Peak Oil is You
Donate Bitcoins ;-) or Paypal :-)
Page added on April 22, 2011
New Car Engine Sends Shock Waves Through Auto Industry
Despite shifting into higher gear within the consumer’s green conscience, hybrid vehicles are still tethered to the gas pump via a fuel-thirsty 100-year-old invention: the internal combustion engine.
However, researchers at Michigan State University have built a prototype gasoline engine that requires no transmission, crankshaft, pistons, valves, fuel compression, cooling systems or fluids. Their so-called Wave Disk Generator could greatly improve the efficiency of gas-electric hybrid automobiles and potentially decrease auto emissions up to 90 percent when compared with conventional combustion engines.
The engine has a rotor that’s equipped with wave-like channels that trap and mix oxygen and fuel as the rotor spins. These central inlets are blocked off, building pressure within the chamber, causing a shock wave that ignites the compressed air and fuel to transmit energy.
The Wave Disk Generator uses 60 percent of its fuel for propulsion; standard car engines use just 15 percent. As a result, the generator is 3.5 times more fuel efficient than typical combustion engines.
Researchers estimate the new model could shave almost 1,000 pounds off a car’s weight currently taken up by conventional engine systems.
Last week, the prototype was presented to the energy division of the Advanced Research Projects Agency, which is backing the Michigan State University Engine Research Laboratory with $2.5 million in funding.
Michigan State’s team of engineers hope to have a car-sized 25-kilowatt version of the prototype ready by the end of the year.
2 Comments on "New Car Engine Sends Shock Waves Through Auto Industry"
DC on Sat, 23rd Apr 2011 1:31 am
Even if this device works as advertised(who knows), it is an improvement how exactly? An improved gas engine is just that, an improved gas engine. Still will burn gas, needs oil, will pollute the air, land and water, just like the ones we have now, but will it will do it with EFFICENCY! I would remind everyone that high efficency\mpg gas burners have been possible for many many decades. But our oil\auto masters decided “we” wanted expensive clunky wasteful SUV’s and trucks(and screw mass transit too!) and that makeing cleaner efficent vehicles was a waste of time.
For comparison to this latest bit of never-ware
Electric traction motors 90+% efficent
Transmission required for an EV=none
Crankshaft=none
Valves=none, etc
Emissions(at point of use) = 0%
Toyota Rav4EV SUV powered by 30KW NihM battery over 10 years ago, Range ~120miles
Seriously, Ive seen enough press releases saying weve found a replacement for the ICE engine over my life, I have lost track. Im pretty sure weve solved the problems of the ICE engine dozens of times or more in the last 30 or more years alone. Yet look outside and all you see are ICE’s. Gee wonder why that is…
Poopypants on Sat, 23rd Apr 2011 7:52 pm
Agree with above.
New technology here, new fuel source there. Oh really, I’m gonna drive my 2.5ton SUV on algae oil? For GD real?
The SUV will be the downfall of the US.
We use ~20mbd in US, we produce between 6-9mbd, if we as a country had mandated the use of small, fuel efficient cars, and I mean SMALL, we could save a ton of fuel. Gov’t wouldn’t allow that, Repubs would call it Communist, Dems have no balls, so we continue down the road (pun intended) to ruin.
BUT WE ARE THE US, AND DAMMIT I WILL DRIVE MY SUV, AND YOU WILL TAKE IT OVER MY DEAD BODY!!!
Look at all the SUVs on the road next time you drive, it is utterly insane. But we need to feel ‘safe’, for the kids, well I’ll tell you, when you’re kids are fighting the next Oil war, or eating grubs and ‘coons to survive, they aren’t gonna feel all that safe. But ignorance is bliss, and this country is all about ignorance.
Endless growth on a finite planet is IMPOSSIBLE. Not a complicated concept.