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Air-Powered Cars
Azanian writes: "Here is an interesting article about a French-designed 'compressed-air' powered car being unveiled in Johannesburg (South Africa) later this week. The first of these 'alternative-energy' zero-emission cars are scheduled to roll of the production line in June 2001." It ain't a hover car, but it looks interesting (a full day's driving on 3 hours of air compression,
with dramatically less power consumption). Sounds almost too good. Course the auto companies keep this out of our hands like they do with the engine powered by water *grin*.
For an internal-combustion engine, T2 is the temperature of the exhaust, not the outside air. It's the temperature at which heat is rejected. This can be mighty hot, but ICE's get decent efficiency compared to steam turbines anyway. This shows you the advantage of the high T1 allowed by internal combustion.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
French Cars - two words that should never be combined in that order.
Arm yourself with knowledge.
The way I see it, if Bush wins the election we'll no longer have to worry about reducing emissions. We'll just filter the crud with our lungs, like God intended.
Zero emission my eye! Slap a HEPA filter on this thing are you've got LESS than ZERO emissions. How's THAT for cool.
Just wait till some crappy band steals your nic.
Most cars do have the cat converters, but isn't it true that some "older" cars (1960's or before) are not required to have them?
Kinda like the seat belts.... same deal (never installed by the factory)...
Karnal
Unfortunately, it will be quite a while before the US sees anything like this. In France, gas is about 7.5 Francs per liter (about $4.00 per gallon). At $35-40 a fill up for an econo-box, it's well worth alternative technology. Heck, Swatch's Smart car took off in Europe.
But, the US has stricter standards on darn near everything. Ever try to import a European vehicle? Before you can drive it in the US, there are hundreds of modifications that need to be made. Everything from adding additional door beams, 3rd brake lights, catalytic converters, and so forth. Not only does this increase cost, but also weight. I couldn't see the original article (link seems broken), but the alternate one someone posted touts the vehicle, but it doesn't mention crash protection, total mileage on a "tank", or the like.
Also, I wonder what might happen if you were in an accident? If a pressurized scuba tank is standing up, and is knocked over - watch out! If the valve hits pavement, it will break off. A small metal valve being propelled by 5000 pounds of compressed air is deadly - imagine if you were in an accident!
The company's page says 300 liters at 300 barr, that would be three cubic meters, right? So, your half hour figure for one cubic meter times three is close enough, right?
But how much of a market is there for people who live in cities and drive only short distances.
Every mother who hauls her lazy brats to school every morning. My mum would love this, and so would my sister.
You could consider putting the exhaust somwhere on top of the top of the car in stead of under it. If you direct it at the right angle, you won't need spoilers anyway.
People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.
http://www.snopes.com/autos/business/magiccar.htm
Another tale of supression of a carberator.
In response to calls to put up or shut up, Pogue's miracle carburetor was heard of no more. Faced with the choice of believing someone had made claims his invention couldn't later live up to or that a monied bad guy had bought up a technology to forever keep it off the market, at least some chose to believe the suppression theory. That the carburetor never made it to the public, they said, was proof enough of its existence.
Basically, two points:
1) It is not impossible or expensive to build one's own engine. And if it were quite superior, it would be difficult to hide that fact.
2) If this poor person is recieving death threats about his compressed air engine, have those threats been investigated? Or is it meerly said to back up and exagerate the claim. Basically, it seems like this car would not be able to travel as far as stated, as long as stated, as well as it is stated.
I'm skeptical that a "better" engine like this can just pop out of nowhere. Unless, of course, it isn't completely better (i.e. less milage, less speed, less efficiency than is hyped.) Finally, for the ultimate in fuel efficiency for city travel, use a moped, or a bus. I'd bet the efficiency would be far greater than any system moving a car around could produce.
-Ben
i don't think you would need to, would you?
i'm basing my assumption upon my possibly erronious assumption that that a volume of compressed air is cooler than the same volume of uncompressed air...as i said...
anyway, if you were going to directly inject compressed air in, you could conceivably shut off the intake from the outside air...so you wouldn't have the warm outside air interfering in the process.
gods...i can't even spell. no wonder i don't remember any of this stuff.
"The things we wizards have to put up with."--Jethro Bodine
The only problem I see is in compressing the air. I used to drive long-haul trucks, which use compressed air for brakes (for slashdotters not in the know).
Job one every morning was to drain all the water out of the air tanks. You pull a cord which opens a valve and lets the air in the tank blow out the water that settles in the bottom. You wouldn't believe all the muck that is in the air that winds up in that water. If the tanks aren't drained for a few days they will spray out a grey goo that's just nasty.
My point is that low maintenance will only be moved from the engine to the compressor (another high maintenance item) and the associated holding tanks. Probably not as bad as an engine like you say, but still not trivial.
Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
----- I hate sigs.
Doc Brown spend all that time and money on the Mr. Fusion engine, but the DeLorean still needed gas (or a train) to get it up to 88 MPH. Perhaps you can buy a air powered car with the Flux Capacitor Option...just make sure it will do 88!
Beware of Sleestak
the BBChave a piece on the car to.
J-aims
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Yo, whatever happened to peas? Join T( H)GS
If you ever had one of those cheap "air-pump + water" rockets as a kid you know what I'm thinking
That a lot of these cars will get stuck on the roof?
well, you can always just plug it into a socket at the house. :)
i'm pretty sure that the solar cells wouldn't add enough weight to make a tremendous difference. now, i'm not sure you could blanket the top of the thing to generate all the electricity you'd need for the compressor...but it would help.
"The things we wizards have to put up with."--Jethro Bodine
I for one, don't want to be anywhere near it. Why? Ever read the label on a spray can? What does it say? "Do not puncture or incinerate." I can't wait for this grenade-mobile to hit (ahem) the road.
Jeff
I think it's a great idea. That way, if you go to a full-service station to refule, instead of asking for a "fill-up", you can instead tell the attendant to "blow me".
Wired magazine had this report about the same air-powered car company back in May of 1999. They reported that Mexico was going to buy some 40,000 of these things to use as taxis in Mexico City. Anyone know if this sale actually happened?
They're certainly better than most cars but you're only talking 50-60mpg on a 500-600cc bike.
Course 0-60 in 4 seconds doesn't give you 50mpg.
Deleted
Funny, I was watching a speech by Bush where he was criticizing Al Gore's "targeted" tax cut. For instance, he cited "photovoltaic roof apparatus" (or something) stumbling in his eloquent way through "photovoltaic". This got a big chuckle out of him and the audience. How foolish! What the heck is a new fangled "photovaltaic roof apparatus". Yuk Yuk Yuk. Everybody laugh at how stupid this is.
Dolt. It's solar power. Why *shouldn't* we subsidize it?
It's 10 PM. Do you know if you're un-American?
Up in the frozen white north (a.k.a. most of Canada more than 50 miles from the border), a local hobbyist did his van up the electric/diesel route (12 HP Kubuta lawn tractor engine, IIRC). Running around 75 miles per gallon. I think he had a 20 gal tank. That a cruising range of about 1500 miles. Also had the added benefit of about twelve batteries to start a three cylinder diesel, which some might consider a bit of overkill. Then again, when the local donut shops have electrical outlets in the parking lot for the customers to plug their block heaters in, this becomes a little more realistic.
Jeff
I'm gonna invent myself a wind up car! Then we will see who has the better alternative energy source...
Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
1 cubic metre is 1000 litres.
300 litres is 0.3 cubic metres.
Like most of the so-called Zero Emission vehicles this just relocates the emissions. The car just puts out air, but the horsepower to compress that air came from somewhere. Unless the compressor is run by wind, solar, or hydro power it probably results in a net increase in total emissions.
You never really know how close to the edge you can go until you fall off.
If you want an air-powered car, I think they guys at TriTec Power have a better solution with their power unit that can be adapted for just about any vehicle. It doesn't run on air per se, but it can run on any expanding gas. Steam (made by combusting diesel, gas, hydrogen, whatever), compressed air, liquid nitrogen... anything. Just imagine how much farther you could go with a tank of liquid nitrogen in your trunk expanding. I don't know the figures for N2, but for our old friend H20, it expands by a factor of 1700 times going from liquid to gas. That's nearly 6x what you'd get compressing a gas to 300 atmospheres.
For the record, assuming their claims of 200km per "tank" and 130km/h, I'd be right there getting one if they came here. Just think how damned quiet it could be. Yeah.
Mr. Ska
Erm.. heh
.
Problem being, that once you get it out of the tires its no longer compressed now is it?
(ps who moded croakers post to 2 without giving it funny -- shoot them!)
~matt~
0
o
><>
"So there he is, risen from the dead. Like that fella, E. T." - Father Ted Crilly
1) The constant farting sound of air blowing out the back end
2) Can't steer, car just flys around the room
3) High internal pressure means that exiting car too rapidly causes "explosive decompression"
4) After car has run for several hours, outer surface gets all wrinkly
--
An abstained vote is a vote for Bush and Gore.
Non-meta-modded "Overrated" mods are killing Slashdot
(Hey Ryan! Here's your proof!)
Jeff
If these cars ever became widespread electricity consumption would increase. The environmental-friendliness of the cars would be determined by the source of the power
Sure, but it can take a decade or more to get new advances into most of the vehicles on the road. Much quicker to get things installed in power plants.
It's not enough to bash in heads, you've got to bash in minds. - Captain Hammer
Think again.
The total loss would still be the same, it would
just be smaller per time unit.
"Source... The Final Frontier" -- keepersoflists.org
Joe Isuzu only cares that you buy his car, not what's under the hood...
Ok my karma is maxed out. When do I become Enlightened?
Actually, the catalytic converter is a very good argument for the point you seem to be arguing against. A Japanese company (Honda, I think) had a lean-burn engine that emitted less polution than conventional engines with converters. Because of US (read: Californian) regulations requiring converters, they were unable to introduce cars powered by these engines to the States. The result was more polution than would have been the case if the regulations had not applied, at least in this case. This is a problem with mandating means rather than results, and is widespread in American government ($10,000 hammer, anyone?).
While there would be no guarantee that a few hundred polution sources would be any more sensibly regulated than many million cars are, at least correcting regulatory screw-ups would be a lot easier.
we need a mirror ;)
- Bill
The compressor is on board. You just have to plug it in to recharge the air canisters.
Sig goes here
One word sums up ALL my fears about this concept.
POP!
