dlq04

Drop down on this page a few lines to see and read about this amazing idea.

http://trak.in/tags/business/2008/07/01/ta...ess+Blog+%21%29

WhiteS2k

Good idea, but what happens when the car gets into a crash? Will the air tank explode?

tof

No reason to think that. There are plenty of fleet vehicles running LNG and propane, both stored on board under high pressure. The tanks used will survive impacts that would crumple the rest of the car like tinfoil.

This is an interesting idea...air being quite a bit lighter and cheaper than lead and acid. I would think the engine would be much lighter as well since it would not be dealing with combustion temperatures.

mikegarrison

The pressure in a fuel tank is nowhere near the pressure that would be required for a pneumatically powered car. Tank structural failure would be a significant danger.

I don't see this as a useful idea except for something like a vehicle that would drive around in a factory, where it could be plugged into to compressed air lines any time it wasn't actually being driven somewhere.

tof

Well, apparently tata hasn't gotten the word.

My reference to propane was not a good example of the state of high pressure tank technology since propane liquifies at relative low pressures. But Honda stores hydrogen on board at 5000 psi in the FCX Clarity cars running around the west coast now. So tank integrity is apparently not an issue even at very high pressures.

MDI, the engineering firm that developed the air car, says the car’s carbon-fiber tanks has a capacity of 340 liters of air at 4350 psi. They claim a maximum range of 125 miles.

dlq04

tof, thanks for the added research. Personnally I just shrugged off Mike's comments as - some people just can't wait to kill a good idea.

mikegarrison

4350 psi. And you think that's not a safety concern?

A full tank of gasoline is a safety concern too. Anything with enough stored energy to drive a car around for hundreds of miles is a safety concern.

Keep in mind, I didn't say it was impossible. I just took exception to your brushing off of the issue based on backyard propane tanks.

mikegarrison

Yeah, engineers get that reaction a lot.

Legal Bill

I'm having a hard time believing this would even work, let alone be more economical than internal combustion or electric motors. Anyone who has worked with compressed air knows that it doesn't go very far before you need more of it to do work, such as simple air tools or a blast cabinet. And to compress air, you first need to burn fuel or gather solar energy to make electricity and then use the electricity to compress the air. So there are two losses before you even start using the energy.

I'm not saying it is impossible, but I'm not able to get my mind around it.

mikegarrison

Yes, of course. The point is that a fixed power plant can be more efficient than a car engine. So you still might have a total system efficiency which is better than a small gasoline engine in the car.