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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/6/2008 7:59:49 AM   
defiantbadgirl


Posts: 2988
Joined: 11/14/2005
Status: offline 		Wow, Wichita Kansas. That's only an hour away. I wonder how much it costs to have one of those built. Something I may check into very soon.

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(in reply to FirmhandKY)
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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/6/2008 11:03:27 AM   
luckydog1


Posts: 2736
Joined: 1/16/2006
Status: offline 		Termn8tr.  They have been using regenerative brakes on vehicles for a while now.  Mostly lab stuff, but the millitary is using them some.  You install an alternator into the brake, and generate extra power to recharge the batteries (used to run onbaord computers and equipment).  Various labs are using a system like this in conjunction with hydrogen fuel cells, to convert some of the water produced by the fuel cell back into hydrogen to run the vehicle, increasing its milage.  I have not seen any comercial application of this use yet.

One drawback to the Hummer modification here is it probably requires A LOT of maintence to operate properly.  Great if you are a super rich person, or do the work for yourself, not so good if you are just a regular guy.  But it should definatly be looked into, and is a great invention.

The compressed air vehicles are very interesting also.  And may have a usefull place in the future.  Especially in cities, imagine taxi cabs and trucks.  The drawback to those is where does the electrcity come from?  Large scale usage would require massive amounts of of more electrcity.  Most comes from Coal or nuclear currently.  And a Coal powered car doesn't seem paticularly green (though I could be wrong and the efficiency tips it green).

(in reply to Termyn8or)
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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 1:50:23 AM   
samboct


Posts: 1817
Joined: 1/17/2007
Status: offline 		Umm, sorry to say- but (hack, cough....BULLSHIT)

"But Goodwin wanted more. While researching alternative fuels, he learned about the work of Uli Kruger, a German who has spent decades in Australia exploring techniques for blending fuels that normally don't mix. One of Kruger's systems induces hydrogen into the air intake of a diesel engine, producing a cascade of emissions-reducing and mileage-boosting effects. The hydrogen, ignited by the diesel combustion, burns extremely clean, producing only water as a by-product. It also displaces up to 50% of the diesel needed to fuel the car, effectively doubling the diesel's mileage and cutting emissions by at least half.

Here's the BS line-"Better yet, the water produced from the hydrogen combustion cools down the engine, so the diesel combustion generates fewer particulates--and thus fewer nitrogen-oxide emissions."

Water is going to be no different than any other combustion reactant- it's not going to cool the engine down.  I've also seen folks that want to do water injection into diesels- it's old technology- problem is that it effectively raises the combustion ratio and breaks the engine if you use it too long.

Also- the claim is that by running on half hydrogen/half diesel, the vehicle gets improved mileage.  Well, duh!  If you're adding more fuel, it takes less of another to go the same distance.  Nowhere in the article does it take into account the cost of the hydrogen.

Plus- hydrogen tanks are being used in fuel cell vehicles.  They take up an awful lot of room and I think the range of these vehicles is around 300 miles/fillup.  But this is using hydrogen in a fuel cell, which is a helluva lot more efficient than just burning the stuff.  I think the fuel cell systems are at 70% efficiency (could be wrong on that one, I'm being an insomniac right now) while the best an infernal combustion engine can do is about 40% IIRC- and that's probably high.  Don't bellyache to me, bellyache to the ghost of Sidi Carnot, the guy who figured out the theoretical efficiency of an internal combustion engine- I'll save you looking it up- its = 1 - T1/T2  T1 is the temperature of the environment, and T2 is the combustion temperature in kelvin.  Use 300K for the environment and figure that T2 is maxed out at 800 or so (or the engine melts) and that's your starting point.  Never mind that there'd have to be no friction, massless pistons etc.  Same theoretical efficiency for a turbine too by the way, although the turbine can probably run hotter.  But I kinda doubt that running a turbine for a few seconds is very efficient- it's very hard to get the combustion right on startup, which means that you're going to be wasting a lot of fuel.  This isn't even getting into the theoretical calculations of how much energy and rolling resistance, air drag, etc. the damn Hummer has got.  I have a sneaking suspicion that even with fuel cells, getting the equivalent of 60 mpg in diesel with that kind of performance is impossible, but that's another calculation, and I'm going to bed.

Sam 


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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 9:30:36 AM   
luckydog1


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Status: offline 		Who/what exactly are you saying bullshit to sambo? 

"Water is going to be no different than any other combustion reactant- it's not going to cool the engine down. "  You might want to look up what a reactant is.  In this case water is the result of the reaction, not a reactant.  And your claim of Bullshit is Bullshit.

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 9:44:13 AM   
samboct


Posts: 1817
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Status: offline 		Oh good grief Lucky!

