What happened to the vapor thread?
 

Like the title says, what happened?

The thread itself turned into vapors.

So it was deleted? I didn't realize this was one of those web sites, that erases history it doesn't like.

You were getting too close to the truth. :eek:

Flagrant violations of the forum rules of conduct, Continued violations can get those violators banned. Debate, argue, voice your position forcefully. I think we all know the answer to the OPs question.

regards
Mech

What did I miss?

The problem is the good was thrown out with the bad.
 

pgfpro and others had excellent posts. Someone popped up with their own build that was well along to following Smokey's Hot Vapor engine on a Metro base. I would really like to have that continue.

The problem is the position of this Forum concerning the Unicorn Corral. No matter the subject matter, people feel free to lambast ANY poster's contribution. If one is early in the build, there is no leeway to continue the exploration weather it is a successful one or ultimately a dead end. Consequently, NOTHING is answered.

Truthfully, soulcrusher came in swinging and bullying. And people responded in kind. The problem is, there is no punishment for those that willfully and continuously flood a thread with nothing other than off topic remarks and assaults. I know, I was one of them. The problem is in the keyboard. Hiding behind it, zealots find more zeal, vigilantes find more vigor and bullies find power. I spend time on several forums that require a name, a business or professional standing or a license. It is good networking even if discussions are heated as decorum is absolute since you represent yourself and your business. Even less open forums still require you to state your profession, and if you are unable to effectively contribute to a discussion, you can expect a PM from the moderators asking why you are befuddled by iron allotropes while posting on a material science forum. I know, two semesters of material science does not make me an expert.

However, in an open forum such as Ecomodder, EVERYONE is an expert. And topics that reside in the Corral seem to attract these so called experts.

However, in an open forum such as Ecomodder, everyone IS an expert - within certain boundaries. The problem is, in the Corral, many people overstep their boundaries.

The original question posted by the OP? What was the answer? It's all lost in the cloud of derision and heavy handed criticism.

here we go again!

Its true, theres 5-7 people who contribute little more than LOL or Meme type of comments to almost all threads and it just derails any chance of an intelligent conversation. :eek:

"Intelligent conversation"?? On the internet?? ;) :D

I deleted the thread. After 11 pages of mostly arguing, I am not going to spend tons of time doing the surgery needed to remove the insults and keeping the actual info. At any point, either of the two who were the main contributors to the argument could have decided to stop and ignore or report the other. Thus, both Soulcrusher and Frank Lee were banned for a week. Hopefully, both will come back and act civil as is expected of all EM users.

In the future, we mods would appreciate people reporting this kind of thing a bit earlier. I personally don't read 100% of the forum, so I didn't even notice the problem until it was really out of hand. Thank you to the one who did notify me. Your help is greatly appreciated.

For those who don't know, there is a report post button (little triangle) at the bottom left of each post. It sends us an email and we can check the thread out if anything is going on. We do look at these. Sometimes we don't do anything, sometimes we PM people, sometimes we ban people. But, at least if we get a report we can keep an eye on it from then on out.

never knew that red triangle was there......
maybe you should label it "report post"

I did not know it was there either (the triangle of death!). I admire the moderators for letting it go that far even if it was not by design.

regards
Mech

Id reported some stuff like that in the past and got a message from a modulator that I should just ignore them as I was just feeding the trolls. :eek:

LOL we have MODULATORS here.

regards
Mech

Vapor modulators?

We could use a troll modulator.

regards
Mech

An Eludium Q-36 explosive space modulator?

-soD

I have seen first-time posts that were obvious spam and looked for a report button, but I did not think of reporting my own thread, that would have been simpler than messaging a moderator.

I started reading http://ecomodder.com/forum/showthrea...ent-10979.html and realized he was banned. I figured that it was true because I could not message him. I read his last post and wondered what was wrong with it.

I appreciate the explanation. I wondered, although I did not think that it was my concern.

