AutoblogGreen

Uh huh, it would be nice if this Hummer was based at all on just a tiny bit of reality. What happens when we run out of the few hundred cheap salvage turbines laying around? What do you do with the bumper melting hot exhaust? Turbines don't load follow well, just ask the guys that own those turbine powered motorcycles. There is a couple second lag between throttle input and engine power output. It just sounds like a control nightmare.

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Maybe the reality is applying it to the trucking or train industry? They use diesels now - I know that lots of small power plants are just jet engines... maybe a turbine driven series hybrid is just the thing for those larger applications.

Instead of calling out the limitations let's figure out where the greatest capabilities are.

- Dave

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If they powered it with coal-diesel instead of bio-diesel it would be greener...

And coal-diesel puts up 2x the emissions as normal diesel.

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Turbines, in theory, have advantages for a series hybrid. They can be more efficient than piston engines, and they are easier to adapt to a wide range of fuels. They take a while to start up and don't like to be throttled, but in a series hybrid your batteries or capacitors will act as an energy buffer, so that shouldn't be much of a problem.

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Also the freight train industry already does series diesel hybrid engines.
And they have since around the 1930s.

Same goes for the drilling engines used for mining.

Electric engines are the only thing which can reach the consistant and powerful level of torque needed.
http://greyfalcon.net/torque.png

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Ed Begley, Jr. is the patron saint of green cars.

And this guy seems like a charlatan. That Hummer is not going to get 60mpg, he'll be lucky if it runs at all.

GreyFlcn:
Trains are (generally) not hybrids. They don't store any significant amount of electrical energy, they just use Diesel motors and generators to create the power to run electric traction motors. Also, only some of the mining equipment uses train-style (electric) power transmission, Caterpillar still makes direct-drive Diesel mining equipment even at the largest sizes.

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Does it need to have regenerative braking to be considered a hybrid?

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A hybrid uses two or more power sources to directly power the wheels. The Prius with it’s small electric helper motor used to recapture breaking energy is an example of a hybrid. Batteries, hydraulics and pneumatics have all been used for this purpose. Cylinder deactivation and engine stop-start technologies are not technically hybrids as the motive power always comes from the ICE.

Trains are series-diesel/electrics because they don’t use batteries to power the wheels. The Tesla is a 250 mile range Battery Electric Vehicle (BEV-250) and the Volt is a BEV-40 with an auxiliary power unit in an attempt to cover 82% of all commutes with grid power with a smaller and less expensive and lighter battery while still offering the security of a easily and quickly refillable auxiliary power source. The APU is a security blanket.

Hybrids don't have to have regenerative breaking to be considered hybrids, but it only makes sense to recapture momentum energy that would otherwise be lost as heat.

Using a turbine as an APU is not a new idea. GM killed it because of economies of scale were not present. The pace of change is increasing rapidly and E-Flex will make the turbine APU more attractive. Will GM revisit the idea? Who knows.

http://www.autoworld.com/news/GMC/Series_Hybrid.htm.

http://ev1-club.power.net/newsltr/vol2_1.htm

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A hybrid uses two or more power sources to directly power the wheels.
Then you say Trains are series-diesel/electrics because they don’t use batteries to power the wheels.
@Tim "series-diesel/electrics" is a new term to me. AFAIK a series hybrid is the use of two energy forms to power motion. I don't think there is any requirement for them both to be energy sources. Even without batteries the diesel electric is still regarded as a hybrid powertrain. And for the record that means the series hybrid can come in more than one flavor. By the way an electric trolley bus has batteries so it can perform U-turns where overhead wiring doesn't permit, does the availability of two power sources now make it a hybrid ? I don't think so.

The Prius system could be made functional without the use of its expensive NiMH battery if there was the will. The current system only allows 10kw of regen. braking. Without this battery a superior replacement Regen braking system could utilise a braking resistor with a 50Kw 10 second rating instead. Finally MG1 is not a small helper motor in fact it provides 42Hp of energy to the main traction motor MG2. That's quite some help ! For comparison the Camry hybrid uses a 100Hp "helper" to power MG2. That's where some of the 105kw needed by MG2 is coming from. Impressive Eh!

This turbine is going to need some really good control algorithms it'll be interesting to see how this turns out.
T2

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Kelley Blue Launches Enhanced New-Car Images, 360-Degree Views. 08/15/2007. Kelley Blue Book Co. Inc. announced the addition of enhanced new-vehicle photos
thank you
-------------------------------
http://blue-book-car.info

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Brett, This is a series hyrbid, so the lag in the turbine is irrelevant because the motors are providing the motivation.

The idea of turbines is not new at all, Chrysler tried it in the 60's for quite some time, but like someone previously stated, the economies of scale just weren't there. The Otto cycle engine was well entrenched and there was no real need for change, like todays oil market is necessitating. The nature of turbines do not make for good direct drivetrains in autos because of the lag, however, turbines are far more efficient than any engine in use in todays vehicles because they can achieve theoretical efficiencies greater than 50%, whereas any engine with cylinders can not. They also thrive at constant revs, suiting it perfectly for series applications. They can also be made very inexpensively (take a look at the RC market, there are many low volume producers of 20-40 HP turbines that can do it for under $1K.) And honestly they are very easy to repair as they are fairly simple machines.