Actually I guess it would be more like BOOM. With gasoline, in an accident, you need many things for a catastrophe: 1) massively rupture the fuel tank 2) provide activation energy (a spark) 3) provide a pressurized chamber to fill with gas, creating an explosion
With an air powered car, the entire catastrophe scenario is summed up in a single event: crack the fuel tank, even a little. KAPOW! all the energy that car is carrying goes off in a single burst.
Now imagine a packed, 7 lane freeway of bumper to bumper traffic made up of air powered cars (like we have here in DC). Now imagine a semi rolls over onto one, causing it to explode. The explosion tears through the neighboring cars, causing them to explode. Causing the neighboring ones to explode. Causing the neighboring ones to explode. Causing...
well, you get the idea.
Ever seen that experiment where they put a million ping pong balls on a million mousetraps, and then throw another ping pong ball in the room?
fun stuff.
--
What happens when you outlaw guns
To those concerned about people driving around with big tanks of compressed gas: people already do. A lot of vehicles (mostly small trucks and buses, but also some cars) are power by compressed natural gas -- which is, of course, pretty dangerous even when its not compressed.
(Someone once showed me a way to take out a whole city using this technology. I hope there was a flaw in his scheme.)
I have to mention Stirling's Draka Stories. Despite its appallingly revisionist social philosophy ("Slaveholders are people too!"), this is worth reading for its speculation as to how the industrial revolution might have occurred slightly earlier than in our timeline. One of the factors is the development of pneumatic power. Stirling envisions cities with compressed air mains, much like our gas and electric mains.
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Unlike most people here, I work in the automotive business. Engine Designer in fact. Here are some misconceptions that seem to be prevalent here on this thread. 1.) First off, you dont want to be in a crash on a 700kg car. Lightweight cars like subcompacts have the highest casualty rates in accidents 2.) Dont think for a minute that companies like Ford and GM wantto kill stuff like this. I know we would pay billions of dollars for a no emission engine. When you look at the all the engineering costs to remain within CAFE restrictions and emission standards an actual low weight zero emission engine would double our profits almost. But so far none of these engines have proven themselves reliable or efficient 3.) Look at all the companies that are trying to bring fuel cells to the market. Look at who the major stakeholders are. The Oil companies have plenty to lose from alternative fuel engines, but Detroit doesnt.
1) Wrap lips around tailpipe.
2) Blow
why do _I_ have to come up with all the brillaint ideas around here?
__________________________
"Oh, you hate your job? There's a support group for that, it's called everyone, they meet at the bar."
Not to burst your bubble, but why saddle the thing with pistons and all those moving parts and the associated friction? A better idea (maybe in use already?) would be to use the compressed air to spin a small turbine that drives a flywheel. The flywheel could then be used to drive a generator and the electricity would power the vehicle. That way you maximize the energy in the compressed air... you spin the flywheel at a constant speed except at startup. The wheel motors would also be the brakes scavenging some wasted power during stopping by acting as generators.
Any engineers around to throw some numbers on this? Am I way off-base?
- technik
A 2001 model year 4.7 liter 4WD Durango currently gets 13 city and 18 highway. This works out to 15.6 city and 21.6 freeway. Meanwhile, a 2001 Nissan Pathfinder, 4WD, gets 16/18. A 2001 4Runner (4WD) is 16/19. Mind you, a 2001 Land Rover "Discovery Series" gets 13/17, which is pretty lousy, about what a durango normally gets.
In other words, the import SUVs get about the same mileage as they hybrid American SUV. Meanwhile, by driving a passenger car (Let's say a 2001 Accord, 2.3 liter with VTEC) nets you 26/32. Now THAT is what I call an improvement in mileage. For that matter, the 2001 Chevrolet "Impala" (I think we can for the most part agree that no matter what the badging says, that is NOT an Impala) gets 21/32 in the 3.4 liter V6 model. Too bad they don't even offer it with a stick or it would be better than that.
The problem with SUV's isn't the fact that they burn gas. It's that people who have no buisness buying them do anyway. Even the hybrid has lousy mileage.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
The stated purpose of this first application of the engine is for a car running in the city. From the bbc article, it looks as if it may be used to replace the SABTA fleet of mini-buses that used to (I'm not sure if they still do) shuttle people from Soweto to Johannesburg. I'm sure for other applications, i.e. pulling trailers, long commutes, and rural driving other car designs would be developed with an appropriate shift in effectiveness of the engine. I can't imagine these things replacing all gas engines, but as one who lives in Chicago, I would love to get rid of all the gas burners that are used just to drive around downtown.
This is not the way to build a lasting empire.
Contrary to what people believe, Hydro is not a zero emissions system. The dams lower and raise water levels, screwing thing up for the surroundings. The turbines are cooled by the water that pushes them and to an extent, contribute to raise water temperatures. I'd say we could all walk everywhere from now on, but that wouldn't be zero emissions either. I'd warm the air wherever I went, since my body temperature is higher than the October weather here in Iowa. I'd live microsopic shoe remnants wherever I stepped, not to mention footprints if it was soft dirt. Now just imagine if I had chili for lunch!!
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When in danger or in doubt, run in circles, scream and shout. --Robert A. Heinlein
My favourite would have to be "Yawn a more Roman way".
It almost makes sense, which palindromes tend not to.
oojah
Do you have any better hostages?
This gets to the heart of the issue in America. We don't just need less poluting cars; we need less cars.
Suburban Sprawl is in full effect. It doesn't matter how efficent cars are. It is inherently inefficent to drive 50 miles a day.
If you're concerned about polution from cars live and work downtown. Drive rarely. Vote for better public transportation.
$ finger #timmy
invalid use of finger
For the rest of us, the plusses of alternative fuels are not nearly enough to outweigh the significant disadvantage of fuel availability. Can't just pull off and stick a nozzle in the filler neck if your car runs on LP or some other alternative fuel.
Electric cars have their own problems: recharge time. Cars are "meant" to be ready to go in a moment's notice; the multi-hour downtime for recharging is unacceptable to most.
Jeff
"An exploding tank of petrol is more dangerous than an exploding tank of air".
;)
Fill a glass apple juice container with dry ice. Fill one with gasoline, to the brim (like a gas tank).
Having them be glass will be a close aproximation of metal shredding from an explosion.
Give the latter one a wick and light it (long wick, be careful).
Let the former one sit until it explodes from the pressure.
Be nowhere around either one. See how far the shrapnel flies.
The pressurized air one will fly much farther. You'll be lucky of the gasoline one explodes at all. It'll probably give you a nice column of flame out of the top.
the former is a cheap type of shrapnel bomb that I've seen teenagers play around with. Its rather dangerous.
The reason it flies farther is because you can release much more energy in compressed air in a given space than you can with gasoline in that same space (now, if you vaporize the gasoline and mix it with oxygen, then you're getting somewhere - but gas tanks don't rupture in a way to vaporize the gasoline under most conditions.
- Rei
P.S. - Air doesn't cost anything? yeah, but compression costs electricity
P.P.S - Under current US environmental regulations, coal power plants produce notably more emissions per quanity of energy produced than do internal combustion engines. They make up about 50% of the US's power source. Now, if you go somewhere like Peru, which exports hydroelectric power....
He's just being nice so my real father won't freeze him in carbonite and sell him for spice.
directly injecting cooled compressed air into your engine will give your engine greater horsepower, at a cost of a net energy loss due to the compressing of the gas, spent in compression heat and frictional heat of the compressor.
You just can't beat entropy in a closed system.
I thought it was just because the boilers and expanders of the day were too heavy for their airframes; efficiency does more to determine range and maximum time aloft. For instance, look at this article, which describes a heavier but more efficient diesel replacing a gas turbine for reconaissance drones. The lower fuel consumption leads to either lower mission weight or greater time aloft for the same gross weight.
--
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
It doesn't say in the article, but I imagine there's more than a cubic metre - probably more like 1.5 or 2. They also don't say what pressure the air is stored at.
;) The auto industry is, however, fairly mature despite its relative youth(only going back a couple of hundred years at most, if you count the first steam-engine tests and such).
There is one thing to keep in mind - we've all been spoilt by e-Press e-Releases. This company already has two factories making these things, and the African government has already bought a budle of 'em. They'll be there before the year's end, by the sounds of it. This is obviously *not* vapourware.
Anothing thing to keep in mind is the industry that we're talking about. The "computer" industry is still very immature, and it acts that way - look at Rambus, look at Intel, look at Microsoft. For most other industries, to even *try* to bullshit your customers(especially governments) would spell instant death. And don't think that governments don't know exactly what's going on
The BBC could be mis-reporting that these vehicles will get 10hrs at 80km/h off one fill-up, but I doubt it.
Dave
'Round the firewall,
Out the modem,
Through the router,
Down the wire,
Barclay family motto:
Aut agere aut mori.
(Either action or death.)
sounds much like the iceman cold air intake used on neon's among others. good for a nice power increase, simply because it pulls air more directly from the air(tube goes straight down, picking up near the ground), instead of going through various tubing like factory stock does.
Gore is a major investor in Occidental Petroleum. Likewise, Ocidental Petroleum is a contributor to Gore's campaign.
You can start reading all about it here.
I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar.
Hi All! I'm in South Africa and I'll be attending the Auto Africa car show on Saturday. Hopefully I'll be able to get some more feedback (and post it if anyone wants me to !), since this sounds too good to be true. Converting from South African Rand to US Dollar this car will cost less than $10 000. At 1c/km for 200km would be R2.00 or less than $0.50 . Wow!
When I get one I'm going to fit a tyre valve on it, and fill it up free form the air compressors conveniently located on every garage forecourt.
Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated up.
This car doesn't run on compressed air. It runs on gasoline or diesel fuel. The compressed air tank is used to provide supercharging for an internal combustion engine of unusual design. It's a highly supercharged lean-burn engine, but that's not "zero pollution". There are no reports of third-party tests of the engine, although prototype vehicles are pictured. (You'd think that if it worked they'd at least drive it to a service station that has smog-measurement equipment.) It's not clear why this arrangement is supposed to be better than an ordinary supercharger.
Nor does the factory exist. They're still trying to get financing. They claim to be able to build a factory for $8 million, which is very low for an auto plant.
Something is bogus here.
Yes, and in temperatures below zero the motor/ parts of air-system will freeze.