Daox
You say that there is a triangle at the bottom left of each post. My monitor is not showing me this triangle. However, there is a red triangle at the bottom right of each page, next to the "Page 2 of 2". Is that the triangle that you mean?
How does one start a post? i"m new here but I would like to see some vapor carb research done here. If it proves to get great mileage, wonderful. But as I mentioned in a deleted post, if we keep this device even visible, someone will notice that it is one answer to the third world's need for extremely simple, extremely robust devices like the vapor carb which, as Youtube will be glad to show you, actually is an effective device.

triangle time.

regards
Mech

Glad I never read the vapor thread.....

A good carb tune is more important than having a miracle device.
Mechanical carburetor technology hit its peak in the late 1970s. Then it comes down to cold air versus warm air and tuning from there on.
If some one wants to help these carburetor stricken third world countries then they should invent a dirt cheap wide band O2 meter for tuning.
When I started using a wide band 02 meter and the advanced 100+ piece Edelbrock tuning rod, jet and spring set on my Camaro to tune its Edelbrock 650 with vacuum secondaries it was almost as good as fuel injection.
Its amazing what you can do with a carburetor when you go from just guessing to actually seeing whats going on and having the parts to do something about it.

I say to be able to do any successful fuel vaporing you have to master the carburetor or fuel injection on the vehicle to be experimented on first.

i did. wish i hadn't.

I agree on the whole with what you are saying.
 

But, there is value in the so called "miracle devices" if they have a basis in science. I had previously linked to the Smokey System and the Clackamas Vapor Carb. Old Mech linked to the Transonic Injector technology. These are not simple vapor carbs, but they point to the continued development in fuel systems. After you have improved fuel feed with carbs, injectors, and now direct injection and applied it to an over expanded engine, a designer needs to start looking for more efficiency and emissions advantage. The goverment has MANDATED 50+ MPG cars in 10 years. Does your "well tunded carb" have the ability to meet the requirements? I don't think so.

So it is with Ecomodders. We each have our interests and goals but fuel economy is what ties us together, and some of us are much more capable in the areas of engine development and controls. But, just like the manufacturers pushing the edge, engine development is going to be on the edge for most Ecomodders.

But, I do agree whole heartedly with you - you have to know what you are doing and have the tools to perform measurement and control.

The vehicle its self is 30 year old technology. So no.

If fuel vapor is the way to go then why has the fuel induction element been moving ever closer to the combustion chamber?

You will never see supercritical 450 degree fuel at diesel injection pressures mixed in any amount outside the combustion chamber. That is what transonic does and the combustion byproducts require no post combustion treatment to pass emissions.

Homogenous charge compression ignition without the need for a spark. Molecule by molecule evenly distributed in milliseconds, multiple injection pulses at peak combustion chamber pressures spreading out the "push" of expanison, allowing diesel high compression ratios and practically no currently regulated emissions to leave the combustion chamber and therefore no post treatment of exhaust emissions.

Billions have been spent in the pursuit of this goal and current and future emission regulations are irrelevant when they are not even close to a hurdle. They have come close, but the issue that came into prominence over 40 years ago and the solution will render any mileage requirements laughable.

The 60% efficient engine will become fact, even in displacements under .5 liter.

Gasoline powered cars under 3k in weight will achieve EPA ratings, not the ancient cafe ratings used in the requirements (mostly a joke), will get mileage in the 60-80 MPG rangewhen driven normally at 70 MPH with many accessories and their consequential power drains running as the are normally in almost every vehicle on US roads.

All of this does not even consider the 2006 statement by the EPA that mileage improvements of 80% will be achieved through powertrain improvemnets. This fact will increase fuel mileage, if implemented, above and beyond my prediction earlier in this post, with city mileages actually exceeding the highway prediction I just made.

With further aero improvements, if the manufacturers ever come to believe aero is beautiful and the brain washed publics thinking process is properly modified, then we will see, in my lifetime, cars averaging over 100 MPG easily, with no effort in that pursuit necessary by the driver of that car.

