turbine engine for a geo metro
 

For all those people representing metro's. Found a Turbine engine mounted to a metro torque converter and auto transmission. 100 hp. and only weighs 68lbs. From what I've read turbine engines are 60% efficient, as apposed to ICE's 30%. It's a lot of money to double your FE but it would be awesome.

eBay Motors: TURBINE ENGINE JET ENGINE TIERNAY TT10-1 FREE SHIPPING (item 170268610227 end time Oct-09-08 13:28:02 PDT)

That's crazy....I like it!!! Now, where did I leave the extra 5 grand I had layin' around?

LoL!

Noisy little suckers!!! :D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sUlrIUHqVNg

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=60NqUGPkSqE

EOC with one of these would be hilarious!

And what do you do about the flame torching out the side of that thing in the second video? Your inner fender would be cherry-red and your tire would melt and pop! Like a said before...I like it!

More to the point
 

where would you get a low-power turbine and get it to generate electricity for a Volt (or a Prius that can run full-electrical):p? Obviously there are plenty of (force-induction) turbos in junkyards, but I wouldn't expect them to be something that could be modified for this type of thing (wiki claims it is done by hobbyists, but google let me down in finding them.:(

I think it would be a great engine to run as a series hybrid. Turbines are very efficient... within a very narrow rpm range. The low rpm variability has historically made the turbine a poor choice compared to the Otto.
But running it as a series hybrid with a good battery system would be very nice. Let the batteries discharge down to ~50%, start the turbine to recharge and run the electrics back to full and turn it off. Lather, rinse, repeat.
Additionally, you could run a turbine on just about any fuel, depending on your injection system.

I have to wonder about the ad, though. Wouldn't you think that for that asking price, the seller would have someone check the spelling & grammar? Some of the lines are classic, though, such as "MOTOR MOUNTS USE TO BE NEW". Really?

Pretty typical for eBay, unfortunately.

I Don't Believe It

Gas turbines only surpass ICE's after they pass the 100,000 HP level - what turbine people call Frame 8s. That little heat loss thing, y'know.

It might fit, and it would probably go like a scalded dog. But like the Hyabusa engine in a Smart it would get lousy MPG.

Did you ever stop and ask why - in a hypercompetitive auto market - nobody ever offered a turbine?

It must be the Big Oil conspiracy! :D :D ;)

noise pollution?

Shooting flames would be cool though:thumbup:

Hello -

Dodge tried, but I think it was too finicky and soaked up gas like a paper towel :

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Gy_fNjOy98

Photos of Chrysler turbine engines and cars
http://www.allpar.com/images/bennerm...engine-bay.jpg
Chrysler turbine engines and cars
CarloSW2

issue with turbine engines is the speed variation needed for automative applications.
They operate at a narrow rpm band most effectively
Series hybrid would be awsome.

I recall seeing something where i guy did this with a Hummer..
have to search for it again - but he has some CRAZY MPG as the setup charged the batteries in like an hour.

Steve

Hyper-competitive? But what were/are they competing on? Not fuel economy, that's for sure.

You could ask the same question about a lot of things. How come Detroit has never offered a real sports car? How come it doesn't build small pickups or vans? Why did GM drop the electric car? How come nobody ever offered hybrids before Honda & Toyota? There were working experimental models in the 70s: Godfather of the Hybrid

jamesqf -

Fantastic article. I never knew about any of this. I thought hybrids only happened on paper in the universities in the 1980's.

CarloSW2

Why did GM drop the electric car? Same reason everybody else did: batteries.

I worked on Bill Brobeck's Hybrid in 1982 in Berkeley, CA


so far as a 'thrill show' check out Ron Patrick's converted turbine engine
Jet Beetle

A jet powered Geo.......... Come on, a JET POWERED GEO!!! What could possibly be more cool than that?

http://japanese.engadget.com/images/...en1_PScopy.jpg

http://japanese.engadget.com/images/...jet-beetle.jpg


Jet Powered New Beetle

Not cooler, just completed, now make one in a Geo and that would be one hell of a sleeper!

That doesn't exactly hold up, since the people that had those EVs seemed to be quite happy with the batteries they had. Sure, there are a lot of people who couldn't have used the EVs with the sort of range they had, but isn't that a big part of Detroit's problem, thinking that every vehicle has to work for everyone, so they wind up building cars that only suit the almost-mythical average driver?

what about a jet engine/turbine in the bed of a pickup? Just last week the guys and work and I were discussing mounting a small jet engine in the bed of my truck for highway purposes... and of course for showing off. Rig it up so when the turbine powers up, the tailgate drops, and BAM! flames and power from the bed

Keep in mind that, while the efficiency of gas turbines climbs with practically each passing day, older gas turbines tend to be EXTREMELY inefficient. And I would be willing to bet that what we are looking at here is hardly state of the art.

