Getting Out Of The Box With Hot Air

I did indicate at the beginning of the thread that some proposals could be considered bizarre and preposterous. You may not be aware of the diversity of air compressors that are commercially available.I have a new high efficiency one here somewhere that compresses to 300 psi. The compressor measures about 2x2x6 inches. 200 to 300 psi should be more than enough to to turn a 12 volt generator once a storage tank is pressurized .

If we are ever going to escape the box of failed technologies we are going to have to accept the risks of ridicule that accompany freedom of thought and expression.

 

You turn in circles Questor........

all nonsense!
Put energy in and get more energy out. That is your goal. Like in your pebbles in pool thread.

It is a phantasy, and a very, very premature and uneducated one.

 

Questor, I finally completely agree with one of your posts!

You are absolutely, 100% correct here. All you see all day long on the roads are 2 ton automobiles with a single person in them and several empty seats. That is a highly inefficient transportation model. As much as I've given you a hard time about your lack of scientific training, I do have to say:

Your heart is in the right place. At least you're thinking about the problems. Better than half the citizens of the USA.

 

I'm a little disappointed that you can't appreciate the beauty of wave power being used to compress gas to pressures that would allow valuable electrical power generation. I think it's a very viable low cost alternative energy technology. I can see the possibility of Apex rushing to the patent office with a viable model as I write this.

 

except for the bubble trail compressed air worked well in torpedoes

 

That was a very environmental friendly, extremely efficient and fast vessel, no doubt!

But energy storage with compressed air is mad, just a dumb idea.

 

not if you have a electrically operated compressor running an air motor driven generator

 

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/6138972/

I think its advantage was for the same weight of powerpack it would go as far as the current battery technolgy car at a far cheaper price and woud recharge faster?

 

The car could gain wider acceptance among environmental extremists if owners utilized windmills to mechanically drive the air compressor, used ultra fine filtration to remove air pollutants and captured the heat of compression to supplement home heating. In the event that a home windmill might capture more energy than needed for the car itself it would be good to have plans for alternate uses of the surplus. Other uses for air surplus could be lawn mowers, power tools and the Saturday excursion with the family air power boat.

 

I don't think they will sell a lot here in Luxembourg. The roads are too dangerous because of the crazy "grenzgänger" (foreign drivers).

But I can see a niche market for this where a lightweight cheap-to-run car is required occasionally. It would need to be somewhere with access to a source of compressed air, so an obvious market would be as a boat 'tender' ...

 

Well, maybe it is just marketing, but if the numbers are true then it is the logical solution for the majority of car use patterns. Granted that most people don't choose car by logical reasons, and maybe it is not for most users: You should either have a long-range second car or the willingness to solve long journeys in other ways than own car. (However I have seen calculations stating that for the occasional car user the TCO is much lower if one rents the car for those occasions.)

 

"We need to escape the notions that we need two ton automobiles for personal urban commuting "

YOU , not WE!

If you value your life less than your dream of fuel "efficiency" feel free , the cardboard Yugos are still out there.

The safety folks claim each 400 lbs loss of car weight increases the chance of dieing in the car by a good degree.

4000lb car vs 1200 lb car , enjoy YOURSELF ,

but the rest of the world will decide for themselves weather the co$t of a single day in Intensive Care is worth all the lifetime "savings" of a death trap.

FF

 

A false claim. Or valid, to some extend, only when you compare US cars exclusively.

All European and Japanese cars are much lighter than their US competitors, and ALL are very, very much safer.

To the air nonsense again:

Are these windmills built from naturally grown stuff, given for free, and constructed without consuming energy?

Ahh,

there we are!

Dumb claims and cheating data.

You cannot successfully use compressed air to store energy. period

Skimp on torpedoes and air starter vessels please, we know that. They have a much different purpose.

Regards
Richard

 

The major reason why many consumers buy excessively large personal transport toys has very little to do with personal safety. The primary motivation of those buyers is to to unleash a personal tsunami of environmental and geopolitical destruction in their wake as they travel through life with overwhelming malicious intent.

 

Fred, the only reason any of your points have merit is that there are SUVs (highly unpopular and able to bought for a song now) on the road.

If the entire population of vehicles (excluding commercial trucks) were made lighter and more efficient, your argument for "safe" heavy vehicles would fade into irrelevance.

A "heavy" vehicle is only "heavy" when compared to something else. If they were all lighter, you could still buy your "heavy, safe" vehicle. Only difference? It would weigh 1200 lbs and get 60 miles to the gallon using a regular gasoline engine.

In any case, I'm going to go off the deep end here a minute and put forth one of my own "Questor" thoughts:

IMO, the commute to work is the single most environmentally destructive thing on the planet. Excluding workers who have to be there to work (like construction workers), how much fuel would we save if we worked from a space in our homes? Or... if we had "campuses" like a college/university that surrounded large companies such as Google or Apple? You could WALK to work!

Think what could be saved by eliminating the outdated notion of a commute for white collar workers:

*Families would need only one car
*Instead of heating and cooling 2 large buildings, a house and an office, you would heat and cool only one building, saving 50% on energy consumption right there!
*Instead of cutting down trees for more houses and more office parks, you would have a 50% reduction in need for new buildings and land.
*No longer would each building remain unoccupied for half the 24 hour period.
*Drastically reduced fuel consumption for commuting
*Reduced dependence on foreign oil (for US people)
*MORE TIME! You'd have between 1-4 hours MORE TIME per day to get things done, either personally, or professionally.
*Less seasonal illness, such as influenza. Also, a good security measure for outbreaks of major diseases.
*MORE MONEY! If you didn't have to buy two cars and all that fuel, tires, brakes, oil changes, etc... What would you do with the extra $12,000 per year?? You could put it into your boat!


The list could go on and on.

IMO, the "commute" is completely outdated and is the cause of most of our society's problems when it comes to energy shortages.

I ran a small software company in the early 2000's. We made companies more efficient through business process design and software development that mimics the perfected processes. I put my money where my mouth was. That company had a single "main office" I set up for my CTO and an administrative assistant to be in the office with me. The rest of the employees worked from their homes, the local park, a Starbucks or wherever they wanted to. This was a long time ago and it worked flawlessly. Even way back then, we had fully automated extranet systems for billing, labor, etc... I fail to see why more white collar companies don't do this.