ConnClark, step back a bit from this a bit.
Some things you probably have not thought of.
1) The turbine design required to get useful energy out of it would be larger than the radiators on most cars, this makes the idea impractical from the getgo.
2) The air going through the engine bay may create more drag than the air going around the outside of the car, but, it isn't a complete waste, some of the energy makes it through. I know this is tough to understand, but it is important, cause you seem have it in your head that the air going into the grill is almost like a reverse thruster, it's not. Maybe it has a Cd of like .8, but it isn't a parachute at 2.0. Main point here, the air is not just "Going to waste"
3) Any energy created by the apparent motion of the car has to come from somewhere, so taking this to an extreme, if you put a turbine capable of 100 Amps at 12 volt on a car, you would be getting an output of 16 Horsepower from the device. We all know that the power required to create the 16 HP is not 16 HP, it is much more due to the inefficiencies of the generator and turbine itself, being generous, let’s say it's 50% efficient. You would need 32 HP of effort to push the turbine to get 16 HP worth of power.
Now scale that down, it does not matter where you put your turbine, if it is creating some amount power, it’s needing twice that amount of power to do so, therefore requiring more power from the engine to keep it spinning. Since the current (I know it's a stupid idea) way of making electricity comes from a relatively direct input from the engine, it is still more efficient. Reason being, anything you do to create more drag on the car (Like put a turbine on it) requires more engine power that has to travel through the **Ding** **Ding** **Ding** Drivetrain.....(ya know, tranny, differential, axels & all) So if the drivetrain drag needs to be overcome to create more power, it is that much less efficient. Maybe it isn't a lot, say 10%, but that means your 32 HP now needs to be 35 HP from the engine.
If you want to argue your point further, you need to quantify things for us. You can't just say "Its recovery of energy that is going to waste"....Tell us how much energy is wasted and how your turbine in the grill is going to efficiently recover it. Use real life, honest numbers, then we can talk. If you just go around sayin, "Golly, it just makes sense to me!", this does not qualify for an argument to make your point valid.
Don't say, "Smokey Yunick did something similar in stock car racing with a propeller on his alternator before Nascar outlawed it (back then cars didn't have all the electrical load they have today)." and not tell us how much better fuel economy he got doing it, or why NASCAR disallowed it. (Probably because it wasn’t “Stock”, it is the National Association of
Stock Car Racing after all, I doubt it was because his car was just zipping past everyone.)
Remember, it is you who came up with an idea that maybe works, it's not up to us to prove to you why it won't work, it’s up to you to prove it does. That’s the way big boys play the game.
Any way you slice it, it comes up a fail. A grill generator is Less Efficient than the existing means of creating electricity.
Would you get something out of it? Absolutely!!! There is no one here that’s gonna say your idea does not work for generating electricity.
Will you get something for nothing, and, therefore have an efficiency gain out of it? Never in a million years!!! Not while P=IE and E=MC².
Trust me on this....I know how to type C².
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