05-17-2022, 02:23 PM
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#31 (permalink)
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May I suggest you review what has already been posted and ask specific questions. My whole intent is to show ways to improve fuel economy by increasing engine efficiency -- stuff that isn't readily obvious. If you ask specific questions, I can zero in on specific answers (based on my personal experience & research, of course).
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05-17-2022, 02:58 PM
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#32 (permalink)
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Educate Me please
Let's start with the first question.
Engines are 20% efficient. Why aren't OEMs able to improve this and what makes you think we can?
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05-17-2022, 03:10 PM
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#33 (permalink)
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ecomodder.com/forum/showthread.php/x-prize-sonata-40234.html#post668275
No need to spread the questions over multiple threads.
First question: OEMs have improved efficiency, they are constrained by Return On Investment. Individuals are not.
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05-17-2022, 03:15 PM
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#34 (permalink)
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Thanks for that. So with room for 80% improvement which would bring us to an impossible 100% efficiency, what are we not focused on engine efficiency? Even if we improve combustion to 40% efficiency, we can double MPG. Why aren't we doing this?
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05-17-2022, 04:21 PM
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#35 (permalink)
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Quote:
Originally Posted by RealityRacer
Thanks for that. So with room for 80% improvement which would bring us to an impossible 100% efficiency, what are we not focused on engine efficiency? Even if we improve combustion to 40% efficiency, we can double MPG. Why aren't we doing this?
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Read the comment above, it answers your question.
Engine efficiency has continually been improved for over a century. The low hanging fruit (the easy stuff) has already been done, meaning every subsequent improvement is much more difficult. As an aside, combustion efficiency is somewhere around 40% now.
Diminishing returns applies to absolutely everything in the universe. Training to reduce a mile run from 20 minutes down to 10 minutes is relatively easy. Cutting it in half again to 5 minutes is extremely difficult and saves even less overall time in the process. It's 10x harder and yields half as much improvement.
"There are no solutions, only trade-offs" -Sowell
Last edited by redpoint5; 05-17-2022 at 04:34 PM..
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05-17-2022, 04:32 PM
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#36 (permalink)
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I scanned the first page of duckduckgo.com/?q=thermal+eficiency+piston+engine+vs+turbine&ia=w eb.
It appears diesel ship engines approach 50%, but piston engines scale down more favorably [compared to a turbine]. So ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
I'm more interested in duckduckgo.com/?q=solar+cell+100%25+efficient&ia=web
Quote:
https://intivation.nl › solar-cell-with-100-efficiency
Solar cell with 100% efficiency - Intivation, developing ...
Solar cell with 100% efficiency Engadget reports today that scientists have discovered a way to produce solar cells that can capture 100% of the energy contained in the sunlight that reached them: Researchers over at the National Renewable Energy Lab have reportedly made the first solar cell with an external quantum efficiency over 100 percent.
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Nanoscale quantum dot metamaterials make it happen.
edit:
In my youth I ran a mile in 5:15 in combat boots. And that with a deviated septum.
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05-17-2022, 04:46 PM
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#37 (permalink)
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Curiously, I am VERY interested in EVs, electric conversions, solar, power supplies, battery/super cap efficiencies, and so forth. In fact I do much professional research and development into these fields. However, I spent ~40 years learning about ICEs, and it's obvious they're going to be around for another couple of decades, so why waste the knowledge & experience?
I got to board a coal ship in China and see the engine. It was a 6 cylinder, and about 2 stories tall! I was told it redlined at around 450 RPM. That gives a lot more time to harness the thermal-to-pressure-to-kinecic energy conversions than we see in automobiles. Oh, and the primary fuel is bunker oil (called #6 oil in the US). Even in summer temperatures it is still a solid it's that heavy.
BTW, my best mile was 4:38 the summer between 10th and 11th grade. Now (at 55 years of age) I'd be lucky to pull off that 20 minute mile you mentioned.
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05-17-2022, 06:55 PM
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#38 (permalink)
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The good news here is that I can do a mile.... eventually.
By the 1980s I was convinced that the key to energy efficiency is to push the technology down to the nano-scale.
Quote:
There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom
"There's Plenty of Room at the Bottom: An Invitation to Enter a New Field of Physics" was a lecture given by physicist Richard Feynman at the annual American Physical Society meeting at Caltech on December 29, 1959.Wikipedia
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Put the heating and cooling in the window glass and stop paying bills.
https://phys.org/nanotech-news/ is where to keep one ear to the ground.
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05-17-2022, 07:01 PM
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#39 (permalink)
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I'm still waiting for nanotech and micromachines to change everything.
Michael Crichton's last book was called "Micro". It started fantastic, but I feel that I can locate where in the book he died (did not complete the rest).
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05-17-2022, 07:13 PM
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#40 (permalink)
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I suppose now might be a good time to introduce my take on Ignition systems. I played with MSD and numerous brands of spark plugs. I found a neat trick on the internet (years ago) where you cup the center electrode and drill a small hole in the outer electrode. I call them "Magic Spark Plugs". The drilling turns the spark plug into a blow torch that directs a flame out into the combustion chamber not all that differently than the CVCC pre-chamber. Of course there are way more lessons learned, especially with PDI!
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