Drivers Seek Mileage Boost From Hydrogen, Oxygen Bubbles

Newhouse News ^ | 6/10/2008 | Tim Knauss

[RSmithOpt]

People who wish not to believe it can work forget the alternator of any auto / truck has a fixed amount of current it can deliver at 13.2 to 14.35 VDC depending upon make.

A lot of the output from the alternator is never used by the car in daytime driving; minimal use just charges the battery as you drive. Now, having the stereo on, the wipers going, headlights on and running the ac will consume most of the power from many makes of alternators.

Therefore, the alternator spins to produce voltage that charges the battery constantly whether that energy is needed by the battery or not. Power to run the vehicle's accessories is pulled off the battery.

My problem with the advertisers out there seem not to suggest reserve H2O tanks to automatically fill the electrolysis chamber as needed.

Also, if the system (Hydrogen Hurricane, etc.) cannot store small amounts of Brown Gas, then quick acceleration would be severely hampered.

My take is the units ability to supply the amounts of brown gas needed at a steady rate may be in question with respect to optimal combustion mix of octane and the brown mix.

It does not matter what kind of fuel an internal combustion engine burns as flex fuel vehicles are already demonstrating that capability.

Hydrogen burning in oxygen that is created from water using excess alternator energy is easily accomplished and feeding that gas mix to the air intake just in front of the MAFS is how it is down. One will have to change electrodes at times is my guess and the brown gas additive will tell the car's computer to lean back the fuel mix thus increasing mileage.

[purpleraine]

Yeah, they been such pioneers on fuel economy.

[purpleraine]

Let's cut the nonsense.

Electric plug-ins at home. Increase the R&D on batteries and increase the range into the future. You remember the gear up to World War II. This is a national defense issue. If GM and Ford won't do it, the Japanese and the Germans will and they'll produce some of the cars here.

Start nuke plants which we need anyway for other energy sources.

[VanShuyten]

Supposedly, it uses the excess electricity produced by the alternator, which would be wasted, to split the water. I’m not sure if that really works that way, but it sounds good.

[AmericaUnited]

You obviously don't have any idea that if a greater electrical load is placed on your alternator, it presents a greater mechanical load to your engine.

[AmericaUnited]

See #45

[count-your-change]

Your alternator doesn’t produce “excess” electricity. It produces enough to handle the load imposed upon it until it reaches maximum output at which point the battery will begin to drain.

[Jack of all Trades]

People who wish to believe this will work do not understand physics, engineering or automobile technology.

An alternator is a variable current device. If it weren't, the battery charging voltage would vary with load instead of being relatively constant at 13.5 Volts.

Voltage and power are not the same thing. Electric power equals voltage times current. When there is no current draw on the alternator, it produces and consumes little power. When current is drawn from the alternator, the voltage regulator feeds more current to the exciter coil.

All the power produced by the alternator comes from the crankshaft of the engine. mechanical load on the engine varies directly with the amount of power generated by the alternator.

The efficiency of conversion for an alternator is about 50%. Likewise the efficiency for electrolysis is about 50%. Boiled down, if I force the alternator to consume 10 HP electrolyzing water, the upper limit for the power returned by burning the resulting Hydrogen would be 2.5 HP. The result is a net loss of 7.5 HP at the crankshaft. Engine efficiency is by definition shaft output power per unit of fuel.

Any benefit shown by such a system most likely due to one or more of: driver behavior changes, poor testing controls, or false claims.

Here we see the bitter fruit of the death of science education in America.

[RSmithOpt]

When there is no current draw on the alternator, it produces and consumes little power. When current is drawn from the alternator, the voltage regulator feeds more current to the exciter coil.

True, however, the amount of power (torque from the crankshaft or speed 2X above idle approx 1500 rpm) required to turn the alternator to increase the current being delivered at 12 VDC does not change while the engine is running. Therefore, the power is available for the electrolysis even though the car hasn't called for the power through the battery.

The alternator produces a 3-phase current sine wave which is converted by a 6-diode rectifier. The power is available limited only by low (idle) rpm, the current carrying capabilities of the diodes and the size of the stator and rotor.

The alternator can more than make up for the voltage needed to recharge the battery during electrolysis.

The anode and cathode plate efficiency requires fairly pure and expensive precious metals. That's one thing most people forget.

I have to disagree with your take on 'forcing the alternator' to consume power as it spinning when the engine is running regardless. There are no clutches, etc. in an alternator that increase torque on the engine when more electrical power is required.

Don't believe me? Do a simple test.

Check your gas mileage in normal driving. Then turn all you lights on, stereo, wipers, and passenger compartment fan on high and drive a qtr tank of gas out. Then check your mileage.

I'll bet you $1000 it will not drop because you used more electricity from the alternator recharging the battery.

You may want to change your perception of gasoline fuel independence for the internal combustion versus less gasoline use with extra brown gas supplied to the cylinders.

[underbyte]

“”Unless you’re leaving out some pretty important details, I’m thinking you have a very active imagination...””

PM your email and I will send you a picture.

8 plug wires @ 2000 RPM = 16,000 min I do not know if I got hydrogen or not but I know I had a pretty good plasma thing going.

[HamiltonJay]

But does this tiny amount of hydrogen increase the heat given off by the internal explosion?