Those were very cool - and I remember at the time wondering if they could make real cars like that. I forgot about it until just now :)
I can't remember what they were called or who made them. Anyone?
Can you give a source where turbines using 2000 degrees hot steam are suggested/designed/used/manufactured ? The power plant I know use steam at about 500 deg Celsius (~800 K) at pressures of 250 bar in the first stage. At 2000 K you would probably have considerable radiation losses (radiation scales as T^4, Stefan-Boltzm ann Law) in the pipes/turbine unless you have very good insulation.
What rumours? The big three had a rather large slush fund dedicated to purchasing new technologies that threatened their dominance. While bad for the average consumer, it's a simple question of the economic realities for an auto manufacturer. It would cost them more to re-tool an existing plant, than to start from scratch, as many new technologies do. So they have no advantage over someone building a completely new design. Therefore, it is simply more cost effective for them to buy out the new tech.
To be completely fair, a lot of the stuff they purchase the rights to does end up in vehicles, but there's an awful lot that hasn't. I'm aware of a couple of cases where the invention wasn't even patented, the inventors were bought out so fast, under some of the earliest NDAs around.
The mention of Carnot efficiencies always made me wonder why the K engine was never introduced in cars. (It is found in some larger applications). It a rotary engine (not Wankel), in which the pistons and piston block rotate around a collar, allowing a variable stroke. Still IC, but the efficieny was significantly higher than the standard model. Probably because the patent is held by an existing auto manufacturer. Still, with the huge surge in poularity in monster SUVs, the size limitation is a little less limiting, one would think.
Do you know, how much all of this emissions equipment crap weights ???
Removing most of it from the cars will decrease their weight significantly, thus making them more efficient and compensating for less power from the alternative engine.
Tigers respect lions, elephants and hippos. Maggots respect no one. (C) S. Dovlatov
I saw a video for this new air-powered car at www.pixtv.net in their eureka section this week-end. Cool!
Five or six 7-layer burritos and my skateboard. Boom! Breakin' like the wind. Now that's an air car.
"It's all right, it's ok. There's something to live for" - Uncle Bill
In the Candaian Rocky's, near Banff, there is an abandoned coal mine. Among the foundations of buildings and piles of leftover low grade coal you will find a small coal train. The kind that goes down in mines.
:-)
The engine stands about 3 foot tall, maybe 8 foot long. That large cylindrical object that you will mistake for a boiler is actually a compressed air tank. (Think about it, do you really want to take a fire down into your coal mine?
They would charge these up with air and send them down to get coal, men, whatever. I guess they had the pleasant side effect of delivering fresh air too.
If I remember the appropriate Analog article, what was being discussed involved heating the water with an H+O flame insided of the water tank. So the boiler wall would not be the hot point.
Caution: Now approaching the (technological) singularity.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
A Brazilian inventor had a fully functional compressed-air powered car well over a year ago, it was featured in an edition of Wired magazine.
Of course, it's done there for different reasons: it's easier to get the incredibly high starting torque required to get a train going via electric motors than through direct mechanical means.
Jeff
Everyone worrying about exploding gas cylinders can rest easy. From http://zeropollution.com/zeropollution/concept.htm l:
"This invention, which uses high pressure (300 bar) compressed air to store the energy needed for running the engine, is protected world-wide by more than 20 patents owned by MDI."
I figure they pad the gas cylinders with all the patent applications...
I'm not sure what country you're in but... I wouldn't want to take one of those dinky things out on American roads. I don't know about your commute, but mine invovles about 30 miles of 60-70 mph traffic. I can't imagine what a 7000lb Excursion would do to it. What about a tractor trailer? Hell, a Neon would probably splatter you. Now, if everyone had one it'd be a different story. I like it though... I'd like to see an air-powered motorcycle in fact...
While I am not sure about the air powered car's pressure requirements, i know that natural gas vehicles can run well with the presure on a full tank as little as 3000 psi.
You're missing the point here. I'd imagine you wouldn't want to drive that car over the Macinac bridge, so don't buy one. They're launching it as an urban vehicle for now.
The problem you face has nothing to do with any car manufacturer, but rather the fact that the Macinac bridge was never designed taking wind into consideration. If I remember correctly, a SUV hopped the rail and fell into the ice just a few years ago.
Regarding possible highway collisions. Yes, you would be in very deep shit if you were driving an "air-car," and got rear-ended by a Lincoln Navigator XL. (on a lighter note, which vehicle would you rather be in if you had a blow-out?) Looking at the big picture, if EVERY car on the road was a air-car, I'm sure our accidents would be much safer.
JoshuaBecause once a nice little hail storm hits your house, all of a sudden you're replacing a $200,000 roof instead of a $10,000 roof.
:-)
That is what steel shutters are for. In Germany nearly every window has a roll-up, metal shutter than can be lowered like a window-blind to protect the glass for harsh weather, or drop the ambient light to zero when one wants to sleep the day away.
There is absolutely no reason one couldn't protect photovoltaic roof cells in exactly the same manner for minimal cost. Hell, if no one in the USA makes such shutters, have them shipped over from the EU.
Couple them to motors and, if you want to get fancy, connect a barometer inline with a trigger to close the shutters should the baromentric pressur drop suddenly within a short time. Not a perfect automated defense, but pretty good should you be on vacation. If you're at home and a storm approach, push a button, shutters closed, roof protected.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
I am a car guy and own a V6 Camaro that I hope to trade on a Corvette in a few months. Fact is that these highly efficient devices are of little interest to car guys because they don't go fast. While I am fascinated that it would be cheap to operate, I ride a bike to the light rail and take that to work. This thing I'd have to park, and that would be more expensive.
My energy costs to operate the bike are practically nil (I'm overweight), and the train *has* to be more efficient than an air-powered car or any vehicle that carries its power generation along with it. The train runs off of a suspended wire system that is connected to the local power grid at many places and is relatively lossless. That combined with the exceptional efficiency of the electric motors that drive it makes it very efficient to operate.
As a matter of fact, I'd bet that labor, not energy, is the prime motivator of the cost structure in your average public transportation system.
I'm no real big fan of public transportation done wrong or done for political reasons, but the light rail system Denver has implemented for all the wrong reasons ended up being pretty good.
I drive my car on weekends and for the fun of it, and so an electric or compressed air or any other low-horsepower solution wouldn't be worthwhile. My V6 has 200 HP right now. The Vette I want has 385 and weighs just 3200 pounds. HP weight efficiencies like that just aren't available in alternative energy sources.
A society that will trade a little liberty for a little order will lose both and deserve neither. - Thomas Jefferson
European citizens, companies and government are doing a big effort to reduce CO2 emissions and to reduce the green house effect: high taxes to fuel, promoting the use of public transport, small cars, low consumption diesel engines, restrictive rules for car manufacturers, R&D projects to build cars to consume just 1 litre for 100 kms, etc. etc.
But USA is the _highest_ CO2 producer all around the world, they consume about 40% of the destilled petroleum, they like big cars and hate small cars, they enjoy the cheapest gasoline of the world (about 1/4 - 1/3 than the European average), their laws are less restrictive than european laws...
The best policy to reduce CO2 emission to a half in short period of time is to move all Americans to an European country.
Indeed, it's a good idea for them also, because the Euro is very cheap against the dollar.
COME HERE, so we can forget air-pumped cars for a while.
--ricardo
sgis ddo ekil t'nod i
Still, unlike the movies, automobiles rarely explode. Mostly they burn if your luck is really bad.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
...and the parking lots, and the malls... Someone once said "even if they make a car that runs on farts and emits pure water, we'll still have to deal with sprawl." Sounds like we're pretty close to a car that runs on farts, but that ain't gonna make this country safe to walk again... Alternative-fuel cars are a massive red herring. Alt-fuel buses, maybe...
First off, the articles I've read are contradictory; one says it was created in France, and two others say it was created in South Africa. Then there's the question of if compressed air has enough energy density to power a car. I expect the answer is no, it doesn't, and this is a hoax.
If you are modding me down because you disagree with me, use the "Flamebait" category, not the "Troll" one.
True, the car companies will still make sure that that alternative fuel cars will rust/break down after 3yrs or so. Plus whilst the car is a fashion accessory they will always have a steady revenue stream.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
>I've yet to read _why_ this fundamental change was made
Actually it was commented on.
It seems us Americans like stomping on the peddle and having the car move. So, to give the car 'pick up' they gave it a bigger engine. Was one of the only complaints. (and with global warming...the driving around in the cold won't matter!)
> storing that much energy in an extremely volatile format is just plain dangerous.
As oppsed to pinto?
Perhaps with the cheaper carbon-fiber technology, the safty issues have been addressed.
This gent has links to the concept of air powered cars.
www.redrok.com
the air car link
If it was said on slashdot, it MUST be true!
With 60% of our oil coming from foreign sources, does it really matter? Once Bush takes office and this car becomes widespread, theoretically he could cut up to 60% of the oil supply and not cripple his family's home-grown oil business (or, for that matter, hurt the big oil companies that Gore and Lieberman have major investments in).
OTOH, we all know what happens when oil prices go down...people start driving more, and businesses take advantage of lower transportation costs to do more. Yes, I can see a big cut in our oil needs if this technology were widespread, but I also think that the amount of traveling we do would rise dramatically to offset some (or even most) of that drop.
Economics solves the problem.
You are correct, but the "geared down" release of the energy is exactly why it works.
Think of the pure air "pop" being like the tires of a car on a slick surface when the engine is given full gas. The tires spin, but the car does not go forward. On that same surface, if you give the engine a little gas at a time, you can add forward momentum to the car instead of wasting the energy as heat and noise.
--- -- - -
Give me LIBERTY, or give me a check.
I was hoping it would be powered by the french themselves.
Candidate's Wealth
Gore sold all his stock holdings when he entered the public arena...unlike the other fella who holds a wealth of interest-conflicts.
Gore's upper family indeed holds Occidental stock- what control does he have over that?
There's very little comparison here, IMO.
Kinda like Moe, but just a little more Kool
The Texas kind. Baseball and softball sized. In 1994, there was an incident I call the Mayfest massacre in Fort Worth. Mayfest is an open air fair they have every May (go figure) near the Trinity River. Well, one day in May, the weather turned ugly, and a REALLY BAD hailstorm hit. 4 people were critical injured by hailstones. Millions of dollars worth of damage to roofs and cars. My mother's Izuzu Rodeo looked like someone had taken a baseball bat to it. All the windows were knocked out and there were large dents on the roof and hood.
