"The plans for the evil human engineering plant are about to come to
"fruition" - I just like using that word, but I digress..."
Posted on 02/22/2005 3:21:25 PM PST by goldstategop
These are no ordinary cars. Power comes from fresh air stored in reinforced carbon-fiber tanks beneath the chassis. Air is compressed to 4,500 pounds per square inch — about 150 times the pressure of the typical car tire. The air is fed into four cylinders where it expands, driving specially designed pistons. About 25 horsepower is generated.
Though technical problems are being worked out, company officials say the car is capable of 70 mph and a 120-mile range under normal city conditions, performance that is comparable to electric cars.
Critics say the car has had trouble living up to its range projections. But company officials say they are trying to overcome that by warming the stored air.
Recharging the onboard tanks takes about four hours using the car's small compressor, which can be plugged into any wall outlet. Gas stations equipped with special air pumps can replenish the tanks in about three minutes. Company officials say the oil only needs to be changed every 31,000 miles.
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
We're only 10 years away from 2015. I'm still waiting for Mr. Fusion.
"The act of uncompressing air will cool it quite significantly."
Yes, that is true, but it will not be cool enough to act like Air Conditioning. The temperature of the tank will dictate how cool the air coming out of it will be. So I guess you would need something to cool the tank to achieve.....OH, this is going nowhere.
These guys are French, right?
I've never seen one go off, but I've heard about it happening. Like I said, whenever I transport them in the truck, I keep them with the caps on, disconnected from the welders, lashed down and blocked in on all sides. I don't want to take any chances.
I have several diesel items, but I haven't tried any biodiesel stuff quite yet. I did some research on the production processes when I was in college.
Apparently, some guy in Lancaster, PA managed to convert his Harley to biodiesel. It was in one of the magazines a few years ago, anyway. Also, the Marines have a diesel variant of the Kawasaki KLR650 they're using. I don't know if there's a civilian version yet or not.
"....boldly going where no Frenchman has gone before."
ROFLMAOAF (ROFLMAO..AtFrenchmen) Should be Frenchpersons. I don't think there are any men there.
(Denny Crane: "There are two places to find the truth. First God and then Fox News.")
I would think it would take a hell of a valve to be trustworthy enough to hold back 4500 PSI from blowing your lungs to smithereens. I am no authority on SCUBA but that would be a hell of a lot of pressure.
"I would think it would take a hell of a valve to be trustworthy enough to hold back 4500 PSI from blowing your lungs to smithereens. I am no authority on SCUBA but that would be a hell of a lot of pressure."
Usual steel SCUBA tanks are at 3,200PSI. The first stage regulator, on the tank, reduces the pressure to 150PSI and the final stage, on the mouthpiece, reduces to ambient pressure.
Oh my God the LA Slimes Sorry to my Brain I will not do that to you again!!
I don't know who made 'em, but I noticed them right off too...
"The plans for the evil human engineering plant are about to come to
"fruition" - I just like using that word, but I digress..."
How about the onboard electrical? Headlamps, radio, power seats, windows, etc... I guess some of those could run off pneumatics; windows down....psssssshhhh....like Star Trek - that would be cool.
Seriously - this is like electric cars and hydrogen power - it's a liberal guilt shifting thing, its psychological. As long as the device I'm using is "green"; not burning fuel or emitting wastes, then I am doing good. Let someone else fire up a coal burning power plant to produce power to run the air compressor to fill my tanks, they are bad.
"Not suspected my friend...it is a fact. USS Thresher went down PRECISELY for that reason. I have read the then classified, now de-classified report. No backup systems on the early nukes....."
Thanks for the info, Tex. I qualified it because I wasn't sure. I had seen some stuff in a Magazine (Popular Mechanics perhaps?) a few years ago on the matter.
Try and heat one in Fairbanks in January, you wouldn't make it out of the driveway!
I would like to see it accelerate out the back of a C-130.
You do, if you fly at all. Look at the names of the main parts of an aircraft: Fuselage, empennage (tail group), nacelle, aileron. They had developed the hinged aileron while we were still paying royalty to the Wright brothers for their system of wing-warping to bank the plane. Remember that in WWI we had no combat aircraft of our own and had to use Nieuports and S.P.A.D.s acquired from France. If you could see the plate on Rickenbacker's SPAD at the Smithsonian it would read: Societe Par Avions et Derivees.
Do you drive a car? Then you likely use a differential gear which originally came on the De Dion Bouton. The defroster idea came from an early race at Le Mans. French engineering has been superior in the past, why shouldn't it be good now?
I think that our beef with the French is almost entirely the fault of one supremely arrogant man: Charles DeGaulle. Churchill did not like him and FDR hated him. Now most Frenchmen try to emulate him.
Yes youcan compress air to 4500 psi, that is the pressure in our Draeger air bottles that we use for fire fighting. The wrapped carbon fiber bottle won't explode. It's designed to just burst without flying apart. Think Pillsbury pop'n fresh dough container.
The special compressor that we use to fill thes bottles is about the size of a desk and it takes at least 45 minutes to fill them. The air going into the bottle is pretty hot. (Think diesel engine) When the bottle cools you no longer have 4500 psi, thats why you can't fill them fast. The heat isn't too good for the resin that holds the bottle together either. Our bottles are only good for five years and then we have to throw them away.
In order to fill the bottles from a "gas station" in 3 minutes the station would have to have a huge cascade system and a massive compressor.
Compressed air is one of the most costly ways of powering something due to the amount of energy that must be used to compress the air. All this just to produce 25 hp. You would be better off running a 250cc Yamaha engine to power your car.
I think you all are forgetting something: As crazy as this idea is, I would NOT criticize it to the point that people give up trying to imagine the next viable fuel system. Don't any of you want us to be free from those animals in the middle east? (That being said, this is probably a non-starter as ideas go...)
I think the proper name for this is GOLF CART !
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