Actually, there is a REALLY good reason why automakers aren't offering a turbine - cost. Not only are there hefty costs when it comes to developing the things. But turbines are also VERY expensive to build. Although they have FAR fewer moving parts than an ICE (and by the way, a turbine actually IS an internal combustion engine!), the parts themselves must be manufactured to VERY exacting tolerances, and out of highly expensive heat-resistant materials. Add to this the fact that a truly efficient turbine would likely be of the more expensive axial flow design (as opposed to cheaper and less efficient centrifugal designs), and you can see that it would be virtually impossible to build a cost effective turbine - at least any time soon. Anyway, the automakers currently have all bets on fuel cells (and NOT turbines) for future automotive propulsion. So I would not expect to see any turbines.

As for the 100000HP threshhold, this is not the barrier that you make it out to be. For instance, Capstone Turbines (a manufacturer of microturbines) currently has a 200HP gas turbine on the market for electrical power generation with an ELECTRICAL efficiency of around 33%, or probably about 36-38% efficiency at the power take off! Their 60HP version has an electrical efficiency of 28%, or about 32-33% at the shaft. True, neither is 50-60% efficient. But both are still well in excess of what is possible with a conventional gasoline engine. In fact, the 200HP unit is well within the range of diesel efficiency. Of course, compared to a diesel, it will burn MUCH cleaner, run MUCH smoother, and require MUCH less maintenance. It would also be able to run on a VERY wide variety of different fuel.

Another interesting microturbine is the Wilson microturbine. It is still somewhat in the research stage. But with its special heat exchanger, mostly axial-flow design, and ceramic turbine blades, this turbine promises an efficiency of 55% at the shaft, or 50% to electricity. Yes, it is not a production unit. But given the efficiencies of the Capstone units (which are available right now), as well as all the advantages that this turbine has over the Capstone turbines (more efficient heat exchanger, axial flow design, ceramic turbine), these figures seem completely believable. Oh, and this is a 400HP turbine. Imagine having THAT under the hood of a Civic! Although it might be on the big side as far as power, it would probably still be more efficient than a conventional ICE - especially if run in hybrid configuration with battery power around town. Now THAT'S what I call 'flower power' right there!

Besides the fact that their turbine was probably not NEARLY as efficient as the aforementioned microturbines, the efficiency of Chrysler's design certainly suffered due to the fact that they simply geared the turbine to the wheels of the car through a conventional transmission - the turbine HAD to run under conditions where efficiency would be low. Had they been able to use some sort of hybrid drive at the time (so that battery power could be used during low speed operation), the outcome might have been considerably different.

Tell you what, StorminMatt. Why don't you hit these guys websites and post to this forum the heat rates for these little turbines and prove me wrong.

I would be astonished if any of them get under 12,000 BTU/Kwh. A common diesel works in the 7,000 to 9,000 BTU/Kwh range.

Airplane designers like turbines for their reliability. A PT6 will has a MTBF of three pilots' careers. They are easy to maintain.

The PT6 is also a design that's about 45 years old. Comparing it to what might be done today seems rather like comparing the O-360 in my Cherokee to my Insight's engine.

Capstone does not provide this figure on their website. But according to Capstone, their 200KW turbine operating at 59F, 14.696psia, and 60% humidity has an exhaust gas temperature of 535F, and rejects heat at a rate of 1 350 000 BTU/hr. Under these conditions, the ELECTRICAL output is 190kW. If you divide 1 350 000 BTU/hr by 190kW, you get a heat rate of 7105 BTU/kWH - certainly not bad at all. Of course, this does not take into account ALL possible heat losses. But, unlike a piston engine, the VAST majority of heat produced by a turbine is lost through the exhaust.

Good point. Turbines in those days couldn't even achieve 20% efficiency, and were HORRIBLY dirty. High power output, light weight, low maintenance, and sleek, aerodynamic profile were the only things turbines had going for them at that time. But when Barcroft Labs at over 12000ft in California's White Mountains decided to ditch their aging diesel genset a couple of years ago, they chose a pair of Capstone turbines over another diesel genset. This certainy speaks volumes about modern gas turbines.