Flash forward to March of 2000 when the tornado hit downtown Fort Worth, and one of the people killed was actually killed by hailstones.
Needless to say, solar cells on rooftops wouldn't be the best idea here.
It also stated in the article that a standard air pump at a filling station could fill up the tanks in under 3 minutes. Sounds great but leaves me wondering if filling stations will start charging for air as well...
Not just any turbine, but how about a Tesla Turbine? There is a Tesla Engine Builders Association involved in building these, but I think their focus is on steam rather than compressed air.
The following is parodied in response to a previous post that someone made about air tank ruptures:
OK, I want to know how many of you have ever seen the results of a gasoline explosion? Talk about cars blowing up like they do in the movies. GASOLINE at those kinds of pressures is DANGERIOUS. And they want gas stations? What are they going to have, big cans of gas out in the open? Oh yeah, I want huge amounts of combustible liquid underground, right in my neibourhood.Oh yes, gasoline is undeniably evil and dangerous as all hell to have around. But in my experience, even when it does get free, it's not *that* likely to catch fire. In other words, the only energy released when you gas tank leaks is the energy that was used to put the gasoline in the tank. It still retains its chemical energy. The more subtle dangers of leaked gasoline (ie. pollution) are less immediate in the case of a gasoline leak.
A tank of compressed air only provides energy as a function of the pressure at which it is stored relative to the pressure of the atmosphere to which it will be allowed to escape when its work is done. If your tank ruptures, you lose that stored energy. Period. And that stored energy will often cause the more rapid release of further stored energy. How? When the tank fissures, the force of the escaping air will help to push the sides of the crack apart the way a cushion of air suspends a hovercraft. A chain reaction ensues: as the hole gets bigger, the air releases more force as it passes through the hole, and therefore the hole continues to grow.
Naturally, when a cylinder of compressed gas fails, the results can be quite spectacular. Rarely are things this catastrophic with spilled liquid fuels.
I work for a marine electronics company. Many large marine engines are started either with a smaller engine, or with a large and sudden injection of compressed air into a cylinder, since a conventional starter motor wouldn't be practical at the sizes we're talking about. I was in the engine room of a fairly small tanker; the engine was a SEMT Pielstick, about 300L in displacement. The engine wasn't running, but they were preparing to start it, so they had the electric-powered compressors (which run off either diesel gensets or shore power) running to charge the starting tank. Then, a weld on the side of the tank failed.
While no one was killed, the results were catastrophic: the end of the tank, which was by that point charged to about 170PSI, was propelled across the engine room and actually managed to perforate a hull plate into a ballast tank. The hull plate was over 1" thick steel. Fortunately, the ship was loaded so the ballast tank was empty.
Given that this was in the engine room of an American-flagged tanker (*not* a Russian submarine!), and a well-maintained one at that, I'm not sure how I feel about sharing the road with a fleet of aging cars with aging compressed gas cylinders on board.
I've also seen a cast iron acetylene tank, uncapped without being secured, knocked over and with the regulator and valve broken off. Sure, someone was being careless; sadly, this sort of stuff happens. 3 square inches or so of leak, tank that weighs 75lbs, and is full of gas at a pressure of (let's guess, I don't know for sure) 130 PSI...
3 square inches x 130 pounds per square inch of force = 390 pounds of thrust. On the back of a tank that weighs about 75 lbs. For one thing, it's airborne. Secondly, it continues to accelerate until it either hits something or exhausts its supply of compressed gas. Did I mention that it was a cast iron cylinder?
Fortunately, it didn't catch fire. But it did take out a big piece of a cinderblock wall.
I think that's my problem. With gasoline, *if* it leaks, and *if* it gets ignited, you're in mortal peril.
But with compressed gases, *if* it leaks, you're in mortal peril.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
The link in the article didn't work, but here's another about the same thing. At a price tag of $10,000 I'd have to consider it for a commute to work car. And at a price of 30 cents for 120 miles??? You know the oil companies hate to hear about this stuff. So does OPEC. :)
"Say no more..." - Monty Python
Sounds like a good idea, but you've got to consider that compressed gas can be dangerous. My friends and I used to build compressed-air powered spud cannons that would throw a potato several hundred yards with less than 100 psi.
Any one remember seeing this one around?:
The Sleeping Giant
I am a high pressure, compressed gas cylinder.
I stand 57 inches tall.
I am 9 inches in diameter.
I weigh in at 155 pounds when filled.
I am pressurized at 2,200 pounds per square inch (psi).
I have a wall thickness of about 1/4 inch.
I wear a regulator and hose when at work.
I wear a label to identify the gas I am holding. My color is not the answer.
I transform miscellaneous stacks of material into glistening ships and many other things - when properly used.
I transform glistening ships and many other things into miscellaneous stacks of material - when allowed to unleash my fury unchecked, I can be ruthless and deadly in the hands of the careless and uninformed.
I am too frequently left standing alone on my small base without other visible means of support - my cap removed by an unthinking worker.
I am ready to be toppled over - when my naked valve can be damaged or even snapped off - and all my power unleashed through an opening no larger than a lead pencil.
I am still proud of my capabilities - here are a few of them:
I have on rare occasions been known to jet away - faster than any dragster.
I might smash my way through brick walls.
I might even fly through the air.
I may spin, ricochet, crash and slash through anything in my path.
You can be my master, but only under these terms:
Full or empty - see to it that my cap is on, straight and snug.
Never -repeat- never leave me standing alone. Secure me so that I cannot fall.
--
I can just see it, the local news reminding us not to all refill our fuel tanks at the same time lest we drop the local air pressure and cause weather changes and anoxia...
Have you ever tried to make gasoline explode?
May we live long and die out
Um, did they forget about the power needed to compress the air? Unless they've found a way to build air compressors using room-temperature superconductors and friction-free materials, this is still a net loss of energy. We'd of course have to build a lot more power plants which, given the phobia that many people have regarding nukular (which reminds me of a Simpson's episode...) power, would use just as much fossil fuel as we currently do. Probably wouldn't do much about air pollution either except localize it to the power plant (instead of internal combustion engines spreading it around).
Nice try. Perhaps an on-board cold fusion generator could compress the air? Might not work but it'll get you on the news.
--
CUR ALLOC 20195.....5804M
This looks like a great idea, god knows internal combustion engines are very inefficient (I believe the Carnot cycle will show that a maximum theoretical effiency is 40%, unless you build your block and pistons out of ceramics) but I don't think it will sell in the US.
Small cars like this, though fun to drive (I still miss my urban commando Plymouth Colt, tiny and sporty, perfect for living in the city) sell poorly in the US, because most American's like big ass SUV's to haul their flabby bodies from the office park to the suburbs and back, even though their unsafe, gas guzzling top heavy behemoths. I think the size and mass of the SUV's appeal to Americans, for reasons of low self esteeem, or perhaps marketing brainwashing.
So, until the French designer jacks up the wheels, puts a plastic off road grill on it and make it look like a truck, don't even bother selling it in the US.
Piston engines are not the same as internal combustion (IC) engines. IC engines are actually a subset of pistion engines. A piston engine works by expansion of gasses at the top of the piston forcing the piston down. Of course the earliest incarnation was the steam engine where a furnace and boiler created steam that was channeled into a cylinder where it forced a piston down and transfered the up-down forces of a piston into a circular motion needed to drive wheels. The second incarnation was the internal combustion engine where exploding fuel provided the push on the piston. This engine simply uses compressed air to force the piston down and drive the vehicle forward.
-- Greg
Slashdot, would a spell-checker for posting be too much to ask? It's not rocket science!
It depends on where you are...here in Nevada, all vehicles built from 1968 onward are subject to annual smog checks if garaged in the state's two urban counties (Clark and Washoe). They're tested for carbon monoxide and hydrocarbon emissions, with older vehicles subject to less stringent restrictions. AFAIK, there are no exceptions, other than that 1967 and earlier model-year cars aren't tested.
It's not a "treadmill" or dyno test like they use in some places, though...they just stick a sensor up the tailpipe, run the engine at 2500 rpm for a couple of minutes, and then run it at idle for a minute. I've heard horror stories about the places that do the other type of smog check.
20 January 2017: the End of an Error.
I don't think any of the articles mentioned this. What would this vehicle use to power its electric necessities? You need to have headlights, turn signals, a radio would be nice, a DVD player that pops out of the headliner to show Bugs Bunny clips, etc. Maybe a battery and some sort of alternator?
Cats are only "required" (in practice - I think the law actually mandates a year) on cars less the 25 years old. Any older and the vehicle is considered a "classic", at which point no emissions test is needed.
If the car came with a cat and is older that 25 years, then most people just take 'em off (massive performace and mileage increase).
Me, I just tool around in my uber 1337 '66 VW squareback (thanks, fishbowl) that has no emissions equipment what so ever...
censorship is a form of noise, which actively seeks to drown out content with silence - Crash Culligan
There is a web site full of these kinds of innovations at http://www.futureenergies.com/. They have a hydrogen fuel-cell powered mountain-bike, the quasiturbine engine (as revolutionary as the Wankel) which overcomes the problems of the piston engine *and* the Wankel, a computer screen that is powered by ambient light alone, and loads more.
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
There's lots of free compressed air in the tires of those cars parked around you...
Heck, I'm sure you could drain a few miles worth of air from that Ford SUV with the Firestone tires, and the owner wouldn;t know the difference...
Notice how much uglier it is from the back side...
I have a positive modifier on Troll. When I mod someone Troll their karma should go UP!
The idea was to use reverse electrosis to product energy (that is, hydrogen gas plus oxygen plus spark -> water and lots of energy). So you have to store oxygen and hydrogen on board for this to work. So far, not too unreasonable (though r.e. has long be discounted as a possible fuel source).
The hydrogen tank, since it's very flammable, couldn't be stored in hazardous places in the car, so they had suggested redesigning the car as to use up the trunk space for the H2 tank, moving the chassis up off the group a bit, and having the space underneath the car for where you could put your "groceries or babies or stuff".
They suggested a similar thing with the oxygen tank but had a better suggestion - instead of having oxygen onboard, it could be pulled from the air and separated out from the nitrogen, then used in their engine. To do the separation of oxygen from nitrogen in air, they suggested a distillation column be installed on the car. I did a quick calculation and found out that they would need at least an 80ft tall column to be able to achieve this.