Come back in a decade and read that prediction and see how close I am to predicting the future, but you will never see it done while relying on air flow to accomplish that objective and if you ever came close you would be carrying a significant container of an explosive mixture, just waiting for an ignition source.

regards
Mech

Low hanging fruit.
 

Fuel mixture control has more benefit than fuel vapor in the immediate applications of need. Thus, throttle bodies gave way to port injection and then to direct injection. But, once injected directly into the combustion chamber, gasoline fuel has a tendency to form soot particulates. Now you are back to square one, with loss of efficiency and greater emissions. Some manufacturers are now exploring duel fuel deliver with both port as well as direct injectors to gain the benefits of both. I also pointed out in another thread that the work by companies such as Orbital of Australia has lead to manufacturers using air assisted injectors to gain even more fuel atomization. The next step is what pgfpro is suggesting - hot air assisted injection - to gain as close to a vapor state as possible while retaining the advantages of digital fuel injection.

This does not mean simply reaching a vapor state and feeding it into the engine will gain you fuel economy. I have touched on that with discussion of a high enthalpy engine. Enthalpy is a fancy word for the energy contained in a system including the work lost/gained by that system. This includes heat, pressure, temperature and kinetic energy as well as the internal energy of the gas molecules. Anything that gains you increased enthalpy before the combustion starts allows you to extract more work from the system.

The above, all makes more sense when you start going down the list of things that we already know help an engine's efficiency.

Higher compression increases the working fluid pressure, and gains us more efficiency.

A warm air intake gives us more heat and more efficiency - all else being equal.

An engine with large amounts of swirl and tumble in the combustion chamber design is more efficient than a lazy one. This is the kinetic energy addition to your system ( working fluid ).

Internal energy concepts can be more involved and complex, but let it be said that the vapor state is at a greater enthalpy level than fuel drops that will irreversibly absorb energy to reach a vapor state to completely burn. And trust me, modern engines burn 98% of the gasoline in the combustion chamber so a vapor state is not the issue. It is the loss of enthalpy in the forming of the vapors within the combustion chamber. A fuel already in vapor form does have an enthalpy advantage over a fluid form if only by a few percent.

So is it worth it to fool with vapor engines? I think so. If you add in all of the above and the thermochemical acceleration of the combustion event (combustion contraction).

Your work with turbo charging, pgfpro's build, dustyfirewalker's, and even soulcrusher's - they are all related by the idea of higher enthalpy combustion. In the deleted thread was a post I really want to add to the list - the build of the Metro engine with a Smokey heat engine induction system. Who ever that was, get your build up on a thread!

Transonic does have a problem.
 

The tightrope balance Transonic's system has to maintain before the system fails is a fine one. Unfortunately for Transonic, they have not been able to deal with it and move to production. They have Caterpillar's backing and have been unable to produce.

Some of us already have super-critical systems that bypass Transonic's problems. We are just waiting on the core patents to expire.

Then there is no reason to not post your achievements.

regards
Mech

Some of us actually do this for a living.
 

And, there is very good reason NOT to post some of our work. People criticize my posts because they cannot follow what I have written. So, they criticize me for not posting my work. But, that work allows me a very comfortable lifestyle and a set of shares in a future endeavor that has much risk but much reward. Why would I risk that future on Ecomodder? However, there is much to play around with that does not interfere with my non-disclosure agreements. I am free to talk about general science and applications. If you see no value in that, I am sorry. I can only simplify so much before it becomes drivel. And, this week, I will hear from our legal department what I can disclose about work I helped with almost two decades ago while testing with HHO augmented engines. There really isn't much ado. You cannot "double your mileage" like the scammers claim. But, you can change the thermochemistry of the combustion reaction and contract the burn so as to extract more work from the fuel. If you can see how much of the fuel heat is lost to the environment you can see how combustion contraction can be very beneficial. And, you can see how partnering this technology with the above idea of a high enthalpy engine can be beneficial.

This is why I keep my textbooks on thermodynamics. A wise man does know when to share and when to keep quiet. When Smokey Yunnick was explaining his engine to the Detroit engineers, he had his lawyer present. I have worked at more than one job where cameras were banned.

