Air-Powered Car Coming to U.S. in 2009 to 2010 at Sub-$18,000, Could Hit 1000-Mile Range

Hadn't seen that article yet, though these have been promised "next year" for many years now. This thing doesn't even exist yet, of course! And they'll sell it here in just a year or two? That's a pretty tall order - almost as likely as selling 100's of 1000's of Volts in 2010.

I'm also a bit confused - they speak of the "air car" and "zero pollution" and then go on to talk about maybe getting 1000 miles if they have a tank of liquid fuel and some compressed air. Huh?

Unless the laws of thermdynamics are broken, this will be among the least efficient vehicles on the road. :-(

 

Yes, the losses of going through those compression/expansion cycles will be killers, and carrying enough compressed gas will be harder than batteries, and we know how difficult that is.

Tom

 

Whoa. This company is in my home town? And I do not know about this?

I do now. I will check them out.

 

I find concept drawings to be so very stylized... and usually ugly.

My Prius is prettier.

 

More bullshit. We've beaten this horse to death several times over. :deadhorse: Yes, it is possible, even trivial, to run a car on compressed air. However, the heat generated during the compression phase makes it very inefficient unless you can utilize that waste heat for space heating. (E.g. re-charge the car while it is sitting in your living room in winter.) Further, compressors are noisy. The thing is going to make a dreadful racket while it's charging. And finally, the range on a charge of air will be short, due to the limitations on how much air can be shoved into a given tank. And tanks capable of sustaining high pressures are very heavy. And of course if you carry fuel to run an engine to run a compressor to re-charge the air while you drive then you've defeated the whole point of an air car.

 

Hmmmm.. There's a tire shop down the street that has an air hose that's left out 24 hours a day with free air for topping up the tires. I wonder..........

 

Hey, if it'll deliver a few thousand psi you're in business! :car:

 

According to the website of ZPM, the car is a hybrid compressed air/gasoline engine, getting a total of just over 100 mpg in normal use. The compressed air is stored in carbon fibre tanks and is the source of energy until about 35 mph. There is even a video of an Australian journalist driving a (very noisy) prototype.

It seems to work but the economics of its mechanism remains to be seen. They claim that the three tanks use about $2 per refill which seems very low even at last year's energy pricing. Also, they air is converted to rolling force using pistons and a crankshaft; that seems to be an inefficient way.

The key calculation would be if storing energy as compressed air and converting it into kinetic energy would be as economical as storing energy in a battery.

From a user viewpoint, the noise factor using the proposed drivetain is a consideration. The idea may make economic sense.

 

D'OH! someone beat me to it.

 

There was a great series on one of the Discovery networks last year called Future Cars where they looked at this technology.

It was pretty cool.

 

I saw this a year ago, the prototype seems real, but will they be able to produce something other than a death box that will get approval for the U.S.???

I think that there is a New Zeland company that has an air engine that uses a rotary piston, which is much more efficient for air.

 

While the technology can work