The reaction is 2H2 + O2 --> H2O.  If you 've ever burned hydrogen in a balloon, then you know damn well it gives off heat.  Besides, diesel and gasoline give off plenty of H2O- think about the reaction of C8H18 (octane) + 12.5 O2 --> 8 CO2 + 9 H2O -assuming you can get your engine to burn really cleanly.  Does the water produced from the combustion of octane do something different than the water produced from the combustion of hydrogen?  If you believe this nonsense- let me show a bridge in Brooklyn- cheap.

Also- if you look at the equation for thermodynamic efficiency I gave for a Carnot cycle, you'll see that the last thing you want to do is cool the reaction down- the hotter the better in terms of efficiency.  Yes, I know that engines need cooling- that's to prevent them from melting and having knocking issues- but it certainly doesn't increase the efficiency.  Look at the cars used for ultimate high mileage (something like 300-400 mpg- done with 3 wheels and at 15 mph or so) dry ice on the gas tank and in the air intake, and an engine wrapped in insulation to keep it hot.

Sam

< Message edited by samboct -- 1/7/2008 9:46:37 AM >

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 10:03:11 AM   
luckydog1


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Status: offline 		Sambo, so you are alledging that his vehicle is a fraud, and he is going around lying about the statts?   The whole thing is a ruse of some sort?  

I do not know how do do a full engineering of such a vehicle.  But I do know that a reactant, is what goes into a chemical reaction, not the result of the reaction.  And your misstating that makes me question your expertise.  I also know that temperature does affect chemical reactions, does it in this case, I don't know.  I also know that if you burn a ballon of  pure hydrogen and a ballon with the same amount of hydrogen and some water, the same amount of heat will be created by the burning hydrogen, but some the heat will convert the water to vapor (yes I know that burning hydrogen creates vapor I am talking about the liquid water that was present before combustion), and less heat will be released.

I do think in the real world, you would not get the extremely good results this guy does.  He is a mechanic, and I assume works on his vehicle almost daily.  Banging the thing up and down roads with limited maintence will result in less than  just cleaned and tuned results, as it does with all vehicles.

IF you want to debunk his system, you need to get the real schematics, which are not included, in the article.  This is just a brief laymans terms description.

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 11:12:05 AM   
Termyn8or


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Status: offline 		Be nice lucky.

Water injection may well be detrimental to the engine, you would need a chemist/metalurgist to say for sure. Perhaps that is why the idea got shelved back in the fifties or sixties when it came out.

However I do know that in such a system the water does not act as a fuel. I'm pretty sure it does pretty much what EGR does.

Higher octane fuel burns more slowly and with more power output. The difference is not night and day, but there is a difference. In your modern engine, EGR makes the fuel burn more slowly, and one of the reasons they use it is to lower the peak combustion temperature inside the cylinder. This lowers the amount of nitrogen from the atmosphere that is "oxidized" in the process. The side effect is that it makes the charge burn more slowly, like higher octane fuel, but without the added power. This reduces ping.

In most modern cars you'll never hear it ping, the computer actually uses a microphone to detect it and backs off the ignition timing and/or richens the fuel/air ratio. So the difference now is that with premium gas you might actually get an extra mile per gallon, but whether that offsets the extra cost is a subject for study. Some high perfomance cars might get a few extra horses out of high octane fuel as well, this because the computer will advance the timing until it actually does ping.

You might hear it just once, but the computer puts a stop to it right away.

All bullshit aside, we have to get our heads out of the sand so to speak. Dependence on foreign oil is breaking this country and there is no way out of it currently. Everyone needs it, even if you don't drive, if you get on a bus or whatever, that takes fuel.

Might have to get into this fuel cell technology, because everything else we do burns something up. Everything we do makes heat. Whether this is globally significant in terms of the environment is another hot debate. But simple logic says it can't be good. It is a matter of degree.

I smoke, simple logic tells me that it is probably not good for me, but there are some who think I am going to drop dead. I don't think it is good for me, but I don't think it is as bad as they say. Like just how much are we contributing to global warming ?

In a way this whole topic is useless, at least the OT. First of all we are talking a Hummer. Those are pricey vehicles to start with. Then someone does hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of modifications to one. Even if presented to the public at the local car dealership I doubt it would be a top seller.

What's more anything with a turbine requires maitainence that most people just aren't willing to do. We need a new Wolks Vagon, go ahead and accuse me of being a Nazi, but it may indeed be the Germans who solve this problem. The way money and industry is setup here it is not likely to happen. There is too much greed.

We need something that will get into the hands of alot of people. If three people in California buy electric cars the impact is not great. The whole planet cools down by fivwe degrees and there are spotted owls in every tree ? Hell no. We need like a hundred million people to get into something new.

