Steam engine (from exhaust heat)
 

Has anyone built a small steam engine that could be run from the heat of a car's exhaust manifold? The steam engine/turbine would be used to power a generator/alternator.

arent steam engines typically... massive

and the energy requirements to keep even a small amount of water would be quite high. It also wouldnt work right away. you would have to boil off the water first, and this wouldn't work in cold weather.

I'm kinda ranting but i think its probably more problems than its worth.

Mercedes and a few others have been working on ways to recapture the heat as reusable energy. Stirling engines were an early favorite but they have their own issues.

what kind of issues with the Sterling engines?

I've been researching them recently and they seem like a great way to reclaim a bit of heat energy.

YouTube - Free Energy - Solar Powered Sterling Engine

I would love to make a big version of this one and stick it on my roof. Plenty of sunshine round here :)

Stirling engines have been making some headway lately, mostly being used in solar energy and for marine propulsion/secondary electricty. The main problems are the size to power ratio, potential temperature difference, pistion seals, and engine controls, specifically engine pressure control. The working solar commercial models that I have seen have used molten sodium-- but more practically for automotive use the working fluid would be helium. Plain air could also be used, like the original stirling, but there have been problems with the lubricants oxygenizing and causing explosions. Nasa acutally did some automotive testing with stirling engine for main propulsion in the late 70's and early 80's in a chevette.

I think this is something that is definitely worth looking in to. Especially if you could pull enough power out of it to replace the alternator.

If you use steam would you have to have the boiler inspected?

I doubt it can replace the alternator but I can see it replacing an A/C or even for some kind of regenerative charging system for hybrids. Love that prototype in the video -- but I know when people hear "hydrogen" they automatically think of Hindenburg-like images of immolation and fiery coffins of doom. :eek:

...guess they didn't know about fuel cells or metal hydride release systems.

That demonstrator is cool even to just play with make an rc boat out of it.

So along with these from azrael:
driving style
aerodynamics
tires
weight reduction
engine maintenance

I think we should add steam to the list for a small inexpensive method to reclaim some of our energy. Even in cold whether it should work -- provided you use a shroud to keep some of the air out of the engine compartment. Add a solar reflector to the game -- and POW -- we are getting H-O-T.

We should keep thinking small, inexpensive mods -- because once things get to elaborate they don't make sense from a financial perspective.

Looks like BMW is building a gas / steam hybrid.

BMW Developing a Steam/Gas Hybrid Engine : TreeHugger

iHero -

I really like this part :

Retrofit-Mania!!!!

CarloSW2

+15% efficiency with steam boosters? Intriguing...

Looks like another company working the steam option -- there is obviously something to this idea.

Clean Power Technologies still working on new steam-assisted cars - AutoblogGreen

Plus 15% efficiency is pure ad-man's hype. Plus 1% would be more like it.

There are a lot of car companies on the ropes and MPG is a hot selling point. If they could really deliver a 15% improvement with Rankine cycle compounding, why don't they? Could it possibly be they know they cannot deliver?

When BMW started working on it in 2005 they predicted it would be 10 years before a production model was ready. There's a ways to go yet.

With the amount of heat pooring out of any ICE vehicle after 15 minutes -- a simple design of copper tubing, small turbine and and alternator -- could save a fair amount of gas.

If you have a short commute -- steam will never work except for recharging.
I think the solar collector idea has merit for recharging during work ours too --much more so than solar panels.

I'd build one -- but my two prototypes severly limit any project time.

Right or Wrong ? Does more IR than UV pass through the atmosphere?

Bill Lear (daddy of the Lear Jet) tried this back in the 70s. It wasn't worth the effort.

Actually plus 30% was a reality on large ship size motors and was employed sucessfully but caused contamination and subsiquent daily maintenance, but a ship also has all the room in the world for such engines, a small version would need to use dangerous low boiling point liquids to be effective, especially given that most of the motors heat goes into the radiator fluid at relatively low temps which is hard to recover usefully.

Given that 50-75% of your motors full energy is lost in the form of heat this is no small energy source, sadly heat is difficult to make locomotion out of.

There is a guy in Australia that has been converting full size cars and trucks to steam since the 70's. A well designed capillary steam engine weighs no more than a standard diesel. But then you have to take care on what type of water you use and again the irritating cleaning.

Well worth more reasearch, main issue developing a fully contained unit like AC to handle the dangerous low boiling point liquids available or a safe low boiling point liquid needs to be developed.

And on a side note, I have long wondered why engine heat wasn't used to make passive AC. It wouldn't require any extra power from the motor and would be Always on for better or worse.

