Detroit could have given America the Air Car

[newmac]

Run time: 08:27 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fm8RCww3cUY   Posted on YouTube: February 19, 2008 By YouTube Member: Views on YouTube: 0   Posted on DU: December 06, 2008 By DU Member: newmac Views on DU: 1391

 
If some Italian inventor can do it why can't we? Exhaust = breathable air. Whole new industries and jobs could be created with this kind of imagination. The era of oil has ended. Good riddance to the internal combustion engine.

[BobRossi]

1. What powers the compressors?

High pressure air doesn't just appear from no where. For every 1 horse power delivered by compressed air, 1 horse power is required to compress it.

[sellitman]

2. This company is making a compressor that .....runs on air.

It would regenerate compressed air as the car drove.

A complete system.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztFDqcu8oJ4

[BobRossi]

3. Perpetual motion?

A compressor that drives a generator that drives a compressor that compresses air that drives a compressor that drives a genrerator.....
Sorry, there is no such thing, never will be. It takes some form of energy conversion, you cannot get energy from nothing.

[sellitman]

10. There is a bit of gas used.

very little. Look at the vid.

[jberryhill]

19. And if...

...it takes less gas to run an engine to compress the air that is then used to power the car, then I have a bridge in Brooklyn you might be interested in purchasing.

The amount of energy that you can get from a given amount of gas is a fixed quantity. You can't get "more" energy out of compressed air than the amount of energy you put into compressing it. The compressed air here is not a "source" of energy, it is merely a mechanism for storing the energy that was consumed in compressing it in the first place.

[newmac]

13. agreed

No perpetual motion; there would have to be some loss of energy; but it could recoup much

[jberryhill]

4. OMG

There are people that fall for that?

[newmac]

12. Prolly electricity

and hopefully the electricity was produced by a dam....

[Festivito]

5. Two hours of driving, not talking about speed for two hours.

Nice for some applications, like tunnels, caves, enclosed spaces, and short travel provided you have a really good compressor access.

[immoderate]

6. Not this bullshit again!

You have to be more than ignorant about physics to believe this. Where is there an independent test drive that takes any of these vehicles more than four miles? Answer: nowhere. You'd think after ten years, there would be some test drive.

I can't do the math, but I don't think that compressed air can hold enough energy to move any significant weight a distance for practical driving.

The go cart type vehicles might have some practicality in a warehouse, but they would have to be recharged frequently.

Note: The laws of thermodynamics, that have not varied for centuries, would preclude this working without some outside energy source. You cannot run an engine off a compressor, which would then recharge the compressor, anymore than you could lift yourself by your shoelaces.

--IMM

[harun]

7. No one is saying that.

You should be beat with that strawman you just put up.

[immoderate]

8. Oh yes, see post #2 and follow the video link.

The video actually uses the term "perpetual motion."

So where is the independent test of this vehicle? I guess I missed it. What's the strawman? That the car has to go more than four miles?

--IMM

[Hissyspit]

9. The video says "small amount of petrol." They are not trying to create perpetual motion.

"about $2 worth of electricity to recompress."

[immoderate]

11. See the video linked in post #2, it's about the compressor that runs on air.

That video mentions perpetual motion.

Meanwhile, the (phantom) air car has a gasoline engine that compresses air to run the air engine that is more efficient than the gasoline engine by itself. Right. :eyes:

Or is it the gasoline engine that runs a generator that creates electricity that runs the compressor that runs the air engine?

--IMM

[Creationismsucks]

14. Perpetual Motion Is Certainly Bullshit

...but on reviewing these videos it isn't clear to me that the manufacturer is the one making the inane "perpetual motion" claim. That might just be something written by the person who wrote the copy for this little clip.

As to the potential utility of the air car, well yeah it takes energy to compress air, but if you can plug it in at home, like the electric car, and say your local electricity company runs on hydroelectric power, it would leave you with way less emissions than using a regular gasoline engine, and nothing would have to come out of the ground.

I understand the need to be on the lookout for scams, but there was a time before the engines we use today; the engines we use now are by no means the only possible workable solution. I don't think there's any necessary limit to human ingenuity. Something resembling this could well turn out to be true and immeasurably useful.

You (or someone else on this thread) asked if there are any test drives exceeding 4 miles. That's a great point. I will poke around and look for independent verification of these claims.

