Interesting article: energy from water

[wmw999 2,149]

Someone making energy from water. Link here.

I've done no research into this other than copying a link I was sent, but it's an interesting idea to explore.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[narcimund 0]

Uh, interesting how?

This article has fluffy words and wandering imagination, but electrolysis is hardly news. Electricity + water releases hydrogen and oxygen which when burned together give you back slightly less energy than you spent in the first place.

Nifty neato. I did this when I was 12 years old -- and I bet you did too.

The article wants you to FEEEEEL he's got something more going on, but notice how carefully they avoid actually saying so.

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[DJL 232]

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...but electrolysis is hardly news.

I don't care. As long as the ass-hair removal is permanent.

"I encourage all awesome dangerous behavior." - Jeffro Fincher

[Channman 2]

Have you seen the video? And to think he converted a car that would run on water and drove 100 miles while only using 4 oz. Not to mention, the off gas is vapor (Water).

[PLFXpert 0]

There are LOTS of great ideas for cars to run (and at good speeds) on alternatives to gas and MUCH friendlier for the environment.

The problem is re-doing the entire auto-making industry of how they engineer cars, converting "gas" stations to "other" stations, etc. It's a big overhaul that none of the gas companies or auto makers want to do for obvious reasons (loose a lot of money/spend a lot of money initially).

It sucks

I'm guilty of it, too. I REALLY wanted a hybrid but my Toyota Sequoia is proven to hold its value. Who knows the longterm resale values/ramifications/endurance/reliability yet of a hybrid.

If they prove themselves years from now, I'll buy

Paint me in a corner, but my color comes back.

[jonege 0]

The article clearly acknowledges that electrolysis is not new and is not, itself, the news in this article. I think the "interesting" thing is the apprently new application of a by-product of a process that has been around for a long time. Are you saying you were using the off-gas from electrolysis for welding and to alter your parents' fuel efficiency when you were 12? My guess is you are not. The guy is not claiming to have invented the process. Rather, he is claiming to have found new uses for it. To some people, the original poster and myself among them, that is interesting.

[Lindercles 0]

It's interesting on the surface, but he claims the his process of electrolysis makes "HHO" which is somehow different that just normal hydrogen and oxygen.

But how do you get something other than hydrogen and oxygen when you break up H20?

Sounds like modern alchemy to me.

[narcimund 0]

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Are you saying you were using the off-gas from electrolysis for welding and to alter your parents' fuel efficiency when you were 12? My guess is you are not.

Oooooh! You got me good. Lay me down to die and say a few words over my corpse.

No, I did not personally weld with hydrogen nor did I modify any auto engines to use a hydrogen-boosted fuel mixture when I was 12. If I did would someone have written a "Gee Whiz" feature article about me?

This article is a puff-piece to make average-Joe technology-phobe put down his beer can and say, "Gosh, Marge. Look at that there high-dro-gin. Mighty neato huh?"

I'm a little surprised Wendy fell for it. Or did she?

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[narcimund 0]

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There are LOTS of great ideas for cars to run (and at good speeds) on alternatives to gas and MUCH friendlier for the environment.

The problem is re-doing the entire auto-making industry of how they engineer cars, converting "gas" stations to "other" stations, etc. It's a big overhaul that none of the gas companies or auto makers want to do for obvious reasons (loose a lot of money/spend a lot of money initially).

That's the minor problem.

The MAJOR problem is even if you rebuild ALL that infrastructure, you're now wasting even more energy in the process of making hydrogen and that energy has to come from somewhere (ie, hydrocarbons.)

You can't make a string longer by cutting one end off and tying it on the other end. In fact, it just gets shorter.

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[jonege 0]

Why so bitter?

[billvon 2,435]

>Are you saying you were using the off-gas from electrolysis for welding
>and to alter your parents' fuel efficiency when you were 12?

I was using it to blow stuff up when I was 13. I actually tried to build a rocket engine with the gas from an electrolysis rig, but I kept having problems with the combustion chamber melting/cracking, and the combustion propagating back into the hydrogen bag. My parents found out and made me stop. I also tried isopropyl alcohol and propane. Isopropyl worked pretty well; didn't blow up as often.

Little known fact - around the turn of the last century, trains ran on water! Yet for some reason we gave up on this technology.

[narcimund 0]

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Why so bitter?

Sorry if I touched a nerve. Apparently this thread is reserved for people who swoon at pre-IPO corporate press releases.

I'll leave you guys to it. Have fun!

(And a word to the wise: don't invest your rent money in this dog )

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[wmw999 2,149]

I'm curious about it, and open-minded enough not to reject it out-of-hand.

The fact that people aren't falling all over themselves to license this is an indication that it's not as simple as it seems. Only one story in the last year is an indication of possible overblowing. On the other hand, the fact that he's rigged a car to use it is interesting, as is the welding rig.

I'm nowhere near knowledgeable enough to be able to really thoroughly either accept or not accept it.

On another note, there's a guy out there who invented the concept behind the stent; filed for a patent, went to a lot of companies to try to sell his concept, had it rejected, and had his patent application lost.

Now they're found it, and yes, he's back to contacting the medical companies to talk about his patent. It'll be interesting to see the result. The story was on NPR this morning.

Wendy W.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[billvon 2,435]

I just read the thing and I didn't really see anything interesting.

Hydrogen injection has been touted by a few companies for years; I saw one such system a few years back at a trucking industry show. No independent tests have shown it's useful though.