There is another big problem with doing it here, I would rather the drivetrain be built in Switzerland, Germany or somewhere like that. The suits here make things so cheap, that their practices are unsuitable for a new technology like this, which is going to amount to the second biggest investment a normal person makes in their life, being second only to a house.

They have made new houses into junk here, I know. New cars are junk here. It's bad enough, but with new technology it is even worse. Everybody who attempts to service this new technology will have to learn it, and like now the repair bills will be astronomical. But at least now they a capable of repairing the cars.

Take an example from the newer TV technology, if I may digress to give this slant on it. We technicians originally liked the idea of plasma, LCD and DLP TVs. No more high voltage, no more deflection, 1080p is now a reality. No more complex geometry settings for the different scan modes and no more weak picture tubes.

But it turned out quite differently. The fact of the matter is it's a nosebleed. In the field, many CRT based TVs get fixed, but on average less than 15% of plasmas, LCDs and DLP that break doiwn are repairable at all. I mean at all. We can troubleshoot them, but we can't get the parts. One manufacturer states quite plainly "No parts ever have been or ever will be available for this unit". Others will only supply parts and information to an authorized servicecenter. That means about two places in this county even have a prayer of fixing it.

But that is a TV, it is a useless piece of shit and has been for a long time. Now apply this to your car. The thing that gets you to work. If they allow corporate greed to run the show like they did in the electronics industry, referred to as "brownwares" you will see people losing their house because their new car is in the shop and they can't get to work.

It is not the complexity of new technology that makes me try to stay out of it, it is what they do with it. They lie and cheat every chance they get. All this to make more money. And it is getting ridiculous. A buddy of mine shows up with the lower A frame from his olady's car. It is broken in two.

You know what a lower A frame is ? It is one of the most important parts of a car. On my car it is a hefty piece of metal. It is essential that this part be strong, or your front wheel flops around like a limp dick. On the better cars the back wheels have them as well, it's called four wheel independent suspension.

He shows me this thing and it is cheap, stamped metal of a guage that really does not suit me. I told him "I scrap cars over shit like this". That does not only mean that I would scrap the car, I would never buy another of a similar model/chassis style. But his olady was in love with it for some reason so it got fixed.

If you saw this A frame and know what it does for a car, you would agree. If this had happened on the freeway they could be dead right now.

But that's not the point. If your brand new car breaks down you don't want it fixed right away, you NEED it fixed right away. You do not need to hear "The parts are on order from China". I am not even talking about the wheels falling off. A new type of drivetrain, new technology, you think they are going to sit there and make spare parts ? Hell no, there are no spare parts, all parts aere built into the vehicles which will be sold. The board of directors has a responsibility to the shareholders you know. Maximum profits, BY LAW. So you might as well hitch a horse up to the thing.

And that is, and has been the crux of the problem for a long time.

Think of this, your new car breaks down and they say "It can't be fixed, we can give you $200 scrap for it", but you still owe over ten thousand on it. That is happening in other industries. OK let's touch on whitewares. Whitewares is the term for refrigerators, stoves, washers dryer, things like that.

So my buddy buys a Maytag refrigerator, with a seriously long warranty. Has a problem. Drainage is screwed up, air flow isn't right. Well the Maytag repairman had to get off his ass and go see. Come to find out the warranty only covers the sealed system, the compressor and related refrigeration components and it will be $500 to fix it. He is not stupid and asked "Is this a modificatuion or what ?". The repairman said no, and he found that there is nothing to stop the same problem from happening again. So you have a three year old nine hundred dollar refrigerator out on the tree lawn as a Sears truck backs in the drive with a newer, cheaper refrigerator.

We are not talking a toaster here people.

I like the new technology, but I just do not trust the people who would implement it on a commercial, wide scale.

T

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 1:42:24 PM   
FirmhandKY


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From the article, some things that address issues raised in the thread so far:

Costs:
This is more than a mere American Chopper--style makeover. Goodwin's experiments point to a radically cleaner and cheaper future for the American car. The numbers are simple: With a $5,000 bolt-on kit he co-engineered--the poor man's version of a Goodwin conversion--he can immediately transform any diesel vehicle to burn 50% less fuel and produce 80% fewer emissions. On a full-size gas-guzzler, he figures the kit earns its money back in about a year--or, on a regular car, two--while hitting an emissions target from the outset that's more stringent than any regulation we're likely to see in our lifetime. "Johnathan's in a league of his own," says Martin Tobias, CEO of Imperium Renewables, the nation's largest producer of biodiesel. "Nobody out there is doing experiments like he is."

...