And lastly the best benefit... They can burn just about anything.

Combining this with capacitors and motors is genious, and although he's not the first one to think of it, I hope he's the first one to pull it off and that it gains popularity as a great alternative for a range extender. Heck, maybe Chrysler should dig out it's old files and brush the dust off and come to market with it first.

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The first post listed here by Brett, is exactly why America is in this piss poor gasoline situation. Old Detroit has given us a box and said here, think about fuel consumption inside here. Well Brett, congratulations, you are doing just that. Johnathan Goodwin on the other hand, said no thanks, I have my own box! Let’s just hope he inspires the Brett's of the world to think on the positive side instead of the negative.

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It would be nice to see a standardized "range extender" form-factor so you could have your choice of battery-charging options, whether they be ethanol Otto cycle HCCI, Stirling engine, turbojet running biodiesel/kerosene, fuel-cell stack, or other. Have the standard underlying platform be electric, and have the non-electric stuff be changeable depending on your needs.

Sort of how like most GM cars between the '50s and '80s could take the small-block V8, that size and configuration was standardized.

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There's a bus manufacturer in Northern Ireland near where I live that has been toying with pure electric and diesel turbines for a while now. I don't think the turbine powered ones will take off though outside the densest population areas. They have very low harmful emissions, but for the same fuel consumption they have less acceleration and a lower top speed.

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The car mags don't seem to have the interesting fuel mileage mod articles they had after the fuel crisis in the early 70's, so I'm keen to read about what someone is doing to improve vehicle mileage and performance. I agree with comments in reply 6., though. Johnathan Goodwin seems like a charlatan. I expected more than the article delivered - basically false hope. I'm not keen on Detroit's efforts, either. For instance, their "flex-fuel" approach was lackluster, and seemed to be more marketing hype than any engineering feat. It was a bit bewildering to learn that some now-orphaned EPA research delivered what neither Detroit or Mr. Goodwin seem to have - an effective way to make use of alcohol fuels. "Economical, High-Efficiency Engine Technologies for Alcohol Fuels"
http://tinyurl.com/2jal8d
-brian

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This in impossible.

A hummer has a .51 drag coefficient and 32.9 square feet of frontal area. that means at 60 mph you would have 350 lbs of drag. to maintain 350 lbs of drag at 60 mph, you would need 34.1 horsepower at the wheels. that is much different that 34.1 horsepower at the crank. assuming the the engine is mechanically linked to one wheel, at it's operating effecieny peak, and no frictional losses such as tire deflection or wheel bearings, it would be possible with ONLY 77.5% effeciency, the same as, well, nothing runs much over 50% including heavy power plants with near unlimited footprints for better energy conversions.

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Turbine efficiency is somewhere around 60%

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To those who say this is impossible, THAT makes it a GOAL. Think outside the box.

But this is where government SHOULD be helping... Offer 10 million to someone who can double the fuel efficency of any car with a straight forward upgrade costing under $3000.

I read the original article. He mentions that using hydrogen to blend with the fuel reduces the fuel consumption by half, creates water, and cools things down in the process. Natural gas can do the
same thing...

I agree with being skeptical. But lets open our eyes and try something different.

Gee, I would a few thousand to add a Natural Gas hookup that double my gas mileage... Cut our dependency on foreign oil in HALF!

I read he already has this Hummer running about 30MPG, and it started at 9!!!! (Nine, no typo).

What other ways can we GET 1/2 way there TODAY.
For me, that has always been the magical problem.
It usually makes solving the problem easier.

The resource issue comes into play. Eventually, waste oil will cost $3/gallon :-)

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Owen, your turbine efficiency numbers are WAY off. The big utility single cycle gas turbines are about 33% efficient. They use exotic materials, a dozen or so compressor stages and fancy turbine blade cooling schemes. (Note: combined cycle turbines can do 50-60%, but are not applicable to this discussion). Small turbines (e.g. Capstone) max out around 25% efficiency. I'd be surprised if Goodwin's military surplus turbine beats 20%.

Goodwin's MPG numbers are basically bogus. He goes 100 miles on 2 gallons of biodiesel plus a bunch of hydrogen or natural gas. He only counts the biodiesel in his MPG number. Want higher MPG? Easy, just burn a higher percentage of natural gas! It's like those 150 mpg numbers you see for plug-in hybrids, which only count the gasoline and exclude the grid electricity. If you only drive short distances you never burn any gas and thus get infinite MPG.

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Of course the big automakers can do this if they want to. But that's just it, they don't want to. If wouldn't be profitable for them. Bio-diesel hasn't taken off like it should because the real owners of major corporations, (our politicians), haven't cornered the market yet on Bio-Diesel yet, like they have on Big Oil.

Right now, they're too busy, trying to set up major ethanol corporations, making deals with Brazil, and other ethanol rich countries. That's why there's only a few mom & pop ethanol stations.

Until the politicians set up there companies, they will make every effort to scutinize and turn down applications and permits to use these resources.

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