Running a V8 on Hydrogen?

[Jonny Boaterboy]

Well I have just been reading about installing a hydrogen system on my V8 to increase the MPG. At first glance it seems like a good Idea. you attach some bottles to your engine bay with water and baking soda in them, pass a current through it and it gives hydrogen..... stick a tube on top of the bottle and put the tube on the air intake and there you have it hydrogen going into the engine thus increasing the "Bang" in the engine and therefor less pedal pressure tho get you going...... and more MPG

Has any one heard of this? more to the point is anyone running on hydrogen? they claim it cleans your engine and makes it run smoother... does it? or will it wreak your engine?

Here is a link to one of the people selling the system:

http://water4gas.com/2books.htm?hop=cbsecured#damage

sounds like a good Idea what do you think?

Jonny

[thermidorthelobster]

The amount of energy you need to electrolyse the water into hydrogen will be more than the amount of energy you get out of it by burning it.  That's the mahoosive flaw in most of these magic water schemes.

I'm not sure what difference the baking soda would make, but I'd have thought you'd have needed a lot of soda to yield much difference in your hydrogen electrolysis when you're talking V8 quantities of hydrogen.

That said, a small amount of hydrogen could conceivably tweak the efficiency of your engine a little by making it burn the dino juice more efficiently.

I'm not really sold on the idea though.

[carracarra13]

can I just say if its an aliminum enging DO NOT use it as over heats engine (this is from a m8 in the no)

[Rossko]

I'm not sure what difference the baking soda would make, but I'd have thought you'd have needed a lot of soda to yield much difference in your hydrogen electrolysis when you're talking V8 quantities of hydrogen.

The soda is needed to make the water conduct ; it'll only electrolyse if you pass current through it and you can't pass much current through pure or tap water.  Proponents of 'free gas from water' are pretty coy about the costs of this necessary additive (although it must be cheap, surely) and the cost of replacing the stainless electrodes which corrode (maybe not so cheap).

Like you say, these gizmos are only intended to trickle a small additive amount of hydrogen/oxygen mix to the engine.  On straightforward laws of thermodynamics, you can't get more energy out of burning the H/O mix than you put in with electricity from the alternator.  There remains a theoretical possibility that the presence of H/O mix somehow magically improves the thermal efficiency of the normal petrol burn more than the (at least) 50% losses involved in generating the electric, but frankly I don't believe that all  :)

No, I haven't tried it.  Nor have I tried a wind generator on top of an electric car so it fuels itself for free ...

cheers, Ross K

[Reggieroo]

Well when you get it working let me know as the cost of LPG isn't all that cheap anymore.................... :'(

[Jonny Boaterboy]

I'm not sure what difference the baking soda would make, but I'd have thought you'd have needed a lot of soda to yield much difference in your hydrogen electrolysis when you're talking V8 quantities of hydrogen.

The soda is needed to make the water conduct ; it'll only electrolyse if you pass current through it and you can't pass much current through pure or tap water.  Proponents of 'free gas from water' are pretty coy about the costs of this necessary additive (although it must be cheap, surely) and the cost of replacing the stainless electrodes which corrode (maybe not so cheap).

Like you say, these gizmos are only intended to trickle a small additive amount of hydrogen/oxygen mix to the engine.  On straightforward laws of thermodynamics, you can't get more energy out of burning the H/O mix than you put in with electricity from the alternator.  There remains a theoretical possibility that the presence of H/O mix somehow magically improves the thermal efficiency of the normal petrol burn more than the (at least) 50% losses involved in generating the electric, but frankly I don't believe that all  :)

No, I haven't tried it.  Nor have I tried a wind generator on top of an electric car so it fuels itself for free ...

cheers, Ross K

Ross I hear where your coming from but let me run this by you: at present I'm getting 17MPG if I fit the hydro system I could be getting 25MPG Yes I am putting more load on the altinater but I'm still getting more MPG, the water and soda don't cost much and need replenishing every 1000 miles or so so surely that means I quids in?

That does depend on how much of an improvement it makes on the MPG but with the outlay being around $250 is it worth a go?

I am a little worried about what carracarra13 said They claim it lowers the temp. of the engine and cleans it out....... but common sense tells me this might be a sales pitch!

[Disco Matt]

I personally wouldn't spend that much money on it. I am very dubious about how much difference it makes, it must be borne in mind that many "fuel saver" devices appear to work because drivers subconsciously drive more efficiently after fitting them.