Bill Lear tried an organic soup he called "Learium" to replace water as his working fluid. Lear found out why water was the better fluid.

You could use an adsorption refrigeration system to cool your car but it would be huge. Adsorption refrigeration is about a third the efficiency of thr Rankine cycle used today.

There is nothing new under the sun. That's completely true in energy technology. Somebody has already tried it. What works is what is in use. What doesn't work is a museum curiosity.

Material and theoretical advances have triggered a few new ideas. Algal biofuels. Aneutronic fusion. Vanadium redox batteries. Not much else.

Since when has mpg been a big selling point? June, maybe? On experience to date, it takes a LOT longer than 3 months for auto executives to pull their heads out of their butts. Then consider how many years they've spent going in front of Congressional committees and saying that they couldn't POSSIBLY meet those CAFE standards. So now they're supposed to turn around and say "Gee, it looks like we could have done it all along"?

When I think about the actions of the auto manufacturers since the '70s oil embargo, and even before, I can only conclude that they simply don't WANT to make cars that get good mpg.

They want to make cars and trucks that will SELL. They give the public what they want. How can you sell somebody an item they don't care about? You can't. In a free market economy you can't change the buying habits of millions, unless you are the federal government and want to tax that behavior. The problem you have to watch out for is who really takes the hit for higher consumption taxes? The poor and middle class, who can least afford it.

Until the day comes when automakers can design and produce cars in a very short cycle we will have this; chasing the likes and dislikes of buyers based on what they told us YESTERDAY(i.e. 2 or more years ago). In the early '80s we got downsized cars with decent MPG because of the fuel shortages of the '70s. Then, for the next 20 years with low gas prices and no shortages, the race for more HP and bigger vehicles was on. Now the pendulum swings back, but who knows for how long? For the next few years we'll see a continuous increase in fuel efficient models. Enjoy it while it lasts

[QUOTE=SuperTrooper;59546]They want to make cars and trucks that will SELL."

Sure, and that explains why Detroit has been losing market share to the Japanese for decades? (And lately the Koreans, too.) The small, fuel-efficient cars that Honda, Toyota, &c made SOLD. Detroit didn't want to make or sell them, so it spent a lot of effort on spreading the "Americans want big cars" meme, and got it believed by a lot of people, even though sales figures (or a look at passing traffic) would easily disprove it.

Sure you can. All you need is a bunch of money to spend on marketing. Create some catchy TV ads that associate the product to status, sex appeal, or whatever, and wait for the money to come rolling in. Face it, most people are gullible, and will go along with whatever they perceive is popular.

Then why do companies spend multiple billions every year on advertising to do just that?

In a market with cheap, plentiful gas you can shout "FUEL ECONOMY" at people until you are blue in the face, or broke, and they won't care. Looking at the car market research from a year ago finds fuel economy fifth or lower for buyer importance. Now it's first, so the advertizing changes to reflect it. 3 years from now the focus might be elsewhere. We'll have all these great cars getting good mileage so the selling points willl switch to cabin technology or size or power. The direction of advertizing doesn't appear out of thin air, it's based on millions of $$$ being spent on market research asking the people what they WANT and then trying to make what you have for sale fit that desire.

Then why have the Japanese (& others) consistently gained market share by selling cars that are smaller and get better fuel economy than what Detroit has chosen to produce? Why did small cars like the Mini & the Miata - not to mention the Prius - become sales hits? Why do people keep running the smaller late '80s - early '90s Hondas & Toyota pickups, and put money into customizing them?

I'll grant you that it may not be fuel economy that sells these cars. The higher mpg is simply a consequence of their small size. It's the same argument, though. Detroit has so successfully spread its "Americans don't want small cars" meme that people will believe it even when faced with the undeniable fact that a lot of Americans do.

In fact, it's more often the other way around. Advertising more often attempts to change people's desires so that they want whatever is being marketed. I'm sure you can think of many examples of completely useless products that were successfully marketed: remember the Pet Rock? Or consider the fashion industry, and how jeans with a designer name on the butt, or running shoes with a swoosh, can be sold for much more than the identical product that doesn't have them.

Who ever asked people if they wanted SUVs? There had always been a small niche market for SUV-like vehicles such as the Jeep Cherokee, Land Rover, and Toyota's Land Cruiser. Then Detroit found a legal loophole that'd let them sell passenger vehicles that only had to meet the lower truck standards, so they could go on building the big vehicles they wanted to sell. Then they spent the money on advertising to sell the idea of the SUV.