Fueled by H2O?

www.bendbulletin.com ^ | 12-26-2008 | By Andrew Moore

[Red Badger]

Can a car run on water?

Bend businessman Rob Juliano claims it can, despite ample skepticism from scientists and automotive experts.

Although the average price of fuel has slipped dramatically from a summer high of more than $4 per gallon, Juliano believes water — specifically the hydrogen contained in water — can be used to power an internal-combustion engine at a fraction of the cost of gasoline.

Hydrogen is being pursued as a fuel by car manufacturers. Honda earlier this year debuted its FCX Clarity, a hydrogen fuel cell vehicle powered by an electric motor. BMW has developed a car that can use either gasoline or hydrogen to power a traditional motor.

Juliano, however, is peddling something a bit different. Through his company — UnitedH2O.com — the 1984 graduate of Bend’s Mountain View High School builds and installs electrolytic hydrogen generators. They are small, footlong canisters that use electricity from a car battery to break water into its gaseous components, hydrogen and oxygen.

The gases are then funneled into the engine, where — due to the combustive nature of hydrogen — it is used to help drive an engine’s pistons. The process means less gasoline is injected into the piston cylinders, hence the car can travel farther on less gas, thereby increasing the car’s fuel efficiency. In other words, Juliano says cars with his system get more miles per gallon.

Lincoln City resident Linda Young, who paid roughly $1,100 to have Juliano install the system, says her gas mileage has increased nearly 65 percent. Her Nissan Maxima used to get roughly 17 miles per gallon, but the last time she checked, it was getting 28 miles per gallon, she said.

[Sudetenland]

1. If you burn the hydrogen you produced, you will not come close to recovering the energy required to produce it..."you can't break even."

Let's assume that the addition of the small amount of hydrogen you are capable of producing by electrolysis does "promote the efficiency of the burn" as you say. You are still talking about an engine that is maybe 30-35%. That means you would have to increase the efficiency of the engine by enough to

• generate enough electricity to maintain the battery charge and energy being consumed by the electrolysis.
• Generate enough excess energy to increase the mileage by 60% as well.

Since we already know that the electrolysis is consuming more energy that it is producing in hydrogen combustion, you just can't get there from here. The engine itself is only capable of turning 35% of the energy consumed into kinetic energy (motion).

Another way of looking at it is that you have an energy sink (the electrolysis unit) hooked up to another energy sink (the engine) and claiming to get more energy than was put in. Sorry, can't be done. A negative plus a negative gives you a higher negative, not a positive.

[chuckles]

....”Please explain.” Everything here has been covered, but one more thing. If you observe the amount of gas produced from these gadgets, it isn't enough to run a lawnmower, let alone a car at 55mph. If you had a water truck following you with a diesel generator, you might hose it up to your manifold and get the volume and pressure it would take to power your car. It take a few hundred amps with multiple cathodes and anodes to generate the volume needed. Your engine will never produce that much on it's own, let alone pull the car also.

This includes additives like aluminum and soda mixed in the water.

[Sudetenland]

Don't know about that, but the same though occurred to me about T. Boone's campaign to use natural gas in cars...what would that do the the cost of heating homes and the price of natural gas?

You think his holdings in natural gas have something to do with his "strategy?"

[AmericanVictory]

Thanks for the link.

[Oberon]

I don’t believe the claimed 60% increase in fuel economy any more than you do.

However, I think it’s not outside the bounds of theory for the insertion of a hydrogen-oxygen mix to increase the efficiency of the gasoline combustion... provided one doesn’t pull one’s numbers out of the air.

[dangerdoc]

peswiki.com

[ecomcon]

“Inventor”. Meh. At least he’s a high school graduate.

[Kevmo]

I was signed up over there but got so time-constrained they kicked me off.

[ecomcon]

Hah! LOL

[ecomcon]

Not to mention the fouled plug Mr Juliano changed when he installed his “invention”.

[Sudetenland]

"I have seen a 40 KW generator that runs without fuel."

Listen, I've got this land deal that I just know you'd love. Guaranteed 200% return on you investment! Give me a call at 1-555-SCR-EWME. Ask for Mr. Madoff.

I've seen a horsefly, I've even seen a housefly, but I ain't never seen me a 40KW self-sustaining generator"

To paraphrase a bit.

[count-your-change]

What does it take to combust hydrogen? Oxygen. Where does
the oxygen come from? The fuel/air mixture already entering
the cylinder. Unless there is an excess of oxygen to combine with the hydrogen, won't the other fuel/air mixture be fuel enriched and thus less efficient?

If the introduction of hydrogen makes the fuel/air mixture more efficient then adjustments to the fuel or engine could accomplish the same thing, no?

[Sudetenland]

"I am an engineer.

Oh really, what railroad do you work for?

[thackney]

I have seen lab scale versions of fuelless energy generation

I am an engineer as well, an electrical engineer specialized in power systems.

You claim is one of the funniest posted here in a long time.

[Anvilhead]

LOL!

[ecomcon]

Gasoline has more hydrogen in it than liquid hydrogen. Further, gaseous hydrogen introduced to the combustion air isn’t going to get you anywhere, as you are displacing oxygen.

[BILL_C]

bump for later

[citizen]

Having read the article, I don’t get the comments about the laws of thermodynamics being broken and this being a perpetual motion machine. Seems to me the claim is to be able to crack the water to release hydrogen and oxygen, a pretty simple process, and add those gases to the combustion misture in the piston chamber. What is so crazy about that?

This can’t be a perpetual motion machine which, by definition, is a machine that will run forever with no additional input of fuels or power. Clearly the engine system still requires gasoline to run, the water canisters, while presumably inexpensive, will require refilling or replacing and the conventional car battery will need to be replaced as all batteried do. I’m leaving aside that the piston engine itself needs maintenance and replacment eventually.

As for the laws of thermodynamics, where are they being violated, specifically? I don’t see any claims about creating energy per se in the process as described. I wonder if the “box” would run hot, though.

It may be that the Popular Mechanics guy has it right, that the fuel mixture can be quite a bit “leaner” (less gas) due to the gaseous fuel (H + O) being pumped into the piston chambers.

[ScreamingFist]

I am an engineer as well, an electrical engineer specialized in power systems.

Cool! Calculate for me, what is more efficient, a diesel engine running at high RPM or these beasts turning at 80 RPM.

Take your time.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WGJhWu_ydfI&NR=1

[Hot Tabasco]

Lincoln City resident Linda Young, who paid roughly $1,100 to have Juliano install the system,

Adios engine warranty..........