The interesting thing is, any and all protected ideas Smokey had . . .
 

. . . are open for all to use today.

I really think there is enough of a skill set here on Ecomodder to duplicate the work of Smokey and bring it up to date if there wasn't such a stigma against anything in the Unicorn Corral. Many things need to be in the Corral and deservedly so, but some items warrant a look and some investigative builds. Hot vapor engines are one of them. A simple bubble through vapor system would have been informative. Additional improvements would have given us even more insight. Heating the fuel makes the vapor capable of adding to the enthalpy. Heating the air is the next logical step. Of course, at this point, detonation can become a problem depending on the engine parameters. We can then explore the lean burn characteristics of hot fuel vapors. I truly think this is the "efficiency gains" people stumble upon when doing the investigation and attribute the gains to some hocus pocus or fringe science. We don't question the Honda Crowd's ability to run their engines at 22:1 Air to Fuel ratio. Let's see if a hot vapor engine can exceed that, and by how much.

Having my own patent issued, I think you might understand that I know the process. Whether you choose to believe it or not is a problem that COULD exist within your own mind. Non Disclosure Agreements are required before you file a completed application and before, during and after the provisional application, which is supposed to precede the complete application by one year. So basically you are not at the point of having filed a completed application or NDAs would be unnecessary. Anyone can file a provisional application. My first one, a decade ago cost $100.

Not sure about the "20 year" term you are referring to when you mentioned waiting out the expiration date on previous patents (mine is 17.5 years). Assuming that is a fact (the 20 year term), it presents serious hurdles to overcome to surpass the rejection criteria of "obvious to someone educated in the art" as well as the "novelty" rejection criteria as well as the legal requirement for the applicant to disclose to the Patent Office any relevant information, that they uncover, at any time in the process, that could cause your own application to be rejected.

Actually "contracting the burn", assuming (again) your terminology is correct is the opposite of what Mazda is (and probably others are) doing with multiple injections after TDC where the burn is initiated then the pressure wave is "spread out" with multiple injections, after the combustion event has begun. The potential for preignition does not exist with high pressure injections of which a significant portion occur after ignition of the first of multiple injections.

Smokeys hot vapor setup is general knowledge today and any component has long passed any Patent protection time deadline. You state that transonic has problems, but you give nothing to support that position. I have no interest in transonic other than my belief that their system represents a significant step forward in the refinement process.

Also much risk means the potential for no reward and if you have no patent pending, you may never see one granted. There are even groups of foundation funded patent lawyers who will drag you through another legal nightmare, EVEN AFTER YOU HAVE BEEN GRANTED A PATENT, and have your patent rejected by a court process.

good luck with the process

Mech

Thanks for sharing this, it is informative.
 

I would just like to point out that NDAs apply to more than patents. I am under an NDA as partner and employee. Employees and partners can be beholden to an NDA for a period of time well beyond the life process of a patent. Also, secrecy in process is often better than a patent if your product has a technological lifespan and the market is not ready for the technology. What good is getting a patent when you will not go to market immediately? Why get protection when market life will be far less than patent life? The problem with most inventors is that they are not market savvy and they waste energy procuring a patent that, as you are correct, only allows them their day in court - nothing more. There are dangers of someone torpedoing your patent if you wait, but that is why there are lawyers and firms that do nothing more than reverse engineer and rip apart the patents of others who's work may stand in the way. I know, I worked for such a firm. The investment group I work for does not tinker with this aspect. They hire a legal firm out of Burbank to provide advice and services. I simply put in a request for disclosure of information the group does not consider critical at this point. The tests we ran on HHO a couple decades ago have nothing to do with a patent. They were just for groundwork. However, the group paid for the data and they "own" the data. It looks like I can recreate the work for disclosure to others but I am waiting on a few specifics. Again, this will be for spark ignited gasoline engines.