Goodwin, perhaps, can afford to be a visionary. He has the luxury of converting cars for fancy clients who'll pay handsomely to drive on higher moral ground. (He charges $28,000 for a "basic H2 conversion to diesel--custom concept cars cost far more.") The future of the American car will likely be won by an automaker that can split the difference--one that may innovate more slowly than Goodwin would like, but a hell of a lot faster than the Big Three.


On the industry:
... Goodwin is doing precisely what the big American automakers have always insisted is impossible. They have long argued that fuel-efficient and alternative-fuel cars are a hard sell because they're too cramped and meek for our market. They've lobbied aggressively against raising fuel-efficiency and emissions standards, insisting that either would doom the domestic industry. Yet the truth is that Detroit is now getting squeezed from all sides. This fall, labor unrest is brewing, and after decades of inertia on fuel-economy standards, Congress is jockeying to boost the target for cars to 35 mpg, a 10 mpg jump (which is either ridiculously large or ridiculously small, depending on whom you ask). More than a dozen states are enacting laws requiring steep reductions in greenhouse-gas emissions. Meanwhile, gas prices have hovered around $3 per gallon for more than a year. And European and Japanese carmakers are flooding the market with diesel and hybrid machines that get up to 40% better mileage than the best American cars; some, such as Mercedes's new BlueTec diesel sedans, deliver that kind of efficiency and more horsepower.

...

Goodwin's work proves that a counterattack is possible, and maybe easier than many of us imagined. If the dream is a big, badass ride that's also clean, well, he's there already. As he points out, his conversions consist almost entirely of taking stock GM parts and snapping them together in clever new ways. "They could do all this stuff if they wanted to," he tells me, slapping on a visor and hunching over an arc welder. "The technology has been there forever. They make 90% of the components I use." He doesn't have an engineering degree; he didn't even go to high school: "I've just been messing around and seeing what I can do."

...

Goodwin's feats of engineering have become gradually more visible over the past year. Last summer, Imperium Renewables contacted MTV's show Pimp My Ride about creating an Earth Day special in which Goodwin would convert a muscle car to run on biodiesel. The show chose a '65 Chevy Impala, and when the conversion was done, he'd doubled its mileage to 25 mpg and increased its pull from 250 to 800 horsepower. As a stunt, MTV drag-raced the Impala against a Lamborghini on California's Pomona Raceway. "The Impala blew the Lamborghini away," says Kevin Kluemper, the lead calibration engineer for GM's Allison transmission unit

...


He speaks of the major carmakers with a sort of mild disdain: If he can piece together cleaner vehicles out of existing GM parts and a bit of hot-rod elbow grease, why can't they bake that kind of ingenuity into their production lines? Prod him enough on the subject and his mellowness peels away, revealing a guy fired by an almost manic frustration. "Everybody should be driving a plug-in vehicle right now," he complains, in one of his laconic engineering lectures, as we wander through the blistering Kansas heat to a nearby Mexican restaurant. "I can go next door to Ace Hardware and buy a DC electric motor, go out to my four-wheel-drive truck, remove the transmission and engine, bolt the electric motor onto the back of the transfer case, put a series of lead-acid batteries up to 240 volts in the back of the bed, and we're good to go. I guarantee you I could drive all around town and do whatever I need, go home at night, and hook up a couple of battery chargers, plug one into an outlet, and be good to go the next day.

"Detroit could do all this stuff overnight if it wanted to," he adds.

...


Industry insiders and observers agree with many of Goodwin's prescriptions, particularly his concept of fuel flexibility. "We have to have alternatives," says Beau Boeckmann, vice president of California's Galpin Motors, the largest Ford dealership in the country, who recently partnered with Goodwin to convert a 2008 F450 truck to hydrogen and biodiesel. "Only with a combination of things can we get alternative fuels off the ground." Boeckmann believes hydrogen is the true "silver bullet" for ending greenhouse gases but thinks it'll take more than a decade to figure out how to create and distribute it cheaply.

Firm

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 1:49:11 PM   
FirmhandKY


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quote:

ORIGINAL: Sinergy

Imagine what might happen if that person used efficient techonology to power a little tiny car, rather than stick it in a huge chunk of iron as his own personal penis extension.


... he even put a methanol-fueled turbocharger on a tiny Yamaha Banshee four-wheeler. "We took that thing from 35 horsepower to 208," he recalls. "It was crazy. We couldn't put enough fins on the back to keep it on the ground." After dropping out of school in the seventh grade, he made a living by buying up totaled cars and making them as good as new. "That," he says, "was my school."


Firm


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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 2:57:48 PM   
Zensee


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Status: offline 		What an amazing coincidence. I was just bemoaning the appalling lack of jet powered hummers on the world's roads....


Z.