I "do" gas turbines for a living (past 25 years). Mostly with aeroderivatives used in power generation or propulsion. They are very inefficient, spending most of their energy keeping themselves running. They would also run on diesel fuel or natural gas if they were to be put in a car/truck - remember there is no spark keeping these running, just an ignitor or two for initial light-off.

It would just be too cool to have one in a production vehicle though. It would be more of a "proof of concept" than anything else. Emissions would be the problem with these however. I don't think you you could ever get them remotely clean enough these days to even consider putting one in a production vehicle.

Looks to me like there is a lot of cut and paste, "everything I learned about gas turbines I learned in the past few google searches" going on here. Interesting discussion none-the-less.

If indeed they are inefficient, then why are so many used in utility power generation? Sure, that's at a different size scale than an auto or light aircraft turbine, but if an IC engine were indeed more efficient than a turbine, then why are these applications not using large "diesel" engines running on natural gas, instead of gas turbines?

Hey - I to am in the power industry ( only 12 years though)..

The current base load power plants running simple cycle gas turbines are operating in the 40 - 50% thermal efficiency range ( depending on the age of the equipment and how advanced it is).

the "BEST" domestically produces power plant efficiency (operating in Combined Cycle) is going for 60% thermal efficiency. This is usign Steam as part of the hot gas path cooling loop to increase efficiency - advanced materials and coatings for the hot sections - even making 12 inch long blades out of a single granular crystal of material.

These are not IDEAL but are what the Gas Turbines are operating at.

I do not know the relative efficiency of the Aeroderiviative units. Probably a little worse but not a TON worse. IN the power world - the aerodrivative engines are awsome for Reliability as well as start time ( full load operation in 7 minutes) may not seem like much to Non-power people - but to get the HP rotor spinning up to +10,000 RPM and get 60 MW on the grid from a stopped rotor is fast.

Micro turbines were the RAGE a decade ago - then kinda went away.
From an efficiency point of view - when you get smaller in size - the Tip Losses start becomming a larger % of the equation ( Tip losses cover the ability to completely limit airflow Around the ends of the blades - where no work is extracted - compared to air going through the blades - and doing work).

Steve

You really expect me to believe that a small-diameter single-stage centrifugal gas turbine gives you 30% efficiency? 30% efficiency equates to a heat rate of 11, 376 BTU/kwh.

If a company is not willing to guarantee a heat rate they are selling snake oil.

Check out this:

http://www.ringpower-systems.com/360...%20Gensets.pdf

0.327 lb/HP-hr equates to 6,540 BTU/HP/hr or 38.9% efficiency To get better thermal efficiency you’d have to go to a LM6000 (54,000 shp) to beat this medium speed engine.

People do stuff for a reason, sport. Gas turbines have their niche but automobiles, trucks and locomotives aren’t a part of it. And professionals don’t believe company propaganda unless the company is ready to back up what they say.

This Capstone outfit looks shady to me.

I had forgotten how poorly conventional turbines scale... It makes me wonder how this guy is coming along? Like a turbine, it is a brayton cycle engine. It looks he's finally getting into developing the second (and most important) half of this engine: the expander.
Star Rotor Engines
The compressor side seems to be pretty efficient.

Because it is impractical to use a 56,000 horsepower diesel engine in the power industry. The power industry also uses the gas turbine's exhaust heat to provide heat to a HRSG (Heat recovery steam generator) to make LP and HP steam to power steam turbines. This would be called a combined cycle. THEN it all becomes more efficient if you look at it as an entire power plant, rather than just a single gas turbine. It's a little more complicated than that, but hopefully you get the idea.

Other reasons for aero gas turbines is that they can cycle loads quicker than frames or coal plants and can be used for frequency control of the grid, and be available as peakers.

Why is that, exactly? Ocean-going cargo ships use bigger engines: Maersk Line shipping containers worldwide

Nor do I see any real reason why a diesel exhaust couldn't drive a combined-cycle plant as well as turbine exhaust.

Sure, but sometimes the reason is "well, we've always done it this way", or "it's not worth the bother of changing".

For an aviation-related example, consider winglets. NASA developed these back in the '70s, and showed that they reduced drag, but it's only in the last couple of years that most of the 737s flying over my place have begun to sport them. How come Boeing didn't put them on 20 years ago, but the airlines are doing it now?

