Wonder what energy company will try to buy this patent? And what will they do with it? Suppress and stifle the technology....or *shazamm* actually implement it?
It's nothing special compared to other turbine technologies. I don't see anything new particularly being presented, nor terribly useful in terms of pulling usable kinetic energy out of it short of driving an electric generator or something equally low-loading. They claim it's fuel efficient and clean burning, but so is ANY internal combustion/turbine engine if you put a clean, efficient fuel into it.
If anything I would say this engine design is in fact less optimal than other designs which use fewer components. I could take an automotive turbocharger and build a similar combustor ahead of the turbine end using natural gas, use that to turn the turbine, then take the compressor side and run the compressor's output to the combustion chamber to draw in more fresh air and wallah: a motor that can be throttled up to about 120,000 RPM with enough energy to drive a significant electric generator and "fuel efficent" with only one moving part. It would like any motor require a starter, but the starter is only used intermittently on all forms of motors.
I don't think anyone will seriously consider buying this or "stifle technology" as it's not unique or beneficial enough to matter. Internal combustion is internal combustion no matter how you shape it.
PS: The rotors/housings in this "pump" are shaped exactly like the the oil pump found on nearly all modern internal combustion automotive applications. There really is only so many ways that you can pump things.
In anycase, we need to start using alternative energy sources, and clean fuels (whether they are applied in combustion or other engine types), whether we are close to running out or not.
I'm getting sick of how we continue to descimate our planet in the name of profit. Puke.... And how alternative engines and energy sources that show great promise seem to be gobbled up by bigger companies who just want to continue on in their own way, regardless of how it affects not just the planet itself, but the people of the world (i.e., potential side-effects, environmental damages that lead to sickness and other forms of human suffering, injury and death during extraction operations, etc...).
I hope that I can get into a position where I'd be able to get off the grid and run environmentally-friendly engines, etc...
Sean Kelly said this in post #2 : It's nothing special compared to other turbine technologies. I don't see anything new particularly being presented, nor terribly useful in terms of pulling usable kinetic energy out of it short of driving an electric generator or something equally low-loading. They claim it's fuel efficient and clean burning, but so is ANY internal combustion/turbine engine if you put a clean, efficient fuel into it.
Hmmm...
I remember reading that it gave fuel efficiency of 80 MPG on low octane fuel.
Cool, so strap you're family onto that baby and have a roar!!!!!
So, why don't they put a 50cc 2-stroke engine ( or similar) in a car? Think you'd get the same results?
What's the difference in weight here between a moped and a car?
The difference in torque between 4 wheels (2 axles) and 2 wheels?
Two stroke and a 6 banger?
I think you just want to argue this one!!!!!!!!!!
And with your knowledge of this (I am serious here) why won't you please come up with a solution?
If you're like me....you'd get tired of buyers only coming from foreign countries and American companies who will never invest in such an efficient engine....because way too many people make way too much money on the status quo!!!
What I'm arguing is that a revolutionary change in this engine "technology" will simply set us back, both economically and from a standpoint of advancement. Where we could have applied our energy to more promising technologies, dumping resources into this would waste another 150 years - capitalism and big industry moves slow like that.
1) The thing is not "that" amazingly efficient in the bigger picture; I can guarantee you that given the numbers they cite for their automotive application (130HP, 10,000 RPM, 8 inch rotor size) that they won't get anywhere near 80MPG. Not even remotely. To make 80MPG you have to have an engine cutting back its fuel consumption to where it's making on the order of 50HP or less. Sophisticated EFI systems can do this by regulating fuel delivery and this motor could do the same thing, no problem. The trouble is that it doesn't take a revolutionary change in engine architecture to accomplish this.
2) Such a revolutionary change in engine architecture theoretically makes it problematic for the existing automotive infrastructure to support. You will have seasoned mechanics scratching their heads and sending you to a specialist in the event of a problem. This is the exact same problem Wankel faced with his rotary engine. It's no mystery why only a handful of consumer vehicle models have ever been mass produced using Wankel's rotary engine technology. I can tell you one thing: Mazda doesn't have any patent riding on it and yet their RX7/8 model vehicles enjoyed tremendous success and earned great respect as reliable, high performers (aside from the unrelated fires on the thrid gen 7's) - yet nobody else wanted to cash in on that kind of performance? Why do you suppose that was? Because it's incredibly costly to re-fit a big auto-maker's infrastructure to support a revolutionary technology that they don't understand.
Put the two together:
1) Low or Null benefits;
2) High Cost
and you end up with:
3) A formula for a no-go.
Indeed I do have a solid understanding of engine and energy conversion technologies and do a lot of my own research on that. Why don't I come up with something? Two reasons:
1) It takes money to make money which I just hain't gots none to spare;
2) There are already some very good projects well under way that at a far more advanced state than my drawings in my journal.
Want to see something promising that I think could be a strong leader possibly over electric/hybrid/hydrogen vehicles one day? Check out this puppy: http://www.theaircar.com/
When I first saw it I balked. They are onto some thing pretty solid but in my opinion are not moving fast enough to establish the firm footing they deserve.
They may be making an attempt to establish themselves in european and South American markets, get production under way and then make a huge entrance into the U.S. and Asian markets once they're settled.