So this group is proposing a car design that is 80ft tall, but you stuff all your possessions underneath it as you go along.
Needless to say, they didn't get an 'A'.
"Pinky, you've left the lens cap of your mind on again." - P&TB
"I can see my house from here!" - ST:
-Marcel
No, but I'll take a couple of $5,000 screws, assuming of course that Natalie Portman is somehow involved.
Pete
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True, I recall the same, now that you remind me. The problem was that Californian regulations stipulated a tri-phase catalytic converter that would reduce CO, NOx and VOCs. Now, lean-burns have lower VOC and CO outputs than conventional engines after conversion, so such a converter makes absolutely no sense, but it is required by CA law... The tri-phase converter raises the exhaust pressure beyond what a lean-burn engine can work with, so lean-burns are in practice illegal in California. A mono-phase NOx converter would have been quite practical, but the authoroties had a regulation, and that was all that mattered to them.
All of the above is subject to memory, which should not be assumed fully reliable.
The compressor is on board. You just have to plug it in to recharge the air canisters.
True, and this is how you get the 3-hour recharge. I was referring to the 3-minute recharge at the gas station idea mentioned in the South African article.
--
Disinfect the GNU General Public Virus!
This concept was first publicized in a french review a few years ago. I can't remember when I first read an article about it here in France, but I think it was about 3 or 4 years ago. The fact is that the concept is rather good. So good that big petrol companies don't want it to appear on the market (neither governments because of taxes that petrol brings to countries). That's probably why it didn't took off by now. May be that if more and more people know the concept, it could become very popular and be widely adopted. Who knows... Bu one would have to fight against big companies and governments. To be more accurate about the ceoncept itself, the engine allows running in two modes : - mode 1 is 'compressed air only'. The endurance is small but high enough to use it in a town - mode 2 is 'air mixed with petrol', which gives a good endurance, and also an ecological engine compared to 'petrol only'.
This is because "older" Diesel engines lack a particle filter. Most pollution from Diesel engines come from microparticles, of which a certain range of sizes can trigger allergologic problems.
Newer HDi/TDI (basically, all common-rail high pressure) engines produce particles of somewhat smaller size ; better, their mandatory computerised injection system makes it relatively easy to put particle filters AND have them autoclean (you need to have them checked every 80'000km or so).
Currently, only Peugeot sells this particle filter, on its flagship 607 model (see http://www.peugeot.com/gamme/fr/html/607.htm), but in 5 years or so, most reasonably advanced car diesel manufacturers will have adapted (still a lorry and coach problem to tackle).
Barring the particles, a diesel engine tends to be more efficient than a gasoline one ; which means less carbon *oxydes. Oh, and high pressure common rail injection even increases this efficiency and still lowers consumption (more power, less consumption for equal sized classic and HDi engines).
Yeah, I cant wait to get one of these, so I can do completely air-powered drive-by shootings with my Nerf Wildfire!
Baz
I think that would go beyond "clean" machines and into "cleaning" machine territory.
Fine point.
I have an off road race car that weighs less than this airmobile, and it handles rather nicely at highway speeds in any kind of wind on or off road. Of course, it has most of it's weight made up in frame, engine and tires and looks pretty much like a bullet with wheels. Handling depends on aerodynamics and suspension, not mass. The hideous composite tub pictured in the article will handle like a pig on skates, and if they are telling the truth about the engine it will never reach highway speed unless it is being towed. The usual objections apply to this airmobile: Low energy density, short range, VERY poor crash survivability (4500 psi = bomb), butt-ugly design, increased dependence on electricity generation etc. Do the planet a favor and get yourself a late model car with computer engine management and a high performance catalytic converter. Less pollution than a coal fired electric plant powering a fleet of these weinermobiles, that's for sure.
Brought to you by the Invincible Chordate Pikaia Commemorative Society.
Look, you keep changing the parameters ... First you said the volume is constant. Then you say n is constant. Nope. Either you consider the tank and tank only, in which n rises and therefore P, or you consider the gas at P=1 atm, whose volume will shrink to fit the tank ...
--
Yeah, guys, I agree with you completely. It's a great idea. I love it, it's the economy car of the future, but with one great reservation: compressed tanks. I've seen compressed air tanks go off, I've seen compressed acetylene cylinders go off, and I don't want to share the road with a fleet of the aging Toyota Tercels of the future, all equipped with thermally cycled, corroded and metal-fatigued compressed air tanks.
Job one every morning was to drain all the water out of the air tanks. You pull a cord which opens a valve and lets the air in the tank blow out the water that settles in the bottom. You wouldn't believe all the muck that is in the air that winds up in that water.<grin> A few years ago, I got my air brake license so that I could drive the company Hino around. (Ugh. Hated the Hino. Loved my TopKick.) This was in the Ottawa and Toronto areas in Canada. Toronto's climate is about the same as Detroit or Chicago's, but Ottawa makes a cold winter's day in Maine seem warm.
Evidenly, the moisture in the brake tanks collects, and will freeze into ice just with the drop in pressure when you apply your brakes hard and fast, let alone when the weather is really cold.
Since the average driver lets their car run out of fuel occasionally, or does minimal maintenance, or can drive for miles without noticing the low oil pressure light, do we want to trust them to add air tank deicer? What kinds of weird compressed air fitting leaks and failures are these things gonna develop when they're frozen up? This is scary.
If the tanks aren't drained for a few days they will spray out a grey goo that's just nasty.LOL.... I'm not perfect either. I have a compressor in my garage, and the bottom of the tank is a bitch to get at. Because I don't empty it as often as I should, I'm starting to get corrosion on the inside of the tank from the water just sitting there. I've been spraying air tool oil into the tank lately just to ensure that the corrosion doesn't get out of hand.
My point is that low maintenance will only be moved from the engine to the compressor (another high maintenance item) and the associated holding tanks.I'm only worried about the idiots with whom I have to share the road. The people who aren't smart enough to know that a tractor-trailer can't stop as fast as a car and therefore cut them off are oblivious to the laws of physics, and therefore to the basics of driving and vehicle maintenance. At least if a gas tank leaks, it has to be ignited before you have a problem. If a tank that is compressed hard enough that it powers your vehicle fails, you and your vehicle will be airborne.
In principle, this is a great way to store the energy required to operate a vehicle. In practice, this scares the shit out of me.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
Actually, I drive a Jetta. Infer what you like about my penis size from that, but it is at least made out of metal. I'd plow through that thing like your gigantic penis plows through your favorite crusty sock every night, leaving a cloud of styrofoam, decompressing air, and body parts. (And I probably wouldn't give a damn)
- This company already has two factories making these things, and the African government has already bought a budle of 'em.
Not to nitpickAlex Bischoff
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Alex Bischoff
HTML/CSS coder for hire
blessings,
"Only in their dreams can men truly be free 'twas always thus, and always thus will be."
--Tom Schulman
__________
The concept allows the engine to run in two modes :
- mode 1 is 'compressed air only'. The endurance is small but high enough to use it in a town
- mode 2 is 'air mixed with petrol', which gives a good endurance, and also an ecological engine compared to 'petrol only'.
Doesn't anybody remember Air Jammers?
Relocating the emissions can be a good thing, even if they (temporarily) increase. Right now, all the emissions are from "non-point sources"--meaning from cars that are zooming around everywhere. But if all the emissions could be centralized into a few power plants, it's a LOT easier to apply some emission reducing technology to the problem. Just think about the logistics (and legalistics) of making all car drivers install some kind of filter or post-processor compared to doing the same for a few power plant owners.
Furthermore, it modularizes the problem. Instead of having to come up with an engine for a car (which has to be small, high-power, light, and various other characteristics that vary by car) you can extract all those issues to the power plant where size, weight, cost, etc aren't as important. Imagine, for simplicity, that we were all driving electric cars but that our electric infrastructure was coal-based. Just replace those coal-plants with fusion plants (or solar, or whatever) and the change is transparent to the rest of society.
This is just like putting wrapper calls around malloc/free--you have all the same memory management issues to deal with, but in only one location.
--
An abstained vote is a vote for Bush and Gore.
Non-meta-modded "Overrated" mods are killing Slashdot
(Hey Ryan! Here's your proof!)
Maybe I'm just too old to be in this discussion :) but I remember a story on the now long forgotten TV program "That's Incredible" (over 20 years ago I think [I was only 10]) A guy had a working compressed air engine. It had some type of compressor built into it to self regenerate. I tried finding more out about him but he QUICKLY dissapeared once the story aired. Guess it just goes to show, you shouldn't come up with a better mouse trap unless you can keep from getting squished by the current oil....err I mean mouse trap makers.
"A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals and you know it." - K
they already charge for air and they charge even more for the removal of air! I want a light sail propelled vehicle or something that doesn't require staying on the ground. "There's always an easier way" Gunnventions http://www.geocities.com/gunnman17/
"There's always an easier way" ~Mr. Gunn, Gunnventions
Yeah, but my car doesn't have one. Why? because it rusted through and I'm too cheap to spend $150 on a new one. Sure, new vehicles have installed environmental features, but what happens when these vehicles age? The systems are removed as people don't want to pay to fix non-essential systems.
.... (not as good as first sex (with Natalie Portman - ah the innocent virgin) If you think Natalie Portman is an innocent virgin, you're probably more innocent than you think she is!
Sometimes boldness is in fashion. Sometimes only the brave will be bold.
Not to burst your bubble, but why saddle the thing with pistons and all those moving parts and the associated friction? A better idea (maybe in use already?) would be to use the compressed air to spin a small turbine that drives a flywheel.
Yeah, but the problem with a turbine is that it doesn't make complete use of the fuel passing through it.
In a car, the piston engine won out over *many* attempts (noteably by Chrysler) to build a turbine car, because most of the force of the expanding gases in a piston engine is used to push down the piston. In a turbine, however, only a small amount of that kinetic energy is used to push the turbine blades and create rotational energy - the rest of that kinetic energy goes out the exhaust.
Now, in the case of a jet aircraft, the turbine really only needs to power the compressor that runs the engine - the actual pressure of the exhaust gases leaving the engine is what produces the airplane's forward thrust. In a car, this isn't practical; capturing the energy with the turbine blades is too inefficient, and powering your car with the exhaust would cause jet blast in traffic. (On the good side, this would deter tailgating.)