It seems to me the only way this adding of the Hydrogen and Oxygen from the electrolysis of the water could create an end benefit to the cars MPG would be if the engine actually ran cooler, converting more energy into HP and less into heat. Because that’s the only two directions the energy is going to go... mechanical energy and heat. The small (and it must be incredibly small amounts) of hydrogen being added adds that much in terms of BTU to the combustion chamber.. but the O which is the other product of splitting the water molecule may be causing the fuel to burn more efficiently, and thus more energy gets transfered to mechanical than heat? I dunno.. but I woudl think you’d have to run cooler in the mixtures they are probably winding up with, to see any discernable MPG increase.

[HamiltonJay]

This is what I am thinking.. the O is probably the beneficiary, causing the fuel to burn more completely, and creating greater MPG.

I’d be curious to see if you added pure O to the injection chambers at various small quantities if you could get the same results.

[Jack of all Trades]

True, however, the amount of power (torque from the crankshaft or speed 2X above idle approx 1500 rpm) required to turn the alternator to increase the current being delivered at 12 VDC does not change while the engine is running.

Yes, actually it does.

This is the fundamental thing you are missing. If I drop a 1/4 Ohm 1000 Watt power resistor across the terminals of the battery while an engine is idling, the resulting 50 Amp load increase will make the idle speed droop slightly. This is due to the extra 3 or so HP consumed by the alternator and the reaction time of the idle governor.

An alternator produces a variable output current in order to regulate a constant output voltage. As output current load increases, so does the required input shaft HP. The alternator converts mechanical power into electrical power.

The total electrical load presented by the accessories in a car represent an insignificant load to the engine. The extra fuel consumed by turning them all on could be resolved on a dynamometer, but probably not in road driving.

[Right Wing Assault]

A lot of the output from the alternator is never used by the car in daytime driving

Assuming the battery is charged and no accessories are on, where does the output go?

[RSmithOpt]

The alternator is advantageously a three phase alternator in which the rate of rise of the current output decreases at increased speeds. However, in such an alternator, a battery must be connected to the alternator as a load to prevent the voltage from rising to a destructive level. Thus, as the load is reduced on the alternator, the voltage increases. The winding may be wound as a three phase wye winding to accomplish this.

Remember to that the electronic coils in today's autos also constantly require voltage to step up the spark to the plugs when the engine is running, OB computer, dash instruments, etc, so there is always an electrical load on the alternator through the battery. In older cars, the ignition switch was off, everything was off...that's not the case today in the newer cars.

Basically, think of it like this......the larger the load on the battery, the slower the recharge rate of the battery from the alternator, however, power is maintained to the accessories.

[Mr. Dough]

People who wish to believe this will work do not understand physics, engineering or automobile technology.

You're right on. I found in engineering school that a lot of times just using conservation of energy was a much easier approach to solving problems than some other approaches. This is certainly the case with cars running on electrolyzed water, which people have been imagining for many years.

[Mr. Dough]

...you added pure O to the injection chambers at various small quantities...

I've wondered about that but I would say you'd have to be SO careful to add only a tiny bit or you'd rapidly melt your engine block. High potential for catastrophe...I read that a single charcoal briquet soaked in liquid oxygen has the explosive power of a stick of dynamite.

[redgolum]

Three laws of Thermo. For this to work you have to violate at least two.

Guess what, it doesn’t work.

[Vinnie]

I have to disagree with your take on 'forcing the alternator' to consume power as it spinning when the engine is running regardless. There are no clutches, etc. in an alternator that increase torque on the engine when more electrical power is required.

I don't think that is correct.

Why would a 5000 watt emergency generator require, say , a 12 hp gas engine where a 5 hp generator will only put out 1500 watts?

If there is no increase in hp needed why put the larger engine on the larger generator?

(figures are approx)

Doesn't the magnetic field in the field windings make the stator more difficult to turn as power is required from the alternator. This requires more hp to turn the stator.

[RSmithOpt]

A 5000 watt generator using a 12hp gas motor turns a larger rotor inside a larger stator to get the 5000 watts ....more torque required. Therefore more weight of the larger generator components needs more power to deliver the wattage at a given velocity.

You have a generator?

If so, fire it up with exactly 1 pint of gas and pull 500 watts of load. Measure the time until the gas runs out.

Then take the same generator with exactly one pint of gas and load it to 1500 watts and time it until the gas runs out.

There will not be 2 minutes difference in those times - been there on that one.

You are are correct about the flux field getting stronger when more load is being required, however, I do not believe there is a direct (linear) ft-lbs of torque required to overcome to turn the rotor versus to total charge on the stator surfaces if we are discussing electric flux, not magnetic flux as: Gauss's law for electric fields, another of Maxwell's equations versus Faraday's equation for magnetic flux.

One thing's for sure, there is no energy gain nor energy conservation running a H2/O2 generator for fuel supplementation to gasoline engines, however, the electricity is available from a car's alternator to supply the power easily if the brown gas generator isn't too large and the electrodes are of high quality.

My question is how many cu ft / min of brown gas has to be made to lean back the gasoline consumption when a vehicle is traveling 60 mph to where there is at least a 25% savings in mpg on the gas.

I don't see such a device saving gas in stop and go city driving as much as when traveling a constant speed. Seems to me an adjustable voltage has to be supplied to generator when idling or a compressor with pressure regulator is needed to temporarily store the brown gas to add more when accelerating to obtain the gas mpg efficiency.

It's definitely doable....does a car's gas mileage go down when some young punk hooks up a 1000 watt boom boom stereo system in his ride? I think not....the only thing that goes down is his hearing. LOL!!