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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 3:01:25 PM   
samboct


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Status: offline 		Lucky

I'm not alleging anything.  Here's my stance-

1)  the changes described in the article- adding hydrogen to the fuel system to reduce diesel consumption don't take into account hydrogen consumption- which isn't free.
2)  Adding hydrogen to produce water to cool the engine down will decrease efficiency, not increase it according to Sidi Carnot- who hasn't been wrong yet.
3)  Any claims about increased fuel efficiency without taking into account hydrogen consumption are bogus.
4)  Nowhere does the article mention emissions- and I'd be curious as to what the emissions are from the turbine upon startup.  Bear in mind that most engines are tuned rich to meet emissions standards, although I've gathered there have been some improvements in this area based on better catalytic converters.

As to your question- is it fraud?  Well, if the guy had some snazzy sounding degrees- I'd certainly say yes.  However, his ignorance counts as a defense- he can honestly believe his claims, although they are factually in error.

As to your puzzlement as to why I would use reactant rather than products- well, all chemical reactions are in principle reversible- and the reaction of hydrogen and oxygen to produce water is certainly reversible- otherwise electrolysis of water to produce hydrogen couldn't happen.  Hence, any compound on either side of a chemical reaction can be considered a reactant, although you're correct, a lot of people would have referred to water as a combustion product.  (probably engineers)

I'm not guessing here, by the way (I tell people when I'm guessing- this isn't one of those times.)  Rather than point fingers and argue, let me propose an amicable solution.  I'll put whatever you want on the outcome of your research- an apology- a promise of buying a beer should we ever meet- or sending a good bottle of scotch through the mail.  Let me suggest the following- take the article along with my comments, to any physical chemistry prof at an ACS (American Chemical Society) accredited school- don't care whether it's college or university- and see what he/she says.  If they can point out the flaws in my application of Carnot's laws to this problem, I'll be delighted to send you whatever we agree upon as a wager.  In short- I'm willing to put my money where my mouth is.  If you're uncomfortable with that- I'll happily accept a gentlemen's wager of a nickel or an apology on this forum.

Sam

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 3:20:58 PM   
FirmhandKY


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quote:

ORIGINAL: Zensee

What an amazing coincidence. I was just bemoaning the appalling lack of jet powered hummers on the world's roads....


Z.



Z,

Strange.  Aren't you part of the "Save- the- world- from- the- terrible- carbon- cycle- big- cars- are- bad- corporations- are- evil- and- suppressing- innovation" crowd?

Instead of reading and thinking about the ramifications of what this guy is doing, all you see, and want to bitch about, is that he used some Hummers to prove your own "crowds" point.

I guess ... since I'm the CM source from this ... it must be evil and oppressive, and you must instantly insult me and it with sarcasm and childish comments. I'ms uh con-ser-vuh-teve, ya know.

Come on. Get out of your box of prejudice for a change.

Firm

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 3:32:54 PM   
Termyn8or


Posts: 18681
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Status: offline 		"They've lobbied aggressively against raising fuel-efficiency and emissions standards"

A Man who knows politics would not say that.

Industry owns this government. Not to change the subject, but the TV comversion, why would TV stations want it ? They obviously do because if not they would tell the gov "OK, we are all retireing in Feb 2009". It would be as simple as that.

The media USES the FCC to maintain their turf. And in the same way the auto industry supports standards which keep the market locked up. The big money even runs the FDA and people have had SWAT teams swooping down on them for selling milk.

The government is in service to the big money. Those fuel efficiency standards are what they can do, and hope not many others can do, so there is not a bunch of competition.

It is all the same shit, like the RIAA and the MPAA using the government to enforce unrealistically favorable copryright laws. Your local TV station bribes the government to regulate them, to regulate them to do exactly what they were planning to do anyway. The big three bribe the government to make sure they stay the big three.

I'll stop now because if you don't get the concept by now, you never will.

T

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 3:53:53 PM   
FirmhandKY


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I've been thinking about Zansee's post, and the type of attitude that it shows.

It's one of the biggest problems I have with the "liberals" of American today (yeah, I know, he's a Canuck).

If the "lefties" embraced the free-enterprise system and guys like Goodwin, instead of investing in Al Gores bogus "Carbon Credit" scheme and greater government intrusion on the individuals ability to make their own decisions, then they would be investing in people, and products like this thread is discussing. 

Money would flow, companies would be formed, and you would have a viable product that both does what the eco-liberals say they want to accomplish, and provide the public with products that they wanted.

More choice, not less. Less CO2 in the environment. Less dependence on foreign oil.

A win/win for everyone - except the big corporations who already have a stake in the status quo and act like dinosaurs when ever innovation comes along.