So, in all likelihood, the automotive turbine will go down in history as a really cool curiosity. (However, it did pioneer the use of many inexpensive high-temperature alloys that are used in today's car engines.)
The flywheel could then be used to drive a generator and the electricity would power the vehicle. That way you maximize the energy in the compressed air... you spin the flywheel at a constant speed except at startup.Absolutely. You spin your engine at its most efficient speed, and then use other technologies to couple that power to the wheels. Let's say this is done with a piston engine. Good idea; this is why hybrid cars are starting to come about. But if the engine is running entirely on compressed air, I'm not sure if the additional cost of a hybrid system will be worth the incremental savings in fuel costs. The marketplace will have to bear out whether the added weight and cost makes that feasible.
With a gasoline engine, the appeal, in particular, is that when a gas engine runs at its most efficient speed, it produces less emissions for the amount of mechanical power it is creating. It's not the gas mileage, though that's a great selling feature. And it simplifies engine design to meet a given emissions target for a vehicle. If the engine is running off compressed air, though, do you care? The efficiency and emissions questions are mostly going to come about at the compression stations that produce the "fuel" for these cars.
The wheel motors would also be the brakes scavenging some wasted power during stopping by acting as generators.Again, worth the cost, weight, decreased reliability penalty from added vehicle complexity? Probably not. Regenerative brakes are a great idea in electric cars and in hybrid cars (which are that way more for emissions reasons, rather than for gas mileage issues). In either an electric or a hybrid car, this is a very simple extension to the system that you've already implemented to power the vehicle. The cost and impact are minimal, the payoffs are good. But, I don't see them really being important enough to bother on air cars.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
This all sounds great but what kind of pressure does the air have to be compressed to? One of the downfalls of natural gas is that it has to be compressed to somewhere in the neighbourhood of 30,000 psi which requires numberous small heavy cylindars to get any sort of range. Also with such a high pressure I wouldn't want to be anywhere near the vehicle in an accident.
Even having said that it's definately a step in the right direction!
Trevor.
P.S. My inferiority complex isn't as good as yours!
And this is why we didn't have steam powered airplanes, and had to wait on the IC engine before we could create them.
Is there more to this or is it just an urban legend?
1.Big Oil companies
2.Current big car manufacturers (don't want to change out those assembly lines)
3.Governments of large oil producing companies
4.Politicians who are controlled (oops I mean lobbied) by the oil companies
5.Car parts manufacturers (have to start making parts they may be unfamiliar with)
And the list just goes on...
6. Laws of physics (the big corporations won't let our government pass better laws of physics)
blessings,
"Only in their dreams can men truly be free 'twas always thus, and always thus will be."
--Tom Schulman
Step 1: There is a small, circular, pink bag of air that you inflate to be the size of a small cushion.
Step 2: Place the cushion into the driver's seat of the car, preferrably under the seat cover, in a way that the small pink tab is sticking out.
Step 3: Have the driver go to sit down on the seat, and distract them so they do not notice the bulge in their seat.
Step 4: Laugh in a childish manner as a loud "poot" sound comes out of the seat. As an added bonus, you can say something else amusing in a childish manner. e.g. "JEEZ! WHAT DID YOU HAVE FOR DINNER?!?!?"
As you can see, it will not transport you anywhere, but you'll be having such a good time at someone else's expense, you won't care.
Mas vale cholo, que mal acompañado.
Marketers pay 3.6% for losses across AEP's system. These would be 128kV to 765kV lines.
Cost ranges from ~$50/MW to as much as several thousand per MW(during peek load hours: summer or winter extremes).
Except that turbine engines are now used in main battle tanks, like the M-1 Abrams, and the T-80-something, or whatever the latest Russian model is, which also uses a turbine engine. So what is the engineering reason which makes turbines practical for tanks, but not for automobiles?
They don't have to conform to Corporate Average Fuel Economy (CAFE) laws. Or emissions standards. They're an off-road vehicle.
And the poor efficiency (mileage) of a turbine is probably quite inconsequential when you're talking about something that takes gallons per mile, not miles per gallon, based on its sheer bulk, inelegant steering system, and the friction of treads against the ground, regardless of how you power it.
In fact, a turbine has a very important advantage here. The reciprocating mass of a piston engine makes it comparably slow to build RPMs, but its greater sealing makes it more efficient. While I know nothing about tanks, I'm sure they've got fairly simple transmissions that can take great advantage of the fact that a good turbine can spool up quickly, can run fairly low (if a 5,000 RPM idle is low) and has a bigger RPM range than pistons. The simpler drivetrain makes it less vulnerable to breakdown under attack, among other things.
The performance of the M-1 using a turbine is far superior to the older diesel engined tanks.Probably, yes. Diesels aren't known for great speed. Volkswagen Turbo-Diesels and a few others have gotten around this, but by and large, diesel engines aren't great for torque or horsepower (which is torque over time, essentially) per cubic inch.
Diesels are known for great gas mileage, though, because the fuel produces a lot more BTU of heat per milliliter. But they don't do it suddenly the way gasoline does.
Diesels are known for being tough to start in a cold climate. Since the heat of compression is what ignites the fuel/air mixture, glow plugs are employed for cold winter mornings. Even so, they can be tough to get running. While jet/turbine engines or a gasoline piston motor can have trouble too, I've always dreaded being the poor sucker who gets to help someone start a cold Mercedes/VW/Isuzu/etc. diesel engine on a cold Ottawa morning.
Half the problem is getting the diesel into the fuel pump. I've seen in jelly up. Neither gasoline nor kerosene/naptha (jet fuel) does that readily, since it's a far lighter hydrocarbon.
Of course, once the diesel is running, the friction and heat of combustion quickly warm the motor to its normal operating temperature and all is well, even if it's -50C with the wind chill. (And Ottawa does get that cold. Don't believe me? Mid-January, 1993; the only things that started in that cold were *well-maintained* Chevettes, Volares, Ladas (Russian cars that are sparsely sold in Canada), older Volvos and stuff. Seems EFI computers don't use components rated to those temperatures.)
You don't choose where wars get fought. Nor do you want a tank that wouldn't start easily after it's just been airlifted in the cold of a transport at 20,000 feet and has just been parachuted to troops in the middle of hostility.
So, while a diesel engine is great for a ship or a big rig or even a commuter car in a warm climate, it's not very good for something where speed might be important - like a tank which may have to get out of the line of fire.
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
I drive a Mazda Miata-it only weighs 2100 lbs. with me in it and a couple of heavy parts taken out.(A/c, etc) Except for when the top is off I have no problems even in the strongest of winds because of the aerodynamics of the vehicle. The Sienna, however, in even gentle winds you can really feel it. With SUV's it's even worse. The point is that it's not about weight, it's about wind.
Now oil companies are going to figure out a way to overcharge us for AIR.
We'll just end up using all of our air to fuel our cars. Then the French will have to design a spaceworthy version of the Statue of Liberty so we can steal all the air from another planet with an atmosphere.
Let's just hope the superintelligent manta rays of that world haven't a clue what is going to happen.
Andrew Borntreger
Andrew Borntreger
Champion of cinematic disasters
Same here, there really isn't any enforcement in Michigan.
glad I don't live in your country...
I've *never* seen this.
The weight isn't as big an issue as you may think. The Geo Metro of the late 80's was only about 1680 pounds. Yeah, you would feel it when a truck roared by, but it wasn't a challenge to hold your lane in it.
Note that it runs on high-pressure air, and 4500 PSI air compressors aren't that common - yet - and not at all at gas stations. (Imagine "Honey, I need to go down to the dive shop to fill up the car!")
I have to wonder about crashworthiness issues, though.
--
Disinfect the GNU General Public Virus!
kinda like a large container of gasoline? Besides, I love a glorious death
If your gasoline tank leaks, it's only deadly dangerous if it also gets ignited.
A tank of compressed air under sufficent pressure and with sufficient volume to serve as the motive power for a vehicle will be deadly with a simple leak. Forget ignition; a pinhole could kill you.
In a vessel of compressed gas, leaks tend to spread.
If, in a controlled fashion, there is enough pressure and enough volume of compressed gas to move the vehicle at respectable speeds over respectable distances through the inefficiencies of tires, transmissions, and the friction incurred in a piston engine, just think of how fast, how far, and in what direction the vehicle will travel if the tank is ruptured.
And if you think it won't happen, think again.
If you rear-end a car and split the gasoline tank, chances are you'll just make a (potentially dangerous) puddle.
But if you rear-end a car and split open a tank of compressed gas, the energy stored in that tank is going to be released like a big strong spring being flicked across a room.
Ever play with a spring-powered BB gun? Think of your tank of compressed air as being a metaphor for the spring. Think of the BB as being a car, hurtled out of control as the spring is released suddenly.
Finally, think of how far the BB can embed itself into the object at which it happens to be pointed.
Any questions?
Fire and Meat. Yummy.
If it was a hot air car, I could run it off my boss - finally, turning him into a useful resource. More generally, We could power entire public transportation systems simply by holding regular meetings to discuss great new e-commerce ideas with venture capitalists.
Correct me if I'm wrong..But having the water doesn't so much give you a 'boost', as slow down the rate at which the compressed source is depleted, allowing longer acceleration time. The overlal energy released will be the same, exactly. Water does not compress.
If you use one of those rockets with no water, all the air comes out 'pop' just like that. with water, it takes considerably longer. In both cases, there is the same amount of energy expended.
How crash proof is this new car? I wonder any puncture in the compressed air tank could make it explode.
A sig is redundant.
when i was a kid I thought by 2000 we'ld be driving jet cars like in the jetsons and stuff. Now all we have is an air powered one? Millenium schmillenium...wheres my jet car!!!
"sex on tv is bad, you might fall off..."
I lost my concept of community when my community lost all concept of me.
Contrary to what people believe, Hydro is not a zero emissions system. The dams lower and raise water levels, screwing thing up for the surroundings.
The turbines are cooled by the water that pushes them and to an extent, contribute to raise water temperatures.
Needless to mention the massive powergrids of wires, poles, etc. which all consume brute product.
Hydro is clean.. But it's not Zero Emissions.
Here is the Company that makes the Air powered cars.
h tml
Someone please mirror important stuff before it gets dotted.
http://www.zeropollution.com/zeropollution/index.
How about an air powered bike/scooter? Surely that would have some market value for people. I have a lot of friends who commute on motorcycles partly because of the fuel economy. This would be even better.
