Quote:
Originally Posted by Ecky
The immediate issue I see with the practicality of this (and I know I'm late to the thread) is the volume of oxygen.
Peak, a 2.4L engine like as is in my car, pumps 2.4L of air through per revolution. Assuming we want to feed it pure oxygen at 20% of the volume of the air that would normally pass through it (0.48L per revolution), the oxygen generator would need to be able to produce over 200,000L per oxygen per hour.
A quick google search suggests that the typical home oxygen concentrator can produce 3L per minute and uses around 120w. This suggests that, to feed my engine pure oxygen, there would be an electrical cost of 150,000w, or approximately 200HP - the approximate full mechanical output of my engine when using that oxygen, without conversion losses accounted for.
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Is that a 2 stroke? Only 2 stroke engines pull in approximately their displacement per revolution if naturally aspirated. A 4 stroke only pulls in half. So only 0.24L would be needed per revolution. At 1,000 RPM you'd need 240L per minute. At 5,000RPM you'd need 1,200LPM.
Anyhow, you are still right to a point. A 1,200LPM VSA type industrial oxygen concentrator would still need about 40kW of power to put that much O2 out. Not to mention the huge size and cost. (PSA types would not work. A 1,200LPM PSA O2 concentrator would need about 80kW.)