Mixed hydrogen/oxygen is one of the most dangerous mixtures of gas imaginable. Hydrogen propagates flame _very_ quickly, and has a wide range of oxidizer ratios that allow combusion (unlike methane, which has a pretty narrow range.) I've often thought that if you ever wanted to destroy a building, you could just fill a watercooler bottle with a hydrogen/oxygen mixture under low pressure (say 50psi or so) and set it off with a spark. The explosion would be massive, and investigators would find only water vapor (which you'd expect in a water cooler bottle.)

Elecrtrolysis is a good way to generate hydrogen, but it takes more energy to make it than you get out. Might as well just charge a battery with the same power and use that.

[narcimund 0]

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Little known fact - around the turn of the last century, trains ran on water! Yet for some reason we gave up on this technology.

Wow Bill! You've just given me an amazing idea. This will revolutionize the world. We can power automobiles with ROCKS and WATER!

All we have to do is heat up the rocks until they're REALLY hot. Then put the rocks in the water. The water will boil and we can use the expanding steam to power a generator. The generator makes electricity which we can use to turn the automobile motor.

What's wrong with my idea? You could object that we need to use fuel to heat up the rocks, but only to start! One you've got them hot, the auto is running and you can use the spare heat from the engine and brakes to keep the rocks hot. If that's not enough energy, we can always just turn on the car's passenger compartment heater and for an extra boost we can add the cigarette lighter.

Free power from rocks and water! Woo hoo!

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[hobbes4star 0]

Didn't they make a movie about this

if fun were easy it wouldn't be worth having, right?

[shropshire 0]

It is interesting... but what is the total energy equation?
How much energy do you get back against that what you had to put in?

.

(.)Y(.)
Chivalry is not dead; it only sleeps for want of work to do. - Jerome K Jerome

[bch7773 0]

its very interesting. I'd like to see the properties of the HHO gas. I see this more as a welding improvement then an auto improvement.

MB 3528, RB 1182

[billvon 2,435]

>I'd like to see the properties of the HHO gas.

HHO gas sounds an awful lot like a mixture of hydrogen and oxygen - in other words, what you get when you split water and mix the resultant gas.

Consider what would happen if you tried to use this in a regular welding rig. You'd only need one tank; the oxidizer and fuel are mixed. You crack the valve and light it off. The fuel ignites. The flame would propagate back into the tank (nothing to stop it) and the tank would explode. This is difficult to prevent. Flame arrestors work by denying oxygen to the fuel; in this case it's already mixed in.

[Steel 0]

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Someone making energy from water. Link here.

I've done no research into this other than copying a link I was sent, but it's an interesting idea to explore.

Wendy W.

http://www.wimp.com/fuelwater/
,

If I could make a wish, I think I'd pass.
Can't think of anything I need
No cigarettes, no sleep, no light, no sound.
Nothing to eat, no books to read.

[nanook 1]

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Klein's HHO is made on-demand and mixed directly with the gasoline in the engine at slightly more pressure than is currently there.

To me, this is synonymous with create an extreme lean mixture in the fuel/air mixture thus making less use of the gas. The only difference is pretty words. He wasn't more fuel efficient because of his HHO, it was because he leaned out his gas. They used to do this in the mid 1900's to trick people into buying miracle fuel efficient add-ons.

_____________________________

"The trouble with quotes on the internet is that you can never know if they are genuine" - Abraham Lincoln

[nanook 1]

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Little known fact - around the turn of the last century, trains ran on water! Yet for some reason we gave up on this technology.

We use water now to power our submarines and aircraft carriers.

I guess we need more technology to find a way to harness turbines to provide efficient stop and go type use and to be cheap at that.

_____________________________

"The trouble with quotes on the internet is that you can never know if they are genuine" - Abraham Lincoln

[narcimund 0]

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The flame would propagate back into the tank

Except this guy is (apparently) generating his fuel on the fly. No tank.

In my opinion, that innovation isn't worth a bucket of warm spit, but it got him a minor mention on a minor website.

First Class Citizen Twice Over

[mdrejhon 8]

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Who knows the longterm resale values/ramifications/endurance/reliability yet of a hybrid.

I wondered the same thing. But you know what -- the older hybrids (late 90's, early 2000 models) appear to be holding up very well. We now have almost 10 years of data on early hybrid models (i.e. early Prius models). I've been reading some new data on long-term reliability of hybrids...

Apparently, the gas motor is worked less hard because of the electrical subsystem is taking up some slack of work; improving reliability in the gas motor department. While mechanically more complicated, fewer parts are apparently being "driven" as hard as in a gas-only model. The electrical complications are more of a problem in the long-term reliability.

It is true we need more data on recent models (i.e. 2004 models and later), since the Prius only started "really becoming good enough" around the 2004 model. Purists with high horsepower cars won't be interested in all of this stuff, but modern Priuses (starting after 2004) are finally as convenient to drive as, say, an average Honda Civic, full folding seats not encumbered by battery, similiar space, similiar acceleration (0 to 60). There is not yet enough data on the latest generation "no compromise/less compromise" hybrid technologies (post-2004 models), but if they follow the reliability trends that are only starting to be observed now, it looks like reliability shouldn't be a big worry. Early indicators seem to show the resale value appears of the latest generation models, seem to be no worse on a percentage deprecation basis than the non hybrid models (at least for the post-2004 no/less-compromise models) and may actually be better in some cases, due to high demand for some models such as Prius.

However, early observations show a good future for hybrids from the long-term "Reliable" companies (Consumer Reports) such as Honda and Toyota. Newer models manage the charge cycle of the battery much more carefully so that the battery is much more likely to last the lifetime of the car.

Time will tell, but early indicators are looking promising...

[livendive 8]

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(loose a lot of money/spend a lot of money initially).
....
_______________________________________
I always edit for spelling/grammar. It just bothers me.

Ahem.

Blues,
Dave

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