I have a positive modifier on Troll. When I mod someone Troll their karma should go UP!
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Air-powered cars on the way to SA
By Johann Verster
A car that could revolutionise the motor industry and which led to death threats against the designer will be unveiled at the Auto Africa show in Johannesburg next week.
The e.Volution vehicle is powered by compressed air from high-pressure cylinders similar to those used by deep-sea divers. Made of feather-light material and weighing only 700 kg, it is essentially a city run around but can reach a speed of about 130km/h on the open road.
The e.Volution will be able to travel 200 km on one tank of compressed air at a cost of about 1c/km and can run for 10 hours in city traffic.
The inventor is Guy Negre, a French motor vehicle engineer and former Formula One engine designer. He has apparently received death threats because of the invention, which could cripple the world's oil industry.
Having devoted the past decade to his creation, which uses a suction "engine" of only 35 kg, Negre has licensed groups of SA investors to manufacture the vehicle locally. Up to 2 000 units a year will be made here initially.
He says the energy efficiency levels of his vehicles compared favourably with those of petrol, diesel and electric engines. Air stations could be erected anywhere to fill the tanks in just three minutes. Alternatively, the vehicle can be refilled in about four hours with the aid of an electric pump and an ordinary power socket.
It will sell for R65 000 and the first vehicles could roll off the local assembly line by next June as a factory employing 120 people on eight-hour shifts is to be established in Gauteng.
SA group Zero Pollution Motors will finance the first factory outside France with Helen Brown the founder. Matthews Phosa, former premier of Mpumalanga, is a shareholder and chairman of Zero.
The vehicle will be launched to the motoring press next week and the show will be open to the public from next Friday.
(Caption under picture):
Running on empty - The innovative air-propelled car, e.Volution, will be able to travel 200 km on one tank of compressed air at a cost of about 1c/km. A production plant for the car will be built in Gauteng and the vehicle could be available to the public from June 2001. (Beeld)
If I recall correctly compressed air may be a clean method of storing energy (provided that the compressor equipment is 'clean') but it is not very efficient method of energy delivery. Something to do with the amount of heat generated by the compressor and the diminished return of energy as the pressure drops. An industrial engineer could probably fill in the blanks for me...
one better than mcleodeight
they just increase the price you pay for petrol. Not to mention the fact that they'll add 200% tax to the cost of purchasing it. FYI European social benefits cost me 54% of my salary every month.
The Carnot efficency is the theoretical maximum efficency of any heat engine. The equation for this is: e=(1-(TL/TH)), where TH is the high temperature in the system, and TL is the low temperature. That 40% efficency is independent of materials, design, etc. Only temperature. (I'm taking Thermo right now).
Written by a single drunk monkey in 30 minutes with a copy of MS Word 2000.
I wonder if they could build an air compressor into the braking system so that the tanks would recharge when braking?
Today's vices may be tomorrow's virtues.
It was an air-powered toy car I had as a kid. It had a big plastic air reservior you filled up with a pump, and when you gave it a push, the compressed air drove a piston that scooted the car across the floor.
Pretty cool toy, I thought. The only drawback was that it only went about 30 feet before it ran out of gas! (pun is intended, as always...)
It was called the Air Jammer - by TOMY.
Air Hogs from Spinmaster Toys are similar, but use the air to spin a prop for a free-flight toy airplane (BTW, the site isn't there anymore - does anyone have a clue what happened to them?). I bought one of these when they first came out, and I was impressed (damn fun to fly!)...
Recently I was at a Wal-mart and noticed that this other company (can't remember who) started making the Air Jammer again - except they don't call it as such. It is the exact same car - I own an original Air Jammer (with box, bought it off of Ebay for $15.00 - I collect 80's TOMY), and this car was exactly the same - they either bought or licensed the patents from TOMY.
IOW, they are still available. Air powered machines aren't new things, esp on the toy front. You used to be able to get compressed air engines for radio control and free-flight model planes (back in 20's-40's), not sure if they are still available or not...
I support the EFF - do you?
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
I just found something out on Spinmaster Toys. I am not sure what is happening, maybe their site domain name was infringing on something or another (who knows these days - probably had to do with the fishing reel manufacturer!). Anyhow, a couple of links:
This link auto-forwards you to here, which proclaims to be a new home for "A retail site for air powered glider planes" - which sounds like it may be the real case, not sure...
WHOIS lists a Richard Giardini - but this guy doesn't appear connected with the company. I don't know if they have gone out-of-business, or what...
I support the EFF - do you?
Reason is the Path to God - Anon
If you ever had one of those cheap "air-pump + water" rockets as a kid you know what I'm thinking:
For an extra power boost, keep a small tank of water in the car thats connected to the compressed air tank through a valve and has a cone exit at the rear. For those special merging situations you can get a fast "after burner" like kick in the pants by opening the valve. (No flames, just water spraying out the rear at about 1000000 miles/hr!)
Serious Note: I believe someone in the 80's tried to set a land speed record at the salt flats in the US using the "compressed air expels water"-rocket approach.
--- -- - -
Give me LIBERTY, or give me a check.
The solution is on its way, if you read here They still have not worked out how photosynthesis does what it does. You can come up with as many cute solutions as you like to the environmental problems caused by our species, if compressing air creates polution, then this is not a solution. I'm not that mathematically literate, perhaps someone has the necessary equations, what I envision is, if you can use photosynthesis to extract hydrogen from water you can then use that to power an infernal combustion engine, with the right carburetta mods. So my idea is something like an artificial leaf type thing that sits on top of your car, if the system is closed ie. the water from the exhaust being fed back up to the leaf. As I said before I don't have the math to work it out. But it would be doable if the leaf didn't have to be too big, the point is, could the current ;-) efficiency of photo voltaic cells be beaten by this route. If you have not got the drift of what I'm saying, think about the energy conversion factor of a giant redwood.
Peter.
It's called an elephant's trunk whereas it is in fact, an elephant's nose, a nose by any other name would smell as sweet
I wonder if this e.Volution uses a similar concept? Anyone have more info?
Only on slashdot would someone use a programming analogy to explain an automotive system!
But the Carnot cycle states that the efficiency is increased when the combustion temperature is increased.
For the average IC engine made of materials that you can afford, the maximum theoretical efficiency is 40%.
If you double the difference (in Kelvin) of the combustion temperature and the ambient temperature, you would get 80%. But this would melt an engine composed of normal alloys.
So, it's more efficient to have the electrical powerplant do the combustion, they can afford a turbine that burns at 2,000 degrees and is made out of tungsten-nickel alloys.
Ultimately, ceramic engines will yeild a huge increase in efficiency, but they are a aways away.
Honda already markets a combination vehicle: small and efficient internal combustion engine charging a moderate-size battery, and the main motor is electrical. One can use compressed air as the temporary "buffer" storage as well. The main storage would still be a tank of gas or diesel, and the main engine in this case pneumatic. This is probably less efficient (the pneumatic-only vehicle, too), because air compression is not 100% efficient. A lot of energy is wasted because the air is heated during the compression and then cools down to ambient temperature.
In what way are the auto companies keeping alternatively-powered cars out of our hands? If a car powered by alternative means were a viable substitution for a gas-powered car, then there would be a demand for such a thing, and thus there would be a profit to be made. The auto makers could care less about OPEC's cartel. The fact that the Geo Metro exists proves this point. So why aren't they making alternatively-powered cars? Because we don't want them! If we wanted them, either the current auto makers would sport a line of alternatively-powered cars, or firms would enter the market providing these cars, because there would be a profit to be made. This works because people covet profits. Let's not be too quick to judge the auto makers for our current lack of alternatively-powered vehicles.
An unjust law is no law at all. - St. Augustine
I saw a brief news story on this car about 2 months ago, but when I told my co-workers of it nobody believed me. Then I couldn't find any web links to it, and they mocked me mercilessly. I would proudly print this story and show it to them, if I hadn't killed them weeks ago in a postal rage. Ah well, at least I know I wasn't crazy. :)
www.HearMySoulSpeak.com
If you live where I used to live (Ottawa) it might not be such a good idea.
..... Do it!!!!!!!
Think about it. The engine is incredably light. That means (too my mind anyways) that there is a lot of plastic. I have a hard time with a plastic engine, frozen lubricant & lots of pressure. I suspect that the engine will spend a lot of time in the shop.
Mind you if you live in Windsor or B.C.
Yes I can not spell...Wait....for a second there I almost cared.
Well I'm skeptical. It comes down, as always, to the dull and tedious issue of energy density. My back-of-envelope scribblings tell me a cubic metre of air at 300 bar stores about 30 megajoules. That's only 8 kWh. I don't see that little energy lasting any longer than about half an hour: nowhere near the endurance figures mentioned in the article.
Finally a use for my old BBQ tanks! The Jerry can of the future!
When compressed gas expands, it cools down. This is how refrigerators work. So this engine doesn't need any cooling system. It probably can be used as an air conditioner, like regular engine heat is used to heat the salon.
If you look hard enough around on the net, you find all sorts of nasty rumors that the gasoline companies have either threaten or buy the patents for all competing technologies to maintain thier monopoly.
I always brushed all of those rumors off. Not because I thought that gas companies wouldn't do it, but because it just sounded too huge. How could the gas companies stop everyone who could come up with such technology? Where could they conceal thier "anti alternative energy mafia" that it wouldn't at some point reach the public eye?
Maybe I lept to a conclusion. Mr Negre, if you do have fuel prices down to 1c/km, you'll change the world, be the first big thing in the 2000 history books, and I will salute you. Good luck.
Maybe the state's highest function is to grind out insoluble problems. (Zelazny, Hall of Mirrors)
In reality, a car like this succeeding is unfortunately unlikely. They've got a HUGE battle to fight against:
1.Big Oil companies
2.Current big car manufacturers (don't want to change out those assembly lines)
3.Governments of large oil producing companies
4.Politicians who are controlled (oops I mean lobbied) by the oil companies
5.Car parts manufacturers (have to start making parts they may be unfamiliar with)
And the list just goes on...
It's a great idea, but if you think gaining widespread acceptance will happen anytime soon, think again. Alternative fuel-source cars have made their way into the market, yet the above groups haven't worried about them because they know these cars so far have limits on them that keep the average driver from purchasing them. Either the cost of the vehicle itself or the cost of maintenance is too high, they are limited on distance of travel at one time, etc. A vehicle that could stand up against a regular car in performance, reliability, travel distance without refueling, ease of maintenance and cost would be reason for these guys to worry. A lot.