Okay, I'll give you one thing that I do like about this type of motor (an air pump, really same as any motor) is that unlike the Wankel, the rotors rotate on fixed axes and don't flop around. Two rotating parts can be brought up to very high speeds for incredibly high energy output. 10,000 RPM doesn't even begin to describe how fast that thing could move. Done properly it could peg 50,000 or more with no risk to structural integrity.
You can do a lot of work with 50,000 RPM, even in a miniature scale, say, 1/2" rotors? You could have a gas-powered generator that makes a steady 12 volts to power just about anything you'd need for emergencies: light? communications? Obelisk of power? Okay maybe not, but it'd still make a really neat RC aircraft turbine engine which would be much easier to fabricate than your traditional turbine is.
Thanks for your feedback on this Sean....
As usual, I value it immensely.
Regardless of the time and money needed to find a solution, it's extremely imperative, I believe, that something be done....because by all indications there is going to be a huge oil crunch not so very far into our future.
A friend of mine retired from the Dept of Energy recently.
We talked about alternative energy technology two nights ago.
She said that patents came by her desk all the time....and they were always bought by foreign countries. American companies wanted nothing to do with the cost of development or the net loss in what they currently had.
It's a catch 22. And your statements about the foreign investors verified what she had told me.
I agree that something has to be done, something has to change and very soon. However I think that the next step should not be one of reducing our consumption of fossil fuels by way of higher efficiency. Rather I think we need to eliminate this habitual usage completely. We're presently on a collision course with a zero point on a graph charting the availability of such fossil fuels. No matter how efficient engines get, eventually we will burn completely through the supply and then it will be gone.
And then what? THEN we scramble to come up with a solution for all of our empty gas tanks? I think not. We'll be well ahead of it. The problem with alternative fuels for these same engines is that only one can be produced in enough volume to support our entire economy: hydrogen. Assuming that there is zero petro remaining left and our only recourse for fuel is to generate our own supply, the only thing we have the ability to generate fast enough is hydrogen. That is assuming we continue with the desire to run internal combustion vehicles. By the time we get to that point of mass production of hydrogen in a hydrogen economy however I believe fuel cell technology will have advanced far enough to make a either ICE/electric hydrogen-based hybrids or straight electric models the preferred route. We would scrap all our current vehicles and engine designs short of those owned by hobbyists who will have to pay a premium price for some sort of alcohol-based liquid fuels to drive their prized posessions on.
Honestly it's a good thig we have all these old cars to recycle because using modern manufacturing techniques, we can fabricate 1.5 cars for tomorrow from the materials of 1 car from yesterday. Not bad!
So in summary: I see the "next thing" being something more radical than something which makes a big deal about fuel economy based on petrol.
I have said the same thing in posts in the 9-11 forum, maybe not as eloquently as you put it though.
From what engineers and those who are studying the topic (I work near the Colo School of Mines), they say that there is enough oil in the ground to sustain us for thousands of years....the problem is finding the reserves and extracting them. It takes 5 years and billions of dollars to find and extract the oil we need to sustain our consumption for the same time period.
The world consumption of oil is now 82 million barrels a day. Next year its expected to be 84 million/day. China's consumption is ever increasing.
And how many wars do we need to fabricate to sustain the gluttony?
Global conflict over oil...we're just starting to see the surface of this dependence on fossil fuels.
Somehow I feel I am preaching to the choir here.
Some of the best minds in the country at the Colo School of Mines are devoting much of their time learning how to find, extract and implement fossil fuel technology. I talk to one of them, and try to convince him to shift his focus to alternative energy sources. He comes from Texas and is from a long line of family oil.....such a waste.
Interesting discussion going on here.
Sean, Wankel's motor technology has been implemented by a french manufacturer (Citroën) more than 20 years ago. It worked fine but the garages dis not have the skills to maintain and fix it while its manufacturing required too much investments to be extended.
I totally agree with your statement about the conservatism of the manufacturers.
The same conservatism is at play with your neighbours at the Colo School of Mines Sowhat.
Fuel cells are the future. Right now the limiting factor is the cost ($400 / m2) and reliability of the perfluorinated polymers membranes employed for this technique. New polymers are being developed, notably by Honda whose recent FCX prototype already represents a breakthrough in this field.
As for hydrogen - this fuel is actually produced at a quantity of 50 to 60 million tons per year in the US - that means that this fuel can already be produced at an industrial scale.
Now, a question. Why was the Bush admin, whose links with the oil lobbies is tight, so enthusiast about hydrogen, new fuel of the future ? Because the envisaged production process to supply millions of H2-powered cars would be based on catalytic reforming of ..oil. Interest: consumers would be even more dependent on oil industries.
New solutions exist to produce massively hydrogen, by different solutions than from oil. New technologies are under way to get new fuel cell cheaper and more reliable. Money to equip a country of the scale of the US with the thousands of H2 stations required amounts to $ 20 billions. It seems to me that this is more affordable that a war on Iraq to secure oil supplies.
So you see our western countries have already the means to launch a new era. The real problem is the weight of lobbies dictating their will to our governants.
This process is being developed by the Environmental Engineering Laboratory of Idaho and the company Cerametec located in Salt Lake City.
In fact it consists in a kind of electrolysis, but carried out at 1000 °C. A ceramic membrane allows the separation of the gases. 50% of the energy required to obtain hydrogen is retrieved in the H2 chemical bonding, thus making of this process the most efficient one never ever conceived.
03-09-2005 11:43 PM
