The_Truth
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Re:Ethanol Facts, Car Mods - 2008/05/06 20:41
I had a few random comments on this stuff. I read in some page, that using a pulse width modulated energy source, with the correct plate spacing, caused a resonance effect, in essence generating more than the electricity put into it. Very easy to build a PWM system, but I don't know about the claims...
Anyone that uses stainless steel for electrodes needs to be smacked. Go back to chemistry... if you use stainless steel electrodes, the chromium from the SS is stripped and introduced into the water. SO it looks like the plates aren't erroding as quickly... but the water is pretty toxic, and disposal (dumping in your yard) isn't a good idea. I even sent the author of the original page that suggestion.
DO NOT RUN A GENERATOR ON A FUEL INJECTED VEHICLE!!!!! I cannot stress this enough. There are several reasons not to. First off, the extra power is coming from the added oxygen in the combustion chamber. This is just fine and dandy... to a point. After a certain point... your engine will "lean out" (not enough fuel to air... causing an extremely hot burn). Fuel does not only burn, but it cools. When gasoline is injected into the cylinder, the heat from the cylinder and previous combustion vaporizes the fuel from liquid. In changing the fuel from a liquid state to a vapor, some of the heat is also removed from your combustion chamber. A lean out can EASILY damage an engine by melting piston rings and fusing them to the cylinder walls and pistons. Throw the hydrogen into the mix, and it adds another "fuel". In all honesty, I am not even sure how a normal engine would react to a H2+02 mixture in proper proportions. In a fuel injected car, this completely confuses the computer (they use sensors to monitor the oxygen content on the exhaust and adjust fuel/air mix accordingly). Granted, hydrogen + oxygen burns cleaner... (no carbon emissions), but currently there is no generator that can produce fast enough to keep up with demand due to the energy in, energy out look of things.
I had previously looked into the possibilty of adding napthalene to fuel to increase the flash point of the fuel (octane rating is the RESISTANCE to explosion of a fuel, not the opposite).
Something to research... there is a new type of "spark plug" out. Instead of creating a spark, it creates a plasma between the charged and ground electrodes of the plug. I have been interested in seeing what that does for power... from their videos... the fuel ignites at a much faster rate, which would mean more power, but the consequences are my concern... and at $29 a plug... they aren't cheap!
edit: in my area, there was a media broadcast talking about ethanol and so on... and they were dispelling fuel myths. They asked if "ethanol increased the octane rating" and the guy said no, but that it essentially did not hurt anything. If ya check into it... ethanol is a bad idea unless you are brewing it yourself. It has a lower energy density (energy per unit mass) than gasoline, it cannot be sent across pipes(must be trucked everywhere... increasing diesel use), and actually decreases gas mileage from a tank of fuel if blended! (every pump in the us has up to a 10% ethanol blend, and any car in the us can use 15% ethanol 85% gas WITH NO PROBLEMS OR MODS, and that's what they are banking on... water down the fuel.) Also, in the US, you can get a permit (fairly cheap) to produce as much ethanol you can use for personal use AS A FUEL (yeah... you could technically sneak out some moonshine too). Their only "requirement" is that you blend it 85% ethanol to 15% gasoline (to keep you from drinking your fuel).
sorry for the rant guys... just a couple of cents from my pocket to yours!
Post edited by: The_Truth, at: 2008/05/06 20:48
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