Turbine car:
Who Killed the Gas Turbine Car? : TreeHugger
Chrysler Turbine Car - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Gas turbine cogen versus Diesel Cogen? $$$$$ (installation and maintenance), weight, diesel has a bigger footprint, GT has a better power to weight ratio, emissions are better on the GT if steam or water injected, exhaust opacity. The largest diesels are in the 50mw range. Diesels are better for emergency backup power for telephone company buildings/hospitals or water treatment plants and not running as a cogen. Although small GTs like the Allisons 501K series can be used also in simple cycle (not cogen). I have seen 850kw Garretts used as cogens in colleges running 24/7. A lot of major industry businesses will run an aero or frame unit(s) for their own production or host site, and have an agreement with the utility to buy the extra electricity. Very seldom will anybody choose to build a diesel cogen. WAY too expensive. A LOT of marine vessels are going to Gas Turbines vice diesels due to their light weight and much better power to weight ratio, also ease of maintenance.
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Getting a little off topic here - sorry folks.

I worked on a couple JFS turbines used to start a 2mw Allison gas turbine. They only last about 70 starts, then they are toast. Usually the compressor fails. That little turbine reminded me of the JFS (Jet Fuel Starter). I am primarily an LM6000 person these days, hanging out at a 5x2 the past 10 years. later

I used to work on the Navy hovercraft (LCAC) in Virginia back when they were just coming out. They had some APUs (Sunstrand/Garrett) that would be an interesting install into a Metro...similar to this:

Garrett GTP30 Gas Turbine Engine

here is the link i saw before about the Bio-d Turbine Hybrid.
Biodiesel turbine, super capacitor, series hybrid... HUMMER! (60 MPG and 0-60 in 5 seconds) - AutoblogGreen

Maybe with the right fuel change ( Bio-d) the efficiency would offset itsself as the overall carbon offset is a little better.

The physics of turbine engines are not as versitle as an automobile engine needs to be - so that will never be the "Pusher" of the car. But it does make an interesting "charger" idea for the batteries - you could have a rapid charge capability -but you would need a Hummer to power the darn thing.

Overall - large scale is more efficient - so charging from home using the existing grid would be the best from an Overall CO point of view and allow the large scale Wind / Solar plants to address the overall CO impact.

Steve

Which I think has been my point all along. Once you have a plug-in system with an electric motor driving the wheels, you have a lot more options for what to use to convert fuel to electricity, because you don't need starting torque, can tolerate long warmups, etc. You can look at turbines, Stirling engines, even fuel cells. Just because "we've always done it this way" doesn't mean that there aren't better ways.

Did you ever bother to think there might be a reason for "well, we've always done it this way" or "it's not worth the bother of changing". Do you think hundreds of thousands of engineers and managers over the years are complete blockheads?

Gas turbine engines have a huge problem, regardless of nominal efficiency. Throttle them down and they still guzzle fuel at a rate very near that used at rated power. Jet engines fuel burn at idle is about 80% of that at rated output. One of the arguments for three engine airliners was that they could taxi on the center engine with the wing engines shut off until they got near the end of the taxiway. Considering the taxi times at some airports at some times this is not a small consideration.

A gas turbine to run a Metro would be in the 20-25 kwh range. It would have to be in a series hybrid layout, charging batteries that move the car. The turbine would run in short bursts charging up the battery and then shutting off.

The Metro was a volume car, sold at a low price. How much of an increase in MPG would be required to offset a huge increase in vehicle price? I fear that is what GM is running into with the Volt. A $50,000 commuter car will be as difficult to sell as a $40,000 pickup if not worse.

There is a saying in the auto industry: “Any knucklehead could build a Ferrari or Porsche if money were no object. It takes a genius to build a Model T or VW Beetle that makes money.” Like the VW prototype that gets 200+ MPG. Nice, but it costs $100,000. Is that worth the price of changing?

Managers, yes. I've dealt with enough of them :-) And quite often the reason for "we've always done it this way" is simple inertia, or the not-invented-here syndrome, or some other psychological quirk.

As for the engineers, most of them are not blockheads. Some of them get working prototypes of their ideas - the winglets are a prime example - only to see them ignored by management or marketing. Engineers built working hybrid & Stirling-engined powered cars in the '70s, along with many of the other ideas mentioned here. Management and marketing gave us the SUV instead.

I have absolutly ZERO experience in this field, but I've read everyones comments.
You have to admit this is a very good point. Thinking outside the box is the only way to learn new ways of "this is how it's always done".