I know someone who fitted the "jam jar" type to a Jeep Cherokee, he didn't have any problems with it but MPG improvement was very marginal - his view seemed to be that it was fun to fiddle with and it had made a slight improvement so was worth the effort. But I don't think a 12v electrical system could produce enough hydrogen to make a real difference to an engine this size.

I can't entirely rubbish it, as I know someone who had some improvement from one. But I wouldn't spend $250 on it.

[Eeyore]

Gotta agree with the above. It's kinda snake oil. Yes hydrogen can be used to improve fuel efficiency, but not by cracking your own under the bonnet - it just doesn't math out.

As I'll often point out, virtually all claims made by people selling this kinda stuff are unverified. Driving style can make up 30% difference in fuel consumption, and many rolling road results can be blagged too.

Personally, I'd use the $250 for buying more petrol.  ;)

[thermidorthelobster]

Ross I hear where your coming from but let me run this by you: at present I'm getting 17MPG if I fit the hydro system I could be getting 25MPG

If you write me a cheque for $250, I'll make a sacrifice to the pagan gods, and you COULD magically get 35mpg out of your V8.  But if I'm honest, you won't.

There's a huge difference between could and will get 25mpg.  If you will, then it's worth it.  You *could* get 25mpg by doing a whole lot of things, but you almost certainly won't.

There is one certainty though;  anybody who's just spent $250 on their truck is very likely to find some magical difference where none exists, so they don't feel they've been conned.  This is pretty much the basis of stage hynosis.

[Range Rover Blues]

Burning fule in your engine is very very inefficient, by adding catalysts to the fuel you can change the way if burns, the way it attomises etc etc.

People add acetone to fuel, it makes a difference doesn't it?  and those clever japanese have an in-cylinder catlytic lining in their GDI engines.  This stuff does work, the trick is sifting out the snake oil and finding the ones that work for your engine.

So be careful rubbishing them all out of hand, there is clear evidence that adding LPG to a TDi will increase MPG by a large margin.  In this case it's a fuel catalyst, rich in HYDROGEN.

[The Fat Controller]

ther was an advert in LRO a few months ago with reference to this subject.i phoned the bloke,recieved answers and pictures and prices.the cost was about £100 per cell of which 4 would be needed for a V8 and the fuel use improvement would be no more than 15%.my plans were to visit him for more talks at brighton when i went down at the beginning of october but a visit to look over a carmichel commando came up so that took presidence.4days later i brought the commando back to the fenns from Brighton.it is now living in Cambridge while i do a few things to it.

[crazymac]

You could always go down the "wood gas" route!!

watched on the "Planet Mechanics" the other morning where they hd a toyota pickup running on the gas produced from wood burning!

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=J4n_OaCIQ-s&feature=related

[Range Rover Blues]

Very popular in Europe during WWII, Norway IIRC during the occupation.

[crazymac]

Very popular in Europe during WWII, Norway IIRC during the occupation.

If you do a youtube search its surprising how many are running this over in the Scandanavian countries! I'd never heard of it before the planet mechanics! (great programs by the way!!!)

[Range Rover Blues]

Doesn't look too safe though, all that peipeworj full of gass on the fornt bumper :-o

[Jonny Boaterboy]

well i have been reading a day by day lesson from one of the "gas" people and while I still think it might work I was put off by the fact they they say all cars are designed not to be fuel efficient because "the powers that be" want us to spend money on fuel...... ummm not so sure, allthough everything they say about the hydrogen side of things seems to add up. Would like to hear from someone who has actuall fitted one and got the benifits..... anyway it doesnt matter now fuel at my local shell has droped to 94.9 a litre! bet it wont stay there!


 

Ross I hear where your coming from but let me run this by you: at present I'm getting 17MPG if I fit the hydro system I could be getting 25MPG

If you write me a cheque for $250, I'll make a sacrifice to the pagan gods, and you COULD magically get 35mpg out of your V8.  But if I'm honest, you won't.

There's a huge difference between could and will get 25mpg.  If you will, then it's worth it.  You *could* get 25mpg by doing a whole lot of things, but you almost certainly won't.

There is one certainty though;  anybody who's just spent $250 on their truck is very likely to find some magical difference where none exists, so they don't feel they've been conned.  This is pretty much the basis of stage hynosis.

sacrifice to the pagan gods? Might be worth a go! how about I give you £250? its better than dollers they might like that  [-o<