"Say no more..." - Monty Python
to make a point.
To see more about the Carnot cycle, you can start here.
Maximum theoretical efficiency is
1 - T2/T1, where T2 is the ambient temp, and T1 is the combustion temp.
You can't influence T2, unless you move to Canada, T2 is the temp of the air the engine works in, which is why early helicopters had trouble lifting themselves in hot climates, the ambient aur temp was high enough to reduce their efficency.
Artificially cooling the ambient air won't work either, you'd be battle entropy and thermodynamics.
So, you have to increase T1, the combustion temperature. But most IC engines have low melting points, because they're made of steel and aluminum alloys.
If you changed alloys to a nickel tungsten titanium alloys (Inconel maybe) you could increase T1.
If you could use a ceramic engine block and piston, you could really increase T1.
Hope this helps.
Anyone firing up their local search engine should have found Zero Pollution Motors, the manufacturers of this car. Northerlight has a special report article on it in October last year. According to this site a taxi version was first road tested in Franch in May 1998. I also read somewhere that Mexico City is looking at replacing its entire fleet of 40000 taxis where these vehicles.
i-name =twylite [http://public.xdi.org/=twylite], see idcommons.net
Nuclear cars? There's already been one, by Ford, I think. Worked well, but it was shelved because of concerns about the waste.
dnnrly
I once had a toy car, must be nearly 20 years ago now, that you pumped up and it had a little 2-stroke piston engine that ran off the stored compression.
I always thought it would be a good idea to extend that technique to bigger vehicles, but I figure that you face some of the same safety concerns that flywheel vehicles currently have. What happens in an accident? The article says that the car weighs only a few hundred Kg, it'd fold like tissue paper in a wreck, and what if the air tanks breached?
Slow site... US mirror.
The text is there. The images are coming over very slowly. But at least you can read the article.
________________________________________
Napster-to-go says "Fill and refill your compatible MP3 player", which is a lie. It's not MP3. It's WMA with DRM.
OK OK. I am all for a car that will take less gas and do less polution. But, if this car needs air to run what are we using to pump air in the car? Are we not using a motor that needs fosual fule to pump air?
This whole thing about electric cars, air cars, and you name others do nohting but shift the polution focuse away from the car.
-- George
Karma stuck at 50? Add 2-5 inches.. err.. 2-5x Karmas Count to your pen1es.. err.. Karma all naturally and private
And by the way I hope there is a shield between the driver and the compressed air tank, just in case of accident. Of course that wont console the driver of the other car all to much...
Oh yeah, compressed gas is dangerous. All of the work you put into it can be released instantly if your tank busts. This of course, is bad for people that get in the way. It happens from time to time, especialy when people screw up and put the wrong pressure in a cylinder. Boom, like a bomb. Failures in accidents will be less interesting, but knocking off the valve can give you a thousand pounds of force for a few seconds. If the cylinder is not held down well, it will fly around like a balloon. This is also very bad for people who get in the way.
All of that said, this might be cost effective if you do all of your gas compresion with cheap nuclear or hydro generated electricity. I have my doubts. Natural gas prices are comming up, :(. Windmills, solar and all that, forget it, it will be cheaper to burn oil.
Poster would rather ride his bike.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
How about an AirPowered toy plane
Cars pollute more in cities due to the driving conditions. Therefore, lessening the gas emissions in these conditions could already be a big step forwards. I have heard about a few interesting projects, some of them are already quite successfully implemented here and there involving electric cars which could be recharged by induction. The main hurdle to that is the time it takes to recharge the batteries. However, some recent scientific researches may have found the solution to that problem. Then, it is all a question of mentalities.
... in an ideal scenario.
In Europe, the price for gas is ridiculously high due to the petrol price itself (20%) but mostly due to the taxes (70%). Alternatives to petrol would mean very bad news for both the governments and petrol lobbies. However, people getting more and more weary of the ecologic issues at stake (last December, an oil boat has sunk and brought about one of the biggest oil spills in France), the pressure is higher and higher on them to actually think about changes. Some (local) tests are therefore being done to reinsure voters that the government is taking care of the problem. But events like Gulf war show that there are still a lot of interests at stake for oil.
Anyway, LPG is already a good step forwards in terms of keeping everyone happy. Some other cars use gas and electricity. But in the Information society, soon enough, the third sector will be working remotely thereby reducing the gas emissions. Nuclear electricity will little by little be replaced by sun energy...
É que os desafinados também têm um coração
It sounds great. Just plug and play. Doesn't be the cleanest though as the compression comes from somewhere. Unless it comes with a really really big bicycle pump...
not as good as first sex (with Natalie Portman - ah the innocent virgin)
Hey trolls -- mentioning Natalie Portman here is counterproductive. Not only are they Offtopic and Redundant, but Natalie Portman works for an MPAA studio.
Will I retire or break 10K?
As an aside, it's not the auto companies that don't want us to have air (or water) powered cars, it's the oil companies. They have the resources to either extinguish or simply buy out any alternative means of powering automobiles. Don't expect breakthrough progress until the Earth's supply of petroleum is nearly exhausted -- and then, expect those "breakthroughs" to come from the very same oil companies (a key thing to look for is when they start calling themselves "energy companies" instead -- similar to the way cable television providers now refer to themselves as "broadband" companies to encompass the data and voice services they want to deliver).
Sad, but true. Oil companies are way too rich and powerful. And if we end up with W in the whitehouse, look for them to become even more powerful.
--
Tired of FB/Google censorship? Visit UNCENSORED!
Oh, you mean, like... err ... aah ... a catalytic converter? Or a muffler?? (which, after all, is a filter to reduce noise pollution...)
People are going to continue to like gasoline-powered cars until a really competitive alternative is available. Nothing has even come close yet. This air car is maybe 1/10th of the way there.
Since people like gasoline-powered cars, people will continue to drive gasoline-powered cars.
No amount of fanciful wishful thinking will change this.
If you put 100 square km full of solarpanels in the sahara you can produce enough energy to replace all other forms of energy production.
I don't envy the poor SOB who has to sweep the sand off the panels every day.
UBU
OK, I want to know how many of you have ever seen the results of an air tank rupture?
Talk about cars blowing up like they do in the movies. Air at those kinds of pressures is DANGERIOUS. And they want fast fill stations? What are they going to have, turbopumps? Oh yeah, I want a pump that runs at high pressure and sounds like a jet engine running at my local gas station.
When the first hand built prototype was talked about last year (or the year before), we had a talk about this over on Rec.Crafts.Metalworking . Its seems that they are seriously overstating how for this car can go
Charlie
-- 73 de KG2V For the Children - RKBA! "You are what you do when it counts" - the Masso
Power lines are a lot more efficient than you think, too. I'm having a bitch of a time locating the resistivity of typical aluminum transmission wire (AskJeeves is turning out to be useless), but if we assume that the lengthwise resistivity of the alloy as used would be about 3 times that of pure Al or about 8 micro-ohm meters, the wire has a cross-sectional area of 10 square cm and it carries a current of 50 amps at a voltage of 500,000 volts (25 megawatts) for 160 kilometers, we see that:
- The resistance is 8e(-6)/1e(-3) = 8e(-3) ohms/meter, or about 1300 ohms over 160 km.
- Total voltage drop is 1300 ohms * 50 amps = 65,000 volts.
- This is 13% of the total, not 2/3 or even 1/3.
If I had a line that was leaving about 3 megawatts undelivered, I'd want to lay thicker wire; at $.05/KWH, that's about $150/hour it's costing me. That's $3600/day, $25000/week, $1.3 million a year. You can recoup some pretty steep capital costs with that kind of return on investment, especially if you are amortizing over the kind of time-frames typical of a regulated public utility.--
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
There's another problem with electrics - range.
I want to be able to drive more than a few hundred miles before I have a multi-hour recharge.
Gas/electric hybrids seem like a pretty good alternative to straight electric until we develop some amazing new battery technology.
--K
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They are very much alike, with pistons and valves and what not. Noisy, hot, vibration sources, require maintenance. The humidity that is in the air causes problems when it settles out after compression.
Having one run in the garage for 3 hours a night, isn't an improvement over having that noise distributed over the driving area.
And improperly maintained compressed air equipment fails quite badly.
Quick recap of Carnot efficiency: Eff = (Thi - Tlo) / Thi. Thi is the temperature at which you put heat into your working fluid (assuming that it is at a constant temperature, which it isn't in any real engine). This is where the internal combustion engine kills the steam engine. It does it because the steam engine has to run its working fluid below the highest working temperature of its parts (the boiler wall is always hotter than the steam). The internal combustion engine produces heat within the working fluid, so the working fluid can be far hotter than any part of the engine. You can easily have combustion temperatures of 3000 F or more in your car, temperatures a steam engine cannot approach.
Large steam turbines get thermal efficiencies in the low 30's. Medium-truck diesel engines commonly break 40% (look at the Cummins data sheets if you don't believe me), large marine diesels hit 50%, and combined-cycle power plants (which use gas turbines - internal combustion engines - as the topping cycle) are up to 60%.
--
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
this won't happen,, why? cause since it's being unveiled in Johannesburg, it will probably be stolen first. I hope they installed one of those blades under the driver's side door.
don't touch me
I collect cars. Work on 'em, fix 'em, break 'em, and fix 'em again. I know the internal combustion engine all too well.
;)
:)
How does this car sound? Well hot DAMN, somebody FINALLY figured out something other than (gasoline, alcohol, nitromethane) to inject. Basically, this is a very interesting system that works. How well does it work? Time will tell.
But you could probably modify any engine in the world to do this.
Instead of creating compression through combustion, it's direct injection of compression, forcing the piston down, thusly turning the engine. The horsepower potenetial is nil, but it's an excellent economy design. And the kicker is that, despite what others have said, unless there is a genuine combustion cycle, there is no emissions outside of what you put in. If you put in clean air, clean air will come out, in this setup. The engine will probably be low maintenance as well - you don't have to worry as much about rings failing from carbon buildup, or piston failure from using too low an octane rating. Although I wonder if using pure O2 instead of air could cause detonation, heehee.
Sounds like the best idea I've seen in a good long while. Now all they have to do is figure out how to do it in a better looking car that's smaller, and I'll buy one!
=RISCy Business
your company here.
your company here.
shelby != ford