But ... no, that's not what the "lefties" do.  Because they abhor the free market system, because they believe that it's only right and proper to force people to make the choices that are deemed "correct" they'd rather continue giving the very corporations they rail against the cudgel to beat over everyone's head, and perpetuating the current system.

This is simply foolish, counter-productive, as well as counter to human nature.

But all too common.

Firm

< Message edited by FirmhandKY -- 1/7/2008 3:55:04 PM >

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RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 3:54:19 PM   
Zensee


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quote:

ORIGINAL: FirmhandKY

quote:

ORIGINAL: Zensee

What an amazing coincidence. I was just bemoaning the appalling lack of jet powered hummers on the world's roads....


Z.



Come on. Get out of your box of prejudice for a change.

Firm


And hop into yours?

When is it prejudice and when is it just the conclusions one has arrived at?

Given that any internal combustion engine has practical limits to it's efficiency, and given that he apparently has not factored the production of hydrogen fuel or the long term effect of water vapor on the engine, his claims of remarkable improvements in efficiency are at least unproven, if not a bit fantastical.

Anyway, I was commenting on the Aroooooooooooo! chest thumping factor. Hummers are enough of a hazard as it is and people in over powered vehicles are a constant danger to normal traffic - so the combining excess power and torque in a steel shoe-box with wheels is not my notion or responsible motoring.


Z.



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"Before enlightenment, chop wood and carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood and carry water." (proverb)

(in reply to FirmhandKY)
Profile   Post #: 35
RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 4:08:04 PM   
FirmhandKY


Posts: 8948
Joined: 9/21/2004
Status: offline
quote:

ORIGINAL: Zensee

quote:

ORIGINAL: FirmhandKY

Come on. Get out of your box of prejudice for a change.


And hop into yours?

When is it prejudice and when is it just the conclusions one has arrived at?

Given that any internal combustion engine has practical limits to it's efficiency, and given that he apparently has not factored the production of hydrogen fuel or the long term effect of water vapor on the engine, his claims of remarkable improvements in efficiency are at least unproven, if not a bit fantastical.

Anyway, I was commenting on the Aroooooooooooo! chest thumping factor. Hummers are enough of a hazard as it is and people in over powered vehicles are a constant danger to normal traffic - so the combining excess power and torque in a steel shoe-box with wheels is not my notion or responsible motoring.


See my above post for further comments.

Why the hatred for Hummers? Because they are "overpowered and a constant danger to normal traffic" ... please ... cite some facts or references to that. Don't forget the flip side - that it's safer for the people in such a vehicle than some small box going putt putt down the road.

Maybe we should outlaw school buses as well ... and how about 18 wheeled transport trucks?  That would make the roads even safer, wouldn't it?

Hasn't the complaint always been that Hummers are gas guzzlers, and inefficient? Now, when that issue can be overcome - you've decided to change the reasons you hate them, huh? 

Perhaps, then, it's not that they are gas guzzlers and inefficient ...

You know ... that is a good example of how prejudice works ... you have your conclusion, then you find the reasons to justify it.

Firm

PS ... Does your vehicle get 60 mpg?

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(in reply to Zensee)
Profile   Post #: 36
RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 6:53:56 PM   
luckydog1


Posts: 2736
Joined: 1/16/2006
Status: offline 		Sambo, you do not have the actuall numbers yet declare them to be BS....He seems to be refering to 3 differnt systems, plus one he wants to build.

I stand by my original comments, probably doesn't work as well as advertised in real world use, and interesting and worth more study, so have absolutly nothing to apologize for...  

And if I have this correct sambo, according to you, the IC engine can not be made any more efficient than it currently is, therefore this guy is a fraud.  And I might not be correct, but I suspect there are more factors in the operation of an engine than the simple formula you gave.  Or else all engines would operate the same right?  And that does not appear to be the case to me.

I am not a chemist, but it seems to me that making the fuel burn hotter would make the emmisions cleaner, which hydrogen would do.  Also that increasing the explosive force of a given amount of diesel, would get more power with less diesel used.  Then the water (produced along with the heat not before) would help disapate the heat, protecting the engine from the higher heat.  It also seems that the cascade reactions are a lot more complicated than the simple ones you gave before, so more is happening than you say is.   You make an assumption that it is 50/50 diesel and hydrogen.  The article is not clear on that point, but I doubt it to be so.  Partially because hydrogen is a gas so refering to its volume is kind of pointless.  X numbers of H2 molercules can be compressed to a super cold liquid, or expanded to fill the entire universe, otr any point in between.

I don't know, could using up most of the oxegyn in the engine (making water with hydrogen), result in less free oxygen to create No2 (smog/acid rain).  If there is no O to bond with the N would have to bond with something right?