As to Transonic's problems? Simply look at the tightrope they must walk to keep their system from falling off the super critical point or entering into the zone where the injector life is measured in seconds. Also, their 58% thermal efficiency claims are being pushed by diesel engines with piezo injectors and 30,000 psi working pressures to the tune of 52% thermal efficiency. Even if they overcome the complexity and reliability issues, their market lead may have all but dried up by the time they can introduce their tech.

And, contraction of combustion is most beneficial to the single combustion phasing of a spark ignited engine as it allows minimal ignition lead times and a resultant increase in thermal efficiency. As to how it works in multi-injection schemes in diesel cycle engines? I forward no comment.

I was talking about Mazdas sky-activ gasoline engine with multiple injections, which is gasoline and spark ignited. Preignition is impossible when you only introduce 20% of the total amount of fuel injected during each combustion stroke. They also stop the engine in a specific position so they can restart it without any other components to accomplsih stop start.

Not sure about the piezo electric statement since transonics design is the injector. I think the operating pressure at 30k is correct. The fact that Caterpillar has decided to support them is huge with an 80 billion corporation with worldwide markets providing the r&d funding for further refinement to address the issues you raise. Most inventions are rarely practical without further refinement.

As far as withholding patent applications, I'm sure you know the history of Bell's telephone patent which preceeded his competitors patent by 2 hours. To assume there will be no competitor who is following the same pathway risks loosing the opportunity, precisely what happened to Bell's competitor (the loosing the opportunity part). I would prefer to get my Patent then spend the time period of protection to obtain further patents for refinements and that is something I will not discuss or reveal.


regards
mech

I appreciate your discussion.
 

You are correct about the Mazda SkyActiv System. It uses multiple hole injectors but I am not seeing where the gasoline engine uses multiple injection events. I am looking at the Mazdausa.com website. Digging up the Greencarcongress.com summary of the Mazda report to the JSAE in 2011 states that one parameter to achieving their goals was:

"The combustion duration was also reduced. Faster combustion shortens the time the unburned air-fuel mixture is exposed to high temperatures, which enables normal combustion to conclude before knocking occurs."

If you can guide me to a reference for a multiple injection event, I would be glad to digest the info.

As to patent withholding and it's dangers, I will have to trust Legal about that. In the past, I have seen a battery of seemingly unrelated patents filed at one time. I suppose there is a strategy to it. But, it is beyond my simple agrarian upbringing.

And, I do hope Transonic succeeds. I can work around their success. Their patents relate to their system of heating the fuel before injection at several thousand PSI - not the 30,000 PSI some current systems are using. The injector tip heater is just the last push to achieve that critical "fourth phase" of matter.

Lol, patents, because 2 hours means you should have a codified monopoly on something, and you should always need government protection from competition for every thought in your head. /s

In the Corral, they are simply an excuse for hiding information, or an appeal to "authority".

ICE's are gonna get smaller as plug-in takes over, and with that power abstraction we are gonna finally see more turbines that don't waste energy on reversing pistons and dozens of other friction points. But not until we have milked the @#$@# out of the piston.

You don't need reversing pistons to accomplish compression and combustion and the piston in cylinder has survived any effort to render it obsolete for good reason. It represents the greatest volume for the smallest surface area which means lower heat transfer to the cylinder walls and it retains it's sealing capabilities through huge variations in operating temperature. 100 years ago the Rolls Royce Silver ghost would, on occasion, start after sitting overnight, without being cranked over, from the remaining compression.

Turbines require compounding which uses the exhaust heat to power another method of extracting energy from otherwise wasted heat energy. That is how a turbine can surpass the efficiency of the very large diesel engines, but it is only practical in stationary applications.

Best non compounded turbine efficiency is in the range of 35%.

Bottom line is get rid of the reciprocation, but retain the piston in cylinder configuration.

regards
mech

I think there is a larger factor in the automotive world (certainly aircraft and many military vehicles sorted out turbines long ago), namely drive-ability. With the peaky output of a turbine it wasn't suited to driving like a car, but if most/all your torque is electrical then it is operated independently of the throttle and dependently on battery state of charge. Plus with very low moving parts count and weight and extreme reliability, it is a good match for electric.