Air Car or Hydrogen Car

[sam sarrha]

there is a car that actually runs on AIR!! not Hydrogen, hydrogen will need atomic power plants to run the pumps to liquify the AIR into hydrogen and the Hydrogen cars will be REALLY expensive, the air cars run about $10,000/$12,000. why ? when there are cars that already run on just air? the MDI air car, www.aircar.com , can go 130kph/80mph for 300km/180miles on a 3 minute charge of compressed air. they come in 6 seat vans to 2 seat pickup's the factories are sold in modular kits. does it seem that the air car is lost in a news black out....? the concept was invented by race car driver Guy Negre, the cars have been running as taxi's since 1998 in france.. these cars actually clean the air, its filtered going in...

[Catch22Dem]

1. Link?

I clicked your link, but it redirected me to Air Cargo. Some kind of airline.

Here's the link http://www.theaircar.com

[sam sarrha]

2. links to the air car

it is also under MDI air car , guy negre, and at www.globalstewards.org , will get you there on yahoo. i used MSN..

[Mal]

3. How's the air compressed?

It doesn't just magically appear in those bottles, you know. Pumps have to be run. And if making hydrogen requires atomic power (not sure why you think this, any source of electricity will do the job), then by the same logic so does running the pumps to compress the air.
Is compressed air any more efficient than hydrogen fuel cells?

[sam sarrha]

4. compressed air,

there is a big differance in compressing AIR, and liquifying hydrogen..! i have a compressor from sears that can compress air to run the car, the car does not actually run totally on compressed air, the intake is atmospheric and the compression stroke is boosted by a small amount of compressed air, assisted by an articulated commecting rod.. it is a brillant marvel of engineering, and we are not talking about fuel cells, they are not anywhere near being developed, the space shuttles still use the fuel cells that went to the moon. they are not an off the shelf item presently..the chances are that they are just hype.. to justify the use of liquid O2/H2 as a raw combustable to be used in existing inefficient engines, requiring atomic power plants. they are looking to use all the plutonium created under the myth of the cold war. so they can sell back to us what we paid for with our tax dollars. hemp oil, a by product of fiber production could make us oil independant of the arabs. and burns extremely clean, could clean up semi truck emissions and prevent thousands of early deaths. we can buy that from china but deny our own farmers the right to produce it. it would produce over a quater trillion dollars less trade deficet and produce jobs for our own citizens.

[Throckmorton]

5. Another simple solution, that is not what it appears.

Unfortunately, this item comes up about twice per year. My response to it is in the old DU database, and I can't get it back, so I'll create a new one.

It is not a complete scam, but it’s a far cry from as efficient vehicle as they suppose. As far as zero emissions, well, how about low emission. The electricity does come from some place.

As for their 3000 cubic foot reservoirs, of which there are two, assuming your Sears compressor could reach 4200 PSIG, the typical Sears 6hp compressor delivers a whopping 8.4 SCFM. So, a complete recharge would take about 11.9 hours (6000 CF/8.4 CFM). So a 745 watts per HP, 6 HP will us 4.4 KWh/h. 11.9 hours times 4.4 KWh/h= 52 KW. At lets say 8 cents per KWh, that’s $4.16 for a fill up, or the equivalent of 2 gallons of gasoline at 2.08 per gallon. You in fact could never use this compressor, as it dead heads at about 210 PSIG, or less as it wears out.

As to the claim that you can fill it from a conventional dryer plug connected compressor in 4 hrs, an Ingersoll Rand H15T4 compressor will deliver 13.2 SCFM at 4200 PSIG, so it will take almost 7.5 hours to fill the tanks. To do this, it requires 10 HP, or the current requirement at 220 VAC will be 33 amps. Most dryer outlets are rated at 30 Amps, but we will not quibble. The power demand for this unit is now 54.5 KWh, or $4.36 per fill up, (assuming 8 cents per KWh) the equivalent of 2 gallons of gasoline at $2.18 per gallon. The claim is that this car can go 120 to 190 miles per recharge, so I’ll use the average of 155 miles. A gasoline powered car will need to get 77 MPG to match this, a neat trick.

The comparison chart refers to a MDI CityCat, but their product page doesn’t list this model, so I’m not sure if the comparisons are fair. The Toyota RAV4 is a four passenger vehicle, and the Nissan Altra EV is a small Wagon.

This same compressor could be configured to deliver 23.7 SCFM at 4200 PSIG, coming close to the 4 hour fill up claimed. In this configuration, the compressor requires 19.8 HP, or 59 KWh, or the equivalent of 2 gallons of gasoline at $2.36. It will also draw nearly 67 amps at 220 volts, requiring most homes have a 200 amp service.

The compressor costs are in the range of $48,000, assuming that the price drops radically with consumer demand, lets call it $8000.00 dollars. Still no bargain, and the compressors to do a 2 or 3 minute fill-up are enormous machines. 2000 SCFM at 4200 PSIG compressors fill buildings, and cost millions. You could of course get away with small compressors, and large storage tanks for peak demand, but the economics will suffer some. High pressure air banks also have problems supplying high demands after they have cooled down (the storage tanks are quire hot to begin with), the residual moisture freezes in the high velocity piping causing no end to trouble.

So, is the air car better that a gasoline powered car, the power does have to come from some place. The companies that sell electric power are just as bad as the oil companies. Will they reduce center city air pollution, sure they will, but at a cost of higher emissions from power stations. Will they perform better than electric cars? I really can’t say. I will say that it is not nearly as simple as it appears. The air is not free, the compressors are large, expensive, difficult to maintain, and noisy. Are they part of a larger solution? I'd say for some people, yes they are. Is storing huge volumes of compressed are safer than storing Fossel Fuels, or liquid hydrogen? Thats a finer distinction, if you have ever witnessed an accumulator tank rupture, you'd have your doubts.

[acerbic]

6. Well, this proves that in it's current incarnation the air car is a SCAM:

the car does not actually run totally on compressed air, the intake is atmospheric and the compression stroke is boosted by a small amount of compressed air, assisted by an articulated commecting rod..

Where do you believe the energy used to move the car to be coming from if not totally from the compressed air? Burning the "atmospheric intake" air? Atomic reactions in it? Some temperature gradient? What?
:think:
The scammy wording in the hype had the desired effect on you, but in reality the car runs totally on compressed air.

[Throckmorton]

7. Agreed

See previous post #5, I have some major issues with this product, but I tried to be nice and only address the energy storage portion of the plan.

In addition, the fact that it only uses 1/2 HP per mile (78 HP input/ 155 miles) to move a 1200 lbs vehicle (sans passenger weight) I conveniently ignored.