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Old 02-14-2012, 09:01 PM   #151 (permalink)
IamIan
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Apologies to anyone / everyone for this posts length.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
So, perhaps we will have to agree to disagree.
I guess so.

The rest of this post addresses the earlier part of yours ... feel free to just skip it if you like.

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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
I think 500% is reasonable as a measure of required electrolysis efficiency to just reach break even in real cars, even highly efficient real cars.
Average for average cars maybe ... but highly efficient ones , or the best case ... no ... I've already posted that ... you just ignore it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
You think a lower number is appropriate, because you appear to think that many of these customers might be installing HHO units on fuel cell vehicles or vehicles powered by cogeneration turbines.
You have misunderstood... I've never claimed that.

I explored the limits of what science allows and what the best technology could potentially do as a best case under ideal conditions ... to set a real best case ... to show that even at those limits under ideal conditions it is still not good enough.

To me ... you seem to want to rule out any current production vehicles using more efficient devices ... and you want to use averages to claim upper end limits ... I showed you real production vehicle getting from gasoline to electricity in a window of a minimum of about ~24% and a Max of ~36% ... and you want to ignore it and pretend that 20% is still an upper limit or best case ... that does not agree with the data ... even for real production vehicles ... The Gen-1 Insight in my example is now 12 years old... the tech in it is even older than that.

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That is the gist ... the rest is similar to what is posted above... I'm just addressing individual points in more detail.
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
To me, it seems as if you have switched positions.
I haven't changed positions at all ... the only change I've made was that in my initial post about you're 500% being a bit too high ... was that , as I already wrote ... I had not originally added in the possible use of the heat from a Co-Generation Facility... which is not a change as much as an addition... and I wrote that as well previously.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
Our numbers (for required efficiency of the electrolysis unit to break even on an energy balance) are much different
of course they are... because of the different direction ... as I've already written ... I went the path of what is the limit of what science allows and what is the limit of current technology ... you went a different path ... we should end up with different numbers.

60% conversion from fuel to electricity is a current technology that is in use today ... as such it applies to my path of looking at the best case of what is possible ... in contrast you insist on 20% ... because you have a different path you took ... you ignore the best case ... and instead insist on 20% ... which is not the best case ... it is not the limit of current technology and it is not the limit of what science allows ... thus the difference between our paths... even though both of our results still show it is not viable , and won't work.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
, and you have reiterated that you think that 500% (as an electrolysis break even point) is too high.
To high as long as you use the terms like 'best case' and/or are talking about what is or is not possible or what the upper limit is ... average operating % is not best case ... production vehicles are not the best case ... nor are either of these the limits of what is possible.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
But you wrote:
Quote:
Originally Posted by IamIan
We are thinking of similar things... just a hair different details... mainly along the limits of what current science would allow ... and the best current tech available... vs I think you were thinking of more average real world devices.
500% vs the 86% you mentioned indicates a far bigger difference than "just a hair different details".
Two Things:
  • I don't recall ever claiming 86% ... the lowest I ever got for the electrolysis to break even was:
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by IamIan
    This UBER ideal case would still need an over ~92% Efficient electrolysis ... at least it is under 100% ... but even with every ideal case I can think of , it still isn't enough ... I don't know of any electrolyzer over 92% efficient.
    Maybe if you included the ~3.8% from the study it would come down to ~88.2%... so I don't know where you got 86% from ???
  • Perhaps you are thinking of my use of ~83%:
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by IamIan
    Given the 1.21 heat pump effect ... that is where I got the maximum even under ideal conditions of the Chemical to Electrical back to Chemical cycle would have to be ~83% Efficient ... which won't happen with all those steps.
    But I am not claiming it could reach ~83% ... I'm claiming ... under these ideal conditions the combined steps of Chemical to Electrical Back to Chemical would have to be a net of ~83% to break even ... if the maximum ideal case Heat Pump effect could be reached ... and I wrote there too that even in that ideal case for the heat pump that ~83% was still not going to happen for all those steps.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
I am referring to HHO as it has been promoted, and as it continues to be promoted, as a means to very large fuel mileage increases, in existing cars.
Exactly my point.
We took different paths ... I looked at it from the limits of current science and current technology ... in a true best case scenario ... you did not ... in your path 20% is the 'best case' for gasoline to electricity ... even though it is not actually the best case ... even for production vehicles.

We both came to the same results of those large increases not being possible ... even though we used different paths to get there.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
I have used figures that represent better-than-average efficiencies for fuel-to-alternator electrical output.
Slightly better than average ... then refereed to them as some kind of upper limit ... which they are not.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry
The car's engine produces an electrical output at no more than 20% efficiency (even if the car is the best of the best, a Prius with a high efficiency alternator.)
This position you insist on is incorrect ... they can produce more than 20% ... 20% is not the best case... even from production vehicles ... as I've shown and you ignored.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
[But they correctly make the point that truck engines do not routinely operate a 40% efficiency, so that real efficiency is much lower.]
ie average efficiency ... not the limit of what they can do ... but the average of what they can do ... and they are not the most efficient production vehicles at converting fuel to electricity.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
The figure I used for alternator efficiency is not average, it is significantly better than better than average. Per Delco, 50% is average and 60% would be an improvement.
Both of which are significantly lower than the large window of 90% and above from other devices converting between mechanical and eelectrical energy ... even in other production vehicles ... as I already showed previously with the IMA ... and you ignored it.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
In average cars, engines do not routinely
Average being irrelevant to the limits of what is possible ... or the best case ... or defining a 'no more than' upper limit.

Routinely being irrelevant to the best case of that engine ... or the 'no more than' limit of that engine.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
My 20% figure would seem to be very high given Delco's figure of 21% for a diesel truck.
And if you listed it as an average for the diesel trucks in that group of vehicle reference it would be fine.

But instead you listed it in reference to other vehicles ... and as a type of upper limit ... neither or which it is.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Ken Fry View Post
You can verify that cars do not operate routinely at 25% efficiency by using the this site's calculator.
What the average car or even a specific car averages or routinely gets is not and never will be a upper limit or best case ... or the upper limit that no other can go above.

Any ICE that has a BSFC of less than ~307 g/kwh is operating at over 25% efficiency at that point ... anything less than ~256 g/kwh is over 30% ... etc ... If you look at a high efficiency ICE's BSFC chart you will see parts well above 25% ... The lowest point in the operating window of the Gen-1 Insight's ICE BSFC chart I already posted is 280g/kwh ... which from 13kwh/kg Gasoline is a minimum of over 27% efficiency ... and the 200g/kwh peak is over 38% efficient ... And there are more efficient ICE's out there... some even in production vehicles.

20% is fine for an average ... it is not an upper end limit ... and it is not a best case ... and it is not the limits of current technology ... and it is not the limits of what science allows.

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