Posted on 05/22/2006 8:41:30 AM PDT by BlueSky194
What are people's opinion of this?
It will also provide fodder for future "oil company invention suppression" conspiracy theorists!
Sure, but compressed air tanks are heavy compared to gas and gas tanks.
The main thing is portability. Liquid fuel (hydrocarbons) are energy dense and relatively easy to store and transfer. Refining oil into gasoline is a very energy intensive process. We give up loads of effeciency for the sake of portability. Electric generation can be highly efficient (read nuclear). Electricity used to pump up a tank may be considerably less costly than refining oil. Remember this is a french inventor. Perhaps electric power is cheap in France. I didn't see the range claims, but let's see the math. Like you said, dollars per mile.
The point is that all vehicles must carry their fuel... batteries for electric cars, solid fuel for rockets, etc. It is one of the defining characteristics of being a vehicle.
Ugly and probably has not power to speak of. Does it get 5 or 6 mph?
With all that glass, I hope it has a powerful air conditioner.
If your compressed-air car runs out, can you blow it up?
Jesus, what a thing to say.
The cycle contains 360 degrees crankshaft rotation. 70 deg. is about 20% of the cycle. Power is made after top dead center. Increased dwell at tdc is good in this case because it provides more time for air to move and pressurize. Pressures rise much faster in a cumbustion engine. The torque curve is flatter and for this application is "better", while the maximum torque is not as high.
I certainly agree with that.
It kinda' bothers me that all the "snake oil" types tend to get out there first and that discredits some of the serious work being done without fanfare.
>>>If I'm going to pay money anyway, I'd rather have zero pollution.
Excuse me, but where do you think the energy to compress the air comes from?>>>
That energy would be in ONE place and not spread out throughout the millions of miles of cities that have millions of cars running on gas.
I first wondered how many miles per gallon it gets. Then, realizing that was a ridiculous question because I don't believe we know what the alternate fuel may be (could be cords of wood/km), I thought about miles/cubic foot of air.
But it more probaby is something like feet/cubic feet. Dimensionally, this would be 1/ft2. Improbable.
Then I thought, To heck with it. My kids already have a golf cart.
We think the air car "is dope" proclaimed the air cars inventors.
WTF does that gibberish mean?
Yeah! I did not think about that. Just imagine trying to drive in Dallas/Houston/LA rush hour with no AC!
It means that he's fine with power plants pumping smog into *other* people's lungs, just not in his town. Sort of like those liberals who oppose ANWR drilling because of the supposed environmental devastation, but never say a word against pumping oil in the Middle East.
It's a "con" rod alright.
You seem to know what you're talking about. The 1st Law of Thermodynamics will send this idea back to the drawing board, only demonrats think you can get something for nothing. And yet, there are BETTER BUYS, ask any price comparison shopper. Try this : box/brick shape of semitrucks/UPS brown vans : worst possible shape to push thru the air : thus 4 spinning paddle wheels(long/thin)at front 4 edges, pulling air off front plate, creating tensile stress; 4 more at the back 4 edges, "backfilling" the air behind, creating compressive stress. Thus the C-T 1/2 wavelength of wave drag is reversed into T-C pull-me/push-you THRUST. 90% of CxHx energy in gas-otto/diesel engines is just waste heat, only 10% goes to shoving(and pulling)air out of the way(snowplowing in effect). Thus these 8 spinning cylinders(w/small electric motors)of paddle wheels(or blades like your old push lawnmower)would reduce energy levels proportionately. Know any truckers?
Cue the disco music...
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