Also note, he does get a huge amount of the fuel emmisions improvement by switching from gasoline IC to Vegetable fueled Diesel

(in reply to FirmhandKY)
Profile   Post #: 37
RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 7:28:04 PM   
samboct


Posts: 1817
Joined: 1/17/2007
Status: offline 		Lucky

I am a chemist- so I suggest you do some more reading, because you're gravely mistaken on a number of your points- to whit emissions and temperature, engine efficiency, and combustion reactions.   I made a good faith offer in order to help settle the debate, but it seems you want to argue.  Feel free, but I'm walking away.   I won't spend more time researching this nonsense because like a perpetual motion machine, it can't work for the very simple reason i.e. the Carnot efficiency I outlined earlier.  Note- if the article would have said that turbines achieve higher efficiency by higher operating temperatures, that would be another matter- it's certainly theoretically possible.  But claiming increased efficiency by reducing operating temperature can't work.  Nor is there any mention in that article about the challenges of hydrogen storage, which is currently one of the major stumbling blocks of a fuel cell vehicle.  Maybe that's because the amount of hydrogen needed would be some rather large tanks- and so the vehicle would have not useful load carrying capacity.

Firm- as someone who drives a Ford Focus SVT which pulls 30 mpg quite happily- and would drive rings around any Hummer in an on road situation- here's my grumble- drunken idiots who get behind the wheel of an SUV are more likely to kill other folks than they are in a Hyundai because they have more mass.  So is my alternative to risk it, because I think that saving gas and reducing emissions is a good idea?  Driving Hummers is just escalation-I'm safer because I've got more mass, so the more mass you drive, the safer you are.  Great- now the traffic on the road is broken down into Hummers and targets.

How about this?  How about a drivers license requirement for vehicles weighing over 3 tons that's a bit stiffer than us folks driving our little 1.3 ton econoboxes?  You want to handle a larger weapon?  Fine- prove that you're capable of it- same as the person driving the truck.  How about stiffer penalties for drunk driving, or reckless driving one of those things as well, because let's face it- you're more of a menace to the rest of the traffic.

Let me point out that from the liberals perspective, you've chosen to rally around the idea of large corporations developing radical products and trotted out an example that is nonsensical.  If the damn Hummer would do all that- great!  But it won't- and hence bashing liberals for wanting more fuel efficiency and emissions standards to drive innovation is completely counter productive.  Those same liberals drove lots of technology ranging from the seat belt (it'll kill the automotive industry completely- it'll cost too much to install) to catalytic converters where tuner cars based on smaller platforms have increased performance while still being able to pass rigorous emissions tests.  I have more faith in our capitalist system than you do- I think that our R + D is capable of meeting the challenge of producing cars that emit less, don't use fossil fuels and yet offer high performance- look at the Tesla Roadster for my idea of a fun ride.  I suspect the dirty little secret of replacing fossil fuels is that we're going to have cleaner air, better cars (electrics have an annoying habit to Detroit- they last much longer than IC with the exception of the batteries) and oh yeah- it'll probably be cheaper to boot.  Most advanced technologies save money compared to less developed technology.

Sam

< Message edited by samboct -- 1/7/2008 7:42:21 PM >

(in reply to luckydog1)
Profile   Post #: 38
RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 8:40:23 PM   
Termyn8or


Posts: 18681
Joined: 11/12/2005
Status: offline 		Hmmmm, just thinking here (sorry)

If you add water you are adding hydrogen and oxygen. If combustion is complete they are a component of the exhaust, like the CO2. If you fucking manage not to burn the nitrogen out of the air, so to speak, all you have done is to add a waste product to the intake charge.

Parts of cylinders are hotter and other parts are colder. In the colder parts the water would not "burn" and as water, with the other "reactants" in the environment could form acids with it. Even knowing that, we do not know everything that is going on there, unless we studied chemistry, and I mean heavily.

I have been told that there is really no wear in an IC engine because as long as it is well lubed because none of the parts really touch each other. That is the theory of a pumped oil system, which every car uses. What eats away at the metal is the acidic compounds formed during combustion. In the really old days, the engine would share oil with the tranny, but they found out this was not such a good idea.

For what reason is your tranny fluid seperate from your engine oil ? It is right there, the compounds formed during the combustion process, which is simply a chemical reaction, are detrimental to machinery. That is why we change the oil in the car, but change the tranny fluid much more infrequently.

Want cites and quotes ? Just look at your owner's manual. What possible reason might they have to make you change your oil every 5,000 miles and say practically nothing about the tranny fluid ?

You have to understand the materials involved and how they react tio certain environments. I had a car that did not use a drop of oil in about three or four years. In my view you do not dare change that. Leave it be. But there is no doubt that every day you drive the car, some oil gets up into the combustion area. Engineers take to great lengths to make sure this amount is as little as possible, just enough to do the job.

