heat waste = HP??

[kcap122]

Has anyone thought of using the radiator as a energy source, i.e. using steam in the radiator to power the alternator instead of the crank, and then disconnecting the alternator completely to free up HP?

OR something like filling the radiator with water, and using the steam in hybrid electric engines????

Hm.

[Miataracer]

um... if you have that much steam in your radiator something is wrong.

[Reed]

oh hey why dont you just run the alternator off an electric motor.

or instead of using an internal combustion engine someone should come up with a way of making a boiler that would create steam to turn the wheels.

[kcap122]

Originally Posted by Miataracer

um... if you have that much steam in your radiator something is wrong.

im just saying hypothetically, i.e. use the heat of the internal combustion engine to effectively power a steam engine?

[duplox]

I don't think you'd want to use a steam engine, it takes up much to much space and the entire purpose of a pressurized cooling system is to keep the water from turning into steam. There are other engines that run off of heat exchange, I forget the name of them at the moment. One idea I had was to use the heat to drive a water pump, so you'd pretty much have a self contained cooling system. Another interesting result of using a system like this is if the engine is cold, no coolant will circulate. When its semi warm, coolant will circulate slowly, hot, faster etc. Eventually it'll reach a balance between the radiator's efficiency and how much heat the engine is dumping into the cooling system, and temperature would stabilize. There is a problem that with different outdoor temperatures, the efficiency of the pump would alter(more efficient when its cold, less when its hot), so you wouldn't have the precision of a thermostat for keeping temperatures exactly at 180* regardless of outside temperatures. An idea to get around this is to use a tstat as almost a wastegate for the water pump's "engine". Considering nearly a third of the energy an engine produces goes to the coolant, I think you'd have no problem running a water pump and alternator off of the heat alone. The only problem is keeping the engine running for the first 3 minutes or so until the motor warms up and can actually turn the alternator. I wouldn't doubt that a normal car battery will discharge in less than 3 minutes of running without an alternator.

[91civicDXdude]

after reading this post, i thought of it, then decided it was a retarded idea, unlike turbocharging, which uses wasted heat energy and turns it into horsepower.

[f22burnout]

Alright here's a crazy way to free up the hp lost with all that crap. On a civic and mustang gt we added piping on to the a/c and got a condenser and put the air going into the intake. So when you turn on the a/c it blows cold air into the intake thus cold air more hp. On the civic gained 21 whp and the gt 33 whp.

[civicHBsi91]

The alternator does not waste much horsepower anyway.

I took off the alternator belt at the track after a run to see if it would help me out any.

It did nothing but leave me sitting in the parking lot for a half hour in the dark putting my alternator belt back on.

[kcap122]

Originally Posted by f22burnout

Alright here's a crazy way to free up the hp lost with all that crap. On a civic and mustang gt we added piping on to the a/c and got a condenser and put the air going into the intake. So when you turn on the a/c it blows cold air into the intake thus cold air more hp. On the civic gained 21 whp and the gt 33 whp.

thats basically a 0.5psi turbo haha 33whp is pretty much bull

[Polygon]

Originally Posted by kcap122

thats basically a 0.5psi turbo haha 33whp is pretty much bull

I don't think he is talking about compressing the air to force more in. He is talking about cooling the intake charge temp. That would be some pretty damn cold air.

[Reed]

i find it kinda hard to believe that the hp gain from the colder air would be more than the loss from running the compressor. i guess it could work but you've got to have one hell of a condenser.

i think im gonna try that on my shitty 94 impreza.

[kcap122]

You also gotta remember the reason they tell you not to leave your A/C on when racing. It's because the A/C fan is actually run off the crank in some cars, and as the RPM's get too high, you can blow your A/C out. You'll know if this is the case if you get a loud whining sound while your A/C is on at high revs.

The problem I see is that if you use the A/C to cool incoming air, its gonna slow down the crank and cause a little less air to come in because it will hav to be pushed past the evaporator core. I can't see any gains that would not negated by other issues

[duplox]

The only way I would ever consider doin that is to have something like this:
(cutaway view)

_________
_____________
_____________
_________

The outer lines are the intake pipe, the A/C is the inner pipe. The gap around the outside would have to have a filter hooked to it somehow. I don't think the A/C system would flow enough air to feed the engine... This way, the A/C can run full tilt and the engine wouldn't have any extra intake restriction. It just gets cooler air. Not sure if it'll increase performance. how much power will you get vs running the a/c pump?... probably enough on hot days to gain power, but on cooler days, probably 65 degrees fahrenheit and below, it'd be negligible. maybe if you rig this system up and you live in a hot area, you could turn it on whenever you're pull up to a light next to some hot car. If you never use (for example..) your floor vents, just find where that pipe is and run it into your intake pipe. Then when you want the extra power, just put your A/C on 'floor', crank it up to the max, and go! you could probably just put a Y fitting on the end of your intake pipe(better yet, in the beginning, right at the intake manifold) and one end leads to the a/c and one to a filter. With a fan blowing the A/C into the intake, that would be the path of least restriction, so the A/C air would enter the engine before the just filtered air. Filtered air would come in only when the A/C isnt flowing enough air to feed the engine. I suspect it would work very well in hot weather.

[kcap122]

Originally Posted by duplox

The only way I would ever consider doin that is to have something like this:
(cutaway view)

_________
_____________
_____________
_________

The outer lines are the intake pipe, the A/C is the inner pipe. The gap around the outside would have to have a filter hooked to it somehow. I don't think the A/C system would flow enough air to feed the engine... This way, the A/C can run full tilt and the engine wouldn't have any extra intake restriction. It just gets cooler air. Not sure if it'll increase performance. how much power will you get vs running the a/c pump?... probably enough on hot days to gain power, but on cooler days, probably 65 degrees fahrenheit and below, it'd be negligible. maybe if you rig this system up and you live in a hot area, you could turn it on whenever you're pull up to a light next to some hot car. If you never use (for example..) your floor vents, just find where that pipe is and run it into your intake pipe. Then when you want the extra power, just put your A/C on 'floor', crank it up to the max, and go! you could probably just put a Y fitting on the end of your intake pipe(better yet, in the beginning, right at the intake manifold) and one end leads to the a/c and one to a filter. With a fan blowing the A/C into the intake, that would be the path of least restriction, so the A/C air would enter the engine before the just filtered air. Filtered air would come in only when the A/C isnt flowing enough air to feed the engine. I suspect it would work very well in hot weather.

Then why would you keep the non-A/C intake pipe at all?

[Reed]

why not just use a y pipe into the intake from the ac fan.

i have never seen an AC fan run off the crank. they tell you to turn off the ac cause it ads parasitic hp losses to the crank and i dont think that the gains from colder air would overcome those losses.