All the figure swapping and throwing in that article was confusing, misleading, and full of holes
Let's get to the heart of that article, the one section with *meaningful* data related to friction reduction and energy.
Quote:
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Of the energy output of fuel in a car engine, 33% is spent in exhaust, 29% in cooling and 38% in mechanical energy, of which friction losses account for 33% and air resistance for 5%.
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This sentence induces headaches.
Here it is presented in a more meaningful form:
The breakdown of energy in fuel:
33% Goes out the exhaust (heat and gas pressure) - Wasted
29% Goes gets dissipated in the cooling system (heat) - Wasted
38% Actually turns something (motion) - Useful
Is it saying 33% of the motion is lost due to friction, or 33% of the total losses (which make up 62% of your fuel energy) are due to friction?
At this point I would like to point out that almost all of the 'friction' inside an engine or any given gear set on a car is almost entirely fluid movement and ends up as heat. Any contact of solids quickly results in excessive noise or worn components.
This is completely different from systems where dry lubricant is used and there *is* significant hard surface contact and collection of spheres on a surface would be useful.
Which means your product has to reduce the energy lost to oil shear without losing the protection of that same layer of oil.
How is your product even applied to vehicles? Is it as an oil additive or does it require disassembly and reassembly of a given component?
Note that most small cars today (most of the guys here interested in fuel economy) have sealed for life wheel bearings and electric power steering. You only have the engine and gearbox oil that you can treat.