[immoderate]

15. I agree with you.

The scenario you describe is ideal: "free" energy from hydro, or wind, etc, and no emissions.

My concern is that I haven't seen anything to indicate that air can be compressed enough in this type of package to store enough energy to do a useful amount of work. I would think at least 40 miles. At some point the pressure is great enough to liquefy the air, and it is no longer compressible. It seems like it would take some very heavy duty equipment, to compress the air that much, and to store it at common temperatures. My gut tells me that just compressed air is not nearly as effective as storing energy chemically, as internal combustion or fuel cell or battery systems could. It's more like winding up a spring or a rubber band.

I agree that the air car manufacturer did not make the perpetual motion claim, but I reacted to that because someone posted it.

Good luck finding reviews. I'd love to see them.

--IMM

[immoderate]

16. Some more info....

Even though this air car idea has been around for nearly 20 years, now get this, NO ONE HAS EVER DRIVEN ONE! There are no independent reviews of test drives. NONE. There are lots of "press releases," going back at least five years, that it is "ready for production" in various countries: India, Australia, Belgium, etc. yet, NO ONE IS PRODUCING THEM!

The only math that I have found on the web so far, (which BTW sounds plausible to me,) is that at a pressure of 4000 psi, it would take 1400 gallons of compressed air to store the same amount of energy as is contained in one gallon of gas. This means that to have a range of 40 miles, a car would need a 1400 gallon air tank.

It's nice to dream though.

--IMM

[jberryhill]

17. Correct

Unfortunately virtually nobody is going to understand that you can work that out using very basic calculations, because even the simplest first-order type of "how much potential energy is stored in how much compressed gas" is well beyond what most people can handle.

It's all magic to most people.

[Creationismsucks]

20. Those are excellent points

The lack of independent review is a red flag, for sure (at any rate the apparent lack, as I haven't turned up anything yet).

http://zeropollutionmotors.us/

has a slick website, but suspiciously, while it doesn't offer a way to purchase the product, it does offer an 'investment' opportunity (as all the perpetual motion scammers do). That's really troubling. If they were serious about attracting investors (and not just dupes) the first thing the serious potential investor would want to see would be an independent laboratory review of the product.

This article:

http://www.popularmechanics.com/automotive/new_cars/4251491.html

claims that 2009 could see the air car in the US for just under 18 grand.

Now that's interesting. I'd love to know if they've been making similar "it's only a year away" claims for the past 20 years. If so, it would make the manufacturer look like the end-of-world-is-nigh cults who lose credibility with each passing year.

Sure would be great if they suddenly came through with a battery of kick-ass independent tests, and revolutionized everything though.

I'm skeptical of all sorts of cool things, but I live in the eternal hope of being proven wrong.

However, one key feature of true claims is that they can withstand ANY amount of scrutiny.

When the claimant (like the air-car guys) never seem to submit their claim to that scrutiny, it doesn't look promising!

[immoderate]

21. Thanks for pointing that out.

In my posts, I neglected the fact that the air car companies seem to be more interested in investors than in customers. This, as you say, is a red flag.

A couple of times, I have been dragged by friends to "free energy" seminars. Again, these people were looking for investors. My questions, which were mostly based on conservation of energy principles, were not well received.

In reading some of the comments to the air car and other "free fuel" links, the paranoia is rampant. Many of the posts are about the big oil or auto companies suppressing these neat new inventions. My feeling is that if these technologies are viable, those companies will jump in and reap the profits. That what capitalism is about.

Popular Mechanics, an entertaining magazine, is the tabloid of science journalism. I can't tell you how many times their cover stories have featured things like personal helicopters and flying cars for commuting. And this stuff goes back to the '60s! While some of their articles are indeed practical and useful, it's mixed in with things that are very speculative and sensational.

As for the "year away" type of articles, the NYTimes had one in the beginning of 2008. It said that Tata Motors of India would be marketing an air car by the end of the year. A search of the Tata Motors website returned, "No pages were found containing air." Indeed.

I found this DU post about the air car from 2003. It was "ready for production" then. :rofl:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=115x35

--IMM

[jberryhill]

18. A question for you...

How do you suppose that one can get more energy out of compressed air than the amount of energy you put into compressing it in the first place?

I'm genuinely curious to know how that works, in your opinion.