Has the 5 trillion watt laser been discused yet?

[steve-o]

Tesla... need I say more? (It is 100% battery powered though, not the most efficient, but at least no dino-juice and 0-60mph in a real good time) mewants1

[Dr Laser]

Sorry but I kindly skip trough very long posts on forums As for myself I try to compress my typing as much as possible. I've never attacked a fuel cell. I think it's a great invention. I too believe Hydrogen fuel cell is a power station of the future. But right now there is no infrastructure for it. Right now is more expensive then Petrolium. Thing has to be mass produced before the price can drop. Maybe in 20-30 years I really hope so.

The issue I attacked is that can of water under the hood. I've seen all those videos on youtube. I still believe THIS Electrolysis CAN under the hood is a joke and BS. I don't believe it gives you extra miles. I don't believe it's good for a engine. I don't believe it will put more energy then it took. Just enough to take a look on some of the videos. "YEAH... STEAM COMES FROM TAIL PIPE"..and read their description and do some basic calculations. There are many articles on Internet that explain in details why this thing is a scam. But I will give those guys a credit. They start experimenting with a real hand made fuel cell and electric motors.
Anyways I think everyone is free to believe what ever they want to believe.


And I'm sorry that I got this topic sooo offtopic.
Actually my dad used to work with high power chemical lasers. He has PhD on that. Fascinating stuff it is but HHUUUGGEE

[Dr Laser]

Tesla... need I say more? (It is 100% battery powered though, not the most efficient, but at least no dino-juice and 0-60mph in a real good time) mewants1

Tesla is the greatest scientist of all time. So the car named after him shell at least be half good. BTW can anyone find detailed info on it's power train. Very curios to know whats under the hood. I know car is based on Lotus Elise. But thats all I know

[steve-o]

I can't say that this vehicle can stand up to the genious of Nikola Tesla, but it's neat, expensive and I'd hate to have to fork out the $ when the batteries have to be replaced :\ I still like it though. Here's some info on the car..
http://www.teslamotors.com/design/under_the_skin.php

[tocket]

Hydrogen is in many aspects an excellent energy carrier. It has the highest specific energy of any non-radioactive material, burns with water as its only product and is easily converted into electricity.

It is not without problems however, especially when it comes to storing and handling it. To store hydrogen at any reasonable density it needs to be compressed to very high pressures, liquefied at extremely low temperatures or absorbed into a suitable carrier. Because of the difficulties of the first two methods much of the current research is aimed at finding good materials for absorbing hydrogen. Regardless of which method is used the energy concentration will be significantly lower than that of gasoline.

While the absorption of hydrogen into various materials is interesting from a storage perspective it is also severely complicating matters. Hydrogen is absorbed by many materials; especially metals where it is easily incorporated into the voids of the metal atom matrix (thanks to its small size). A common consequence of this is something called hydrogen embrittlement, a process which severely compromises the strength of the metal. Another consequence is that hydrogen can easily diffuse through a wide variety of materials, basically meaning that if you leave your hydrogen car in the garage for too long you might find it with an empty tank the next time you try to start it.

As for using hydrogen in combustion engines I can see a couple of problems with it (though I don't know if they are real; engines are hardly my area of expertise). My main concern is that hydrogen is highly prone to detonation. Most people have no idea what detonation actually means, but simply put, black powder deflagrates and dynamite detonates. A detonation produces an incredibly intense shock wave that actually shatters metals rather than just bending them. I highly doubt any internal combustion engine can withstand repeated detonations for very long. Combine detonation with hydrogen embrittlement of the engine and... well, catastrophic failure doesn't seem far away. In theory at least. In practice spit and elbow grease might be keeping things together.

Now, I am all for using hydrogen as an energy carrier, but I just think there are too many unsolved engineering problems in the area.

An interesting side note is that (if I remember correctly from my process chemistry course) the by far largest user of hydrogen gas is oil refineries where it is used in many ways to improve the gasoline. So, in some strange way you could say that cars running on gasoline are already partly running on hydrogen. However, as this hydrogen is produced in the cheapest possible way, i.e. steam reformation of fossil fuels, it is no good.

Oh, and on the topic of fuel cells (which I really think is the most promising route) they do not necessarily have to be fueled by hydrogen; there is also for example the DMFC. Methanol has the added bonus of being easily produced from biomaterials. The DMFC is unfortunately not currently suited for use in vehicles.

[steve-o]

Sounds like you know what you're talking about dude.. but as far as energy carriers and what-not I'm no expert but what I do know is that running a current thru H2O you can split water into hydrogen and oxygen, the 2 elements of water.. now, containment of an atom that small -1 electron and 1 proton, is extremely difficult as it will find its way out of most storage mediums -metals- like you pointed out. However, it is flammable and a source of energy, right? So why can't we split water and make cars run? (Overly simplistic, I know, but basic, it is..) This is also interesting I thought.. Maybe lasers could be incorperated in a design..

The ground state energy level of the electron in a hydrogen atom is −13.6 eV, which is equivalent to an ultraviolet photon of roughly 92 nm.[

[tocket]

Certainly you can make hydrogen by splitting water in some way; that is the way to do it once we have a nice and clean source of electricity (i.e. fusion or some sort of solar power).

Producing hydrogen from water in the car does not pass the thermodynamics sanity check however. Because the fuel and combustion product (water) are one and the same there will be no net energy gain. Even worse, you will lose energy in every step of the conversion process.

Emphasis must be put on the fact that hydrogen is only an energy carrier. That means it must be produced somewhere where energy is plentiful then transferred to where the energy needs to be used.

[Dr Laser]

Brr I just realized that I made a big mistake talking about Deuterium fusion and rarity. Helium-3 what I was referring to. I guess chemical lasers got me off the track. Sorry for being stupid ass.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium-3

tocket.... my respect to Swedish education system

[steve-o]

Tocket, You're a chemist? Or Chemical engineer? Can you tell me what two elements I can shoot out of a squirt gun ( 2 squirt guns) when combined to make a large light-ball or fire-ball? I love pyro-technics and it used to be my 2nd job in a band - 1st job waz guitar.. btw I'm 52 years old and I'm not going to do anything stupid.. PM me please if the info is too hazardous for normal internet consumption..
-S

[buffo]

Hydrazine and hydrogen peroxide come to mind... (Worked for the ME163!) Though I don't think you'd want to put either one in something as flimsy as a squirt gun.

Basically any hypergolic fuel will accomplish what you're talking about. But you're going to be dealing with some really nasty chemicals. For sure nothing you'd ever be able to pull off on-stage.

Adam