But in doing that, they are pumping oil. (lubricant, not the black gold as seen by the Bush family) What alot of people do not know is that the crankshaft is drilled and oil is pumped in by the oil pump, and each tie rod has a hole drilled through, and that brings the oil all the way up to the cylinder walls between the piston rings.

There is no way to build an engine with zero oil consumption, but you can come close. You could be laying down oil literally one molecule thick. From what I've heard, this is precisely when it gets burnt up, becomes an acid or whatever, and starts eating away at your metal parts.

In other words, if the oil pump is working, none of these parts ever touch each other, except maybe during startup. Note diesels that they keep running for months. In fact one very large one was recently shut down in England, after runnin for A HUNDRED AND FIFTY YEARS. Or was that a steamer ? Whichever, the regular gas powered IC engine is used in cars for two reasons, first of all they sell and the company gets to stay in business, but last but not least, it is the best thing for the task at hand.

You want to step on the gas and have something happen. Guess who is still in business ? They are not going to make a change very abruptly, but then we do have that law in CA which mandates that X % of all cars there be hybrids by a certain year.

Technology is nice, but let me get to the OT again, just to save base.

Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60 in 5 secs
 
Yes I believe it. (now I picked up this font, sorry but I am too lazy to fix it)
 
Said vehicle costs $476,975 and every time you punch it, it requires $12,972 worth of upkeep. It is right there in the manual. It is in your glove box.
 
Yup, every time you use passing gear it is twelve grand. No fuel, but the unit needs a rebuild. Still want it ?
 
You burned up the A15 clutch plate and it costs six bucks, the rest of it is labor. And there is no guarantee, you might puch it once or twice then it doesn't work anymore. Get another twelve grand out. Still want it ?
 
Now starting from the ground up, where there are no space constraints, possibly an advanced fluid coupling could be used, like back in the 1960s, a switch the pitch torque convertor. Something along those lines. Anything that has clutch plate and sprags or anything of the sort will wear out.
 
Dis guy wit the superhummer, I want to know, can he just park it in his driveway and go out to it in the morning and have no worries ? Just flick the key and get going, or possibly warm it up for a minute ? Or does he have to call ten engineers before he uses the gears ? That is the question.
 
Go out in your driveway and look at your neighbors, see each and every one of them get into their car and drive off to work. That is not what they want, that is what they need. Half the time they are already late.
 
Lookup statistics on American workers, we are always late. Luckily I have a job where it is not an issue, but that is not true of all jobs. If, for example, you work on an assembly line that shit just won't cut it. So if the car doesn't start you are fucked.
 
And I know things. If you build a car and it is not fast, there is a way to fix that. Redesign the seats so it feels fast. You think I am kidding go right ahead.
 
This turbine shit, amma tellya, it is never going to be in the hands of the commoner, and I don't think many of the elite will want do deal with the upkeep. That is my opinion. We need to go way beyond hybrids and shit like this to satisfy the American public, and still, when it breaks down, which it will, they will be fucked, and that is that.
 
I want to see something that runs that is not dependent on petroleum or any petroleum derivitaves. I don't think we will see that in our lifetime.
 
Be well.
 
T

(in reply to luckydog1)
Profile   Post #: 39
RE: Motorhead Messiah: Hybrid Hummer Gets 60 mpg & 0-60... - 1/7/2008 9:39:14 PM   
Zensee


Posts: 1564
Joined: 9/4/2004
Status: offline 		Try not to take my opinions too personally, Firm. It's not all about you. There was no malice aimed at you in my original post, or any subsequent one, but if you choose to feel insulted because I make a general observation, that is up to you. Since you have chosen to make it an opportunity to personalise your attacks on me I can only try and exercise restraint in the face of provocation.

I won't bother trying to parse all the absurd presumptions you make about my associations and my motioves or extricating myself from the straw man arguments you offer on my behalf. That would be pointless as I know you are capable of generating two or more absurdities for every one I put to bed.

Oops! So much for restraint. Sorry.

Suffice to say my hate on for hummers predates this thread and low gas milage is least on my list of reasons. As a professional driver I am well acquainted with Hummers and other SUVs on the road. Along with muscle / performance cars, their drivers, on average, exhibit the FU attitude towards others with greater frequency and deeper conviction than others. This attitude, coupled with vehicles capable of delivering more destructive power than average, makes them things to be avoided and feared. That's my experience. It is not quantified in any online studies I can offer as proof of validity.


Z.


_____________________________

"Before enlightenment, chop wood and carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood and carry water." (proverb)

(in reply to Termyn8or)
Profile   Post #: 40
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