and the shops selling it
Its at princess street you will have to explain them that you want to for making nitro fuel or else they wont entertain you