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Old 05-04-2010, 05:21 AM   #121
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Steam cars were around 100 years ago. Could they be made today to be more efficient? What kind of pollution would they produce?


Water vapour ! - a well known greenhouse gas ....
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Old 05-04-2010, 05:51 AM   #122
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Water vapour ! - a well known greenhouse gas ....
Carbon dust... Water had to be heated before it became vapour.
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Old 05-04-2010, 07:37 AM   #123
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all that extra heat .....
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Old 05-04-2010, 09:23 AM   #124
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Carbon dust... Water had to be heated before it became vapour.
Yes. I was thinking of the old steam locomotives and the immense amounts of thick black smoke they produced from all the coal they burned to produce the steam. Is there a more environmentally-friendly way to produce steam that's economically viable as well? And what about safety? Could auto collisions release life-and-limb endangering amounts of steam?
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Old 05-04-2010, 10:16 AM   #125
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Yes. I was thinking of the old steam locomotives and the immense amounts of thick black smoke they produced from all the coal they burned to produce the steam. Is there a more environmentally-friendly way to produce steam that's economically viable as well? And what about safety? Could auto collisions release life-and-limb endangering amounts of steam?
There are all kinds of less-environmentally-damaging energy sources to use to heat water to steam... including electricity, natural gas, wax and gel fuels of various consistencies. However, the threat of steam escaping from an accident is real--superheated steam is sometimes invisible, and it can potentially kill--and one of the chief reasons steam-powered cars were never popular (though I'm not aware of specific accidents that earned them a bad rep).

Then again, gas-powered cars can catch fire, and even explode (not like on TV, but still), and that didn't keep them off the road. And modern tech can surely devise a buffer of sorts to diffuse the escaping steam to a good extent. Bottom line, I don't think steam safety concerns are enough of a reason to keep steam-powered cars off the road.
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Old 05-04-2010, 10:23 AM   #126
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wonder what the weight disadvantage to using steam would be - how many miles per gallon of water in the tank ?
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Old 05-04-2010, 11:51 AM   #127
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wonder what the weight disadvantage to using steam would be - how many miles per gallon of water in the tank ?
Gasoline is heavier than water, though I don't know by how much. But what is more significant is whether as much energy can be unleashed by turning water to steam, as by compressing and igniting gasoline. As Wodin has noted, I believe the specific energy from igniting gas is higher. So to go the same distance, you'd need more water than gas, probably removing any weight advantage.

Steam might not be the ideal fuel for an engine. But possibly using some other source of existing heat (such as tire and brake friction) to convert to electrical or compressive energy would be a better use of heat exchange. When added to the electric plant of an EV, it could provide additional power for acceleration, or help to power on-board devices.
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Old 05-04-2010, 01:42 PM   #128
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Gasoline is heavier than water, though I don't know by how much.
That's not actually true, Steve. See here for a useful table of the specific gravity of all sorts of liquids. Petrol (gasoline) has a specific gravity of about 0.73 (water = 1.0). This is obvious, if you stop and think about it; petrol consists of the lighter fractions of crude oil, and crude oil itself (specific gravity about 0.8-0.9, depending where it's from) floats on water, as is currently being practically illustrated around parts of the US coastline.
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Old 05-04-2010, 01:52 PM   #129
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But possibly using some other source of existing heat (such as tire and brake friction) to convert to electrical or compressive energy would be a better use of heat exchange. When added to the electric plant of an EV, it could provide additional power for acceleration, or help to power on-board devices.
They tried this in Formula 1 Racing last year. The KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System) would recover energy produced under braking, store it and use it to provide a boost of acceleration when needed. It was generally not considered a success and is not being used for this year's racing (although there's rumours of it coming back again next year). Basically the weight of the system was considered to outweigh it's practical advantages.
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Old 05-04-2010, 01:55 PM   #130
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They tried this in Formula 1 Racing last year. The KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System) would recover energy produced under braking, store it and use it to provide a boost of acceleration when needed. It was generally not considered a success and is not being used for this year's racing (although there's rumours of it coming back again next year). Basically the weight of the system was considered to outweigh it's practical advantages.
The hybrid Toyota Prius also uses energy from braking to charge its batteries. It's a little disconcerting at first, because there's a "lag" of a fraction of a second between pressing the brake pedal and the brakes "kicking in", as a result.
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Old 05-04-2010, 02:04 PM   #131
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Welll here it is. Now if I was in the market for a $32K car, and had a PV farm in the back yard ...
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Old 05-04-2010, 02:07 PM   #132
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That's not actually true, Steve. See here for a useful table of the specific gravity of all sorts of liquids...
Of course... where was my mind? I was obviously thinking of other petroleum-based compounds...

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They tried this in Formula 1 Racing last year. The KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System) would recover energy produced under braking, store it and use it to provide a boost of acceleration when needed.
I was actually thinking of the heat itself, not just the mechanical energy transference used by hybrids, etc. Tires generate a lot of heat strictly by virtue of their rolling along the ground at high speeds. In a more efficient world, even this excess energy might be worth capturing...
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Old 05-04-2010, 02:12 PM   #133
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Welll here it is. Now if I was in the market for a $32K car, and had a PV farm in the back yard ...
Don't forget that Federal rebate... brings the cost down to about $25,000. (And you'd probably qualify the the Federal rebates for renewable energy by putting that PV farm in your back yard!) Still a bit pricey compared to the smallest cars, but about the same as an average American ride. It's still at the top of my list for 2015-2020, depending on how the other carmakers respond...
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Old 05-04-2010, 02:13 PM   #134
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What do you think about this electric car?

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Old 05-04-2010, 02:29 PM   #135
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It would be interesting, if it were actually available. And street-legal in the US. And had a dealer and repair network.

In fact, if it were available here at a reasonable price, my wife and I would probably buy one. But it appears to be made of unobtanium at the moment, so...

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