Emissions from automobiles and trucks need to be reduced, and fuel economy increased. Not only that, we need vehicle engines that can burn almost anything that can be pumped, not just petroleum. I have tried to do my part here: During the Energy Crisis of the 70s, on my own, I explored the field of vehicle steam engines because of their inherent low emissions. My intent was devising an efficient thermodynamic power cycle. Even then, steam engines made sense in terms of quiet operation and low emissions, but needed a cycle that could deliver high efficiency and compact size with warm air cooling. I knew that scaling central power stations to auto engines, which had been tried in programs supported by State of California and the DOE, was hopelessly inadequate for vehicles.

I succeeded in creating such a power cycle, obtained a patent, did a lot of analysis, but failed to get funding. It seemed that, once I mentioned "steam engine", the old quaint stereotypes of big clunkers clicked into place; no one would listen to my detailed innovations that profoundly improved performance and reduced weight and size.

I boxed up my files a decade ago and didn't look at them until recently after moving back to the States following five years working on an international nuclear fusion project in Japan. When I returned, I sent out a few letters to diesel engine manufacturers. I did get one response from a major heavy equipment and diesel engine manufacturer. We have interacted for three years now. They are interested in this engine, but are very conservative about spending their research funds on outside ideas. They are concerned about development costs and the fact that my engine does not quite match current (and polluting) diesels in efficiency - mine gets 36% at part load; the best diesels are nearly 45%. But they believe that my thermodynamic cycle is the best approach they've seen. If diesels are ever saddled with emission controls, their efficiency would come down to about the same as my engine; but they would still be much heavier, noisy, and can be hard to start in cold weather. Of course there is the question as to whether or not emission controls would work on diesel engines.

My engine seems to have all the advantages of gasoline and diesel engines with few of the problems. For example, it has high efficiency at part load: I have calculated 36% net efficiency at certain part-load settings, with modest fuel requirements, e.g, anything that can be pumped. There are no octane or cetane requirements. Unlike the diesel, it is easy to start - even in cold weather. It is also lightweight, 2-3 lbs/hp (even though it is designed to the conservative ASME Boiler and Pressure Vessel Code), and compact. Most important, because it uses a two-stage combustor with 30:1 final air/fuel ratio (twice needed to burn the fuel) and peak combustion temperatures of no more than 2600 F, it ought to be virtually pollution-free. While my original target was passenger cars with gasoline engines, I believe this would make it a strong competitor for modern diesel engines, especially if emission controls become a requirement.

I have done a lot of analytical work on this engine to justify to myself that it was worth my time and effort. For example, I wrote a 5000 line Fortran computer code that uses computerized properties of steam (the best working fluid after all), heat exchanger properties from Kays and London's Compact Heat Exchangers, and temperature-dependent properties of materials. I also did (pre-CAD) layouts for a 90 hp prototype.

With the computer code, I can pick a power rating and then size up the major components. I can perform part-load analyses and calculate performance in vehicles. So far, these have ranged from a 2300 lb compact to an 80000 lb truck. I got access to similar vehicles and did coast-down measurements to get the vehicle power curves. From that I calculated acceleration, grade-climbing, steady-speed fuel economy, and integrated fuel economy over several SAE driving cycles (I converted those cycles to Fortran).

The results were better (sometimes twice as good) than anything I've seen in vehicle tests reported in several magazines, including Consumer Reports, and the maintenance logs from the truck. So far my results have been calculated, not measured; but one has to start somewhere.

My Qualifications

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