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I had thought of using this concept in reverse as a propeller less windmill!
I never got around to developing it, but as a thought invention I did spend some time on it.
As I remember 20,000 volts is almost a minimum to get any efficient propulsion.
MIT proof-of-concept demo of ionic wind propulsion for aircraft
MIT researchers have demonstrated that an aircraft with a 5-meter wingspan can sustain steady-level flight using ionic-wind propulsion. The aircraft has no moving parts, does not depend on fossil fuels to fly, and is completely silent. The researchers describe their proof of concept for electro...
Need to compare the brain of a race driver to see what that does to the brain!
Toyota R&D study finds drivers show significantly more gray matter in brain regions than non-drivers
A brain study by researchers from Toyota Central R&D Laboratories, along with a colleague from Japan’s National Institute of Physiological Sciences, has found that drivers show significantly greater gray matter (GM) volume in the left cerebellar hemisphere—which has been associated with cogniti...
Back in the 70's I installed a kt that was supposed to up your millage by drawing water from a reservoir to the carburetor. Advance your ignition and your ready to go! Did it work? I have to admit I didn't keep track of my mileage close enough to check.
Bosch more broadly commercializing water injection system; up to 13% fuel savings under some conditions
Bosch is now more broadly commercializing its water injection system for turbocharged engines (earlier post). Bosch currently supplies water injection parts for the BMW M4 GTS—the first production vehicle to feature a water injection system. (Earlier post.) In the vehicle’s turbocharged six-cyli...
It appears to me that any kind of electricity could be used to produce hydrogen this way, not necessarily solar electricity!
Swiss team develops effective and low-cost solar water-splitting device; 14.2% solar-to-hydrogen efficiency
Using commercially available solar cells and none of the usual rare metals, researchers at the Swiss Center for Electronics and Microtechnology (CSEM) and École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) have designed an intrinsically stable and scalable solar water splitting device that is fully...
I wondered why it to so long to replace the batteries. It seams to me that with the power to weight ratio of the electric system, an electric dirigible, how ever strange that sounds, would make sense. In due time the battery weight will drop and the solar panels strong enough to make an airplane like this practical.
Solar Impulse 2 used Kokam Ultra High Energy NMC batteries in round-the-world solar flight
The Solar Impulse 2—the solar airplane that recently completed a round-the-world flight—used batteries from Kokam, based on that company’s advanced Ultra High Energy Lithium Nickel Manganese Cobalt (NMC) Oxide (Ultra High Energy NMC) technology. The Solar Impulse uses four 38.5 kWh Kokam Ultr...
I looks like you will live longer moving out of the big city. Hard to find work, but worth your life. Let someone else live in the city and enjoy their shorter life!
Air pollution may shorten survival of patients with lung cancer
Air pollution may shorten the survival of patients with lung cancer, suggests a population-based study by a team from the University of Southern California published in the journal Thorax. The trends were most noticeable for early stage disease, particularly adenocarcinoma—the most common type ...
I would think that having an all electric car for Le Mans would be huge for advertising. A hybrid no so much.
I would think that a 30 second pit stop every hour to swap roll in roll out battery packs would be acceptable and keep them competitive.
Nissan unveils ZEOD RC electric Le Mans Prototype; targeting 2014 Le Mans 24 Hours
Nissan ZEOD RC. Click to enlarge. Nissan unveiled the ZEOD RC (Zero Emission On Demand Racing Car)—an electric Le Mans prototype racing car intended to reach speeds of more than 300 km/h (186 mph) at the Le Mans 24 Hours race in 2014, where it will makes its debut. Nissan will use the same...
I live in a working mans neighborhood. Lots of pickup trucks. Normally the beds of the trucks are empty, until the weekend. Thats when they get used.
I have a Ford Ranger and it gets used on weekend for furniture moving , yard materials , etc. I have the only pickup in the family so it gets shared allot.
During the week it still gets 28 MPG on the highway.
By the way I live in Colorado, not in New York city.
3.5L EcoBoost leading Ford F-150 sales; highest volume EcoBoost vehicle
The 365 hp (272 kW) 3.5-liter twin-turbocharged V6 Ford F-150 EcoBoost (earlier post) is outselling all other competitive six-cylinder trucks combined, according to Ford. In addition, the F-150 EcoBoost is now the highest volume vehicle in Ford’s growing global lineup of cars, trucks and SUVs av...
You notice some interesting features about this system
1) The system is for the back axle on a front wheel drive car. As a result the flywheel has it's own clutch and transmission.
2) The control on this system will be independent of the main engine. You could even charge up this system while the main engine is powering you down the road.
3) You could put any kind of engine you want as the main engine, the only connection would be through a computer that would have input and output for both the main engine and the KERS system.
Volvo Car Corporation developing flywheel kinetic energy recovery system; considering broad application
Flywheel KERS component details. Click to enlarge. Volvo Car Corporation (VCC) has received a grant of 6.57 million Swedish kronor (US$1.05 million) from the Swedish Energy Agency to develop and test a flywheel kinetic energy recovery system in a joint project together with Volvo Powertrain ...
A charging system like this one was used by a company in the 1950's to charge up their flywheel bus. I believe it was tried in Sweden and also they had a system in Zaire. Because flywheel technology was not very advanced, the systems were not in service very long.
Opbrid Introduces New Overhead Fast-Charging System for Buses; Leveraging Lithium Titanate (nLTO) Battery Technology for Rapid Charge Hybrids
The Bůsbaar rapid charger. Click to enlarge. Spain-based Opbrid Transporte Sostenible S.L. has introduced the Bůsbaar—an overhead, pantograph-based fast-charging station for buses. Based on technology from the European rail industry, and leveraging the rapid charge capability of nanotechnolo...
A question I have is how much land area would be required to produce the bio-fuel necessary to supply the airline fleet that exists today?
I don't see how you will be able to produce this much fuel without impacting the worlds food sources
Five More Airlines Join Sustainable Aviation Fuel Users Group
Five new airlines have been accepted as members of the Sustainable Aviation Fuel Users Group (SAFUG), an airline-led industry working group focused on accelerating the development and commercialization of sustainable aviation fuels: Alaska Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, TUIfly and Vi...
The closest to this type of engine flying today is on a corporate airplane called a Piaggio P.180 Avanti.
The unique design of this airplane has the 850 hp PT6 turbine engines driving a 5 bladed propeller that is mounted behind the engine on the back of the wing.
It produces a sort of buzzing sound as it goes by. It is a very different sound, sort of irritating because it's not an airplane sound that your ears are used to. I live under the flight pattern of a regional airport, and I can always tell when one of these planes flies over. I think the reason for the sound is because the airflow off the top and bottom of the wing move at different speeds and the prop blades sort of modulate this airflow producing the distinctive sound.
GE and NASA To Begin Wind-Tunnel Testing This Summer of Open Rotor Jet Engine Systems
Basic rendering of an open rotor engine. Source: GE. Click to enlarge. Following several months refurbishing a special NASA test rig, GE Aviation and NASA this summer will begin a wind-tunnel test program to evaluate counter-rotating fan-blade systems for open rotor jet engine designs. (Earlie...
This is the type of thing that Detroit is so good at. Take an advanced specialized process and turning it into a production line process.
Ford Team Given 2009 National Inventor of the Year Award for Plasma Transferred Wire Arc Engine Coating Technology
Application of PTWA Coating to Ford ZETEC 1.4 Liter VCT Engine. Click to enlarge. The Intellectual Property Owners Education Foundation is awarding the inventors of the Ford-patented Plasma Transferred Wire Arc (PTWA) technology used to apply coatings on engine cylinder bores the 2009 National...
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