Goodbye combustion engine
 

I only recently learned that the hydrogen car of the future is a lot closer to becoming a reality. Supposedly a deal was just signed by one Auto manufacturer to have a factory built in China for the production of these modular vehicles. Best thinking is 6 to 8 years till wide spread production and use worldwide. To me the Skateboard Chassis, capable of multiple body styles from coupe to pickup. is a fascinating subject.

http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f3...ardchassis.jpg

Looks interesting, but do you have any kind of links or other kinds of information sources about it?

Yes of course, sorry :)

http://www.foxnews.com/leisure/2012/...ntcmp=features

http://www.garrygolden.net/2010/01/1...ustion-engine/

http://www.supercars.net/cars/2109.html

It says "end of the combustion engine". I assume this is a FCV, isn't the hold up on a FC that platinum is too expensive? How has that changed?

Mighty thanks!

Interesting developments there. Combine that with developments in Europe and Asia and we have some highly interesting innovations ahead of us in regards to car making.

Too much money for oil and petrol companies to lose,i would think they would do something to stop this.

I just really became aware that production was close at hand. I really don't know any of the technology hurdles, other than what was written in the links. Hydrogen power seems to be in the near future of personal vehicles propulsion though. I have read that these modular vehicles can be produced very cheaply. That's why you see third world applications being mentioned.

Interesting indeed.

There's certainly no shortage of Hydrogen, but the H2 Fuel Cell uses platinum as a catalyst on the anode, and that's pricey.


EDIT: I had a quick read, there are loads of FC types so I guess there's a viable solution to this then.

The vehicle is not the hard part, building a new fuel distribution system and not being crushed by the most powerful corporations in the world will be true challenge.

I have been a fan of these alternitives for many years, I hope we see them soon!

Goodby combustion engine?

Not in our lifetime if ever

It will be easier to spot accidents ahead of you....just look for the mini mushroom cloud. lol

LOL true dat! ;)

Had I read your post just yesterday, I would have agreed with you. But the writing is on the wall, and they have set a course. Look for the combustion engine's to be offered for specialty applications only, say after the year 2025. :)

And in most cases the course is backwards where we will all be waring blue jump suits and riding bycicls

Hardly..

As long at there is not a 3rd world war that sets us back to the dark ages there will be combustion engines for hundreds of years to come! Granted, you and many like you may be riding in smart cars.. but next to you on the highway there will be trucks, delivery vans, 18 wheelers, etc that will be using combustion engines.. Just hope and pray their mirrors are big enough to see you little spec of a car! ;)

Your nuts!... I love the combustion engine, my truck has a 460 engine, and I loved my 1200 Harley...but neither you or I can't stop progress:)

http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f3...ttaMelissa.jpg
http://i51.photobucket.com/albums/f3...6FLHatMoms.jpg

Bud.. nothing I said is nuts..

Fact remains it will be many Many MANY years before the come up with something to replace the trucks I noted above.

As for progress.. The greenie hippie socialist have been predicting the end of the combustion engine for decades.. So I don't see where I am being silly by having a 'show me' and 'seeing is belving' aproach to this latest atempt to call the combustion engine DOA

Two words...energy density.

End of story.

Your mobility (at least long range) will depend on an ICE for a long time.



--Outlaw.

From what I read they are thinking to leave the current fueling infrastructure. Only that you pull in for fuel and they remove and replace the fuel cell in minutes. A plug and play unit that is universal for the different makes of cars...naturally this is the end desire to have in place, but is years away

Well, we never achieved anything like a standardization in the IT hardware. I don't see it happening in the car industry for plug and play (P&P) fuel cell units.

It's a great idea, but Germans will have their own format, French another (with a strange and ugly multi-faceted design), UK will require manufacturer to install it upside down with asymetric design and Chinese will have their own that will fell apart after a few miles.

So, P&P ? humm at least if you don't go too far from your home.

Regarding the bright and orange mushrooms that some fears to multiply on our highway, metallic foams started to appear 3 to 5 years ago as a container for the H2. they look promising in case of crash collisions for safety concerns.

EDIT: Great Bike !

I think it's brilliant if they pull it off. If it becomes widespread it will also be cheap, plus it will probably result in gasoline prices going down due to competition, instead of constantly rising due to increasing demand and decreasing reserves.

I don't get why car/motorbike enthusiasts are so against this and i'll explain why. The vast majority of drivers are not enthusiasts, they are using a vehicle in a practical fashion. They don't care about the nice throaty sound, they care about cheap operating and maintenance costs.

The thing is, if all these guys get those cheap to run cars on renewable energy, both them and the enthusiasts benefit.

-Less pollution, so less restrictions on the remaining minority of internal combustion powered vehicles.

-Lower fuel prices and better ICE technology in terms of performance vs consumption, due to competition.

-Combine the previous two and you get potentially bigger engines on your ICE vehicle.

etc etc

The way i see it, if this thing goes forward (and i really hope it does), people will be able to run an H2 powered family car for their day to day business at very low operating cost and then use some of the leftover cash to get something fun for the weekends.

At least that's what i would do if i was a family man and the technology was available, plus i wouldn't have to pay 1.7 Euros per liter of gas every time i wanted to go on a ride with my motorbike.

At the current prices i need 18 euros per 200km (and that's a 650cc motorbike we're talking about, imagine a car), so yeah, bring on the H2 fuel cell technology and get them scared a bit, then we can all enjoy a mix of cheap transportation and vehicles with character. Why sabotage this and shoot ourselves in the foot?

For me it's a question of practicality, economy, environment (yes, it's a practical issue as well if it pertains to my health) and worldwide supply/demand issues, not if the hippies like it or not. Why cut off my nose to spite my face? ;)

Some electric vehicles are claimed to give BETTER performance than the gas equivalent:



http://hellforleathermagazine.com/20...-on-the-snake/

http://www.core77.com/blog/transport...ross_21599.asp

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3robHRHhNHY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NRllNmeRbRI

The advantage of e-engines is the fact the got 100% torque from almost 0rpm - no wonder they win.

The problem is not increased use but technology itself.
Production of H2 has only some 60% efficiency - i.e. for 100W you put into h2 production you'll get <60W worth of H2.
Of those 60W you'll lose another 50% if you turn them back into energy.

Using it on vehicle comes with a few other problems as well:
- 1L H2 = .3L gasoline
- H2 Tanks are tiny bit heavier than gasoline tanks

You basically use the same argument and hope for Fusion Power.

This. If AofA knew anything other than to call people who support this progress "hippy green socialists" then he might understand some of the tech behind it. If we adopted this attitude with computers we wouldn't be talking online about it now, I would doubt AofA has such a resistive attitude to a new CPU.....

Anyway, even with compressed tank Hydrogen dissipates faster than any other fuel so if there ever were a puncture to a tank and the fuel leaking out I'd rather it be Hydrogen than petrol. Put a spark to either and there's trouble.

It's a very biased argument because you haven't included the efficiency of oil to petrol including finding it, drilling it out, transporting it and refining it.

Very true, and not to mention the energy efficiency of combustion engines themselves after everything else is said and done.

so ... should I sell my oil shares yet?

I always thought bacterial oil would be the next big thing? pump hot C02 from power plants straight into a huge VAT .. add sunlight and you get oil.

.

You'll have to transport H2 too, not such a huge difference there.
Actually you'll need triple the volume for the same amount of energy but we're going off track - this scenario is far away.

Not really - we all know the combustion engine doenst really have a future.
What we do need to focus on how to feed them - it's absolutely irrelvant how efficent an otto engine is.

Baseline: It's not an alternative yet, longterm maybe - all we know is we'll need a sh1tload of energy in the future and we have absolutely no clue where to get if from.

:confused:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1210162222.htm

isobutanol instead of oil maybe?

Don't. There is more done with oil then just petrol. Everything that is made out of plastic, as a starting point. And given the rising costs of Oil exploitation, it won't become cheaper anytime soon. Even if the first western nations manage to switch over to alternatives, the BRICS and other developing countries will need a decade or two longer to provide similiar infrastructure. Petrol won't go away that fast.

They won't allow hydrogen fuel until "they" control all the water though... and what they really need to be doing, with regard to electric vehicles, is apply Tesla technology efectively

Yes..

To me! ;)

The huge demand in SE Asia is for Diesel for trains, tractors, trucks and heavy equipment not Petrol. Commercial shipping is not going nuclear anytime in the near future and the consumption of Jet 1 and Avgas goes up every year. Oil is used for a lot more than powering the family car.

Being the green-eco-freek that I was turned into by my wife, I put a lot of effort into recycling, including used engine oil. I had always assumed that it was put back through the refinery to get useful products.

Then I read that all the oil from my location in the world gets sent up to SE Asia and burnt to produce power. Guess its recycling of a kind!

i dont swallow the fish breathing liquated oxigen in water

they never run out of oxigen however still the fishing tank

does anybody know where im going?

f, why people takes for granted what books and tv say

i even can proof mathematically the kind of spiral you need to get an antigravity schauberger free energy turbine :(

Briefly side stepping for a moment, Raaaid what do you think of the possibility of perpetual motion machines ... impossible right, but I've heard of people who claim to have invented them.

Back to the energy thing, does anyone remember the Sinclair C5, when I lived in Aberdeen a guy down the road had one, looks like part of the reason they were phased out was because of safety (but not enough development either) but we see electric disabled carts going about town these days ... I bet like the Rayleigh Chopper bicycle they are collectors items now!

Trivia fact ... a heavily modified Sinclair C5 hit 150 MPH.

Its odd to think that any future Valentino Rossi Motorcycle racer might be riding an electric bike ... as a petrol head I hope its not in my lifetime though ... just doesn't seem right, LOL.

http://leith.live.blonde.net/blog/wp...02/twitter.jpg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0EQetm_qWDg

Speaking of Electric Vehicles ... some nail biting stuff ....


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PMW_wLrDSRE

I am with AofA, if they dont find something to fill the hole that gas would leave, meaning all the jobs in the transport, production and sale of gas you wont see it happen... the the big corporate giants need to be appeased first.

Kinda like cancer... an average treatment costs around 20 grand... hundreds of thousands are employed for the current "treatment" options... could you imagine what would happen if they cured it... it would cost alot of people alot of money... they arent in that big of a hurry... although they are working hard on breast cancer, Hollywood needs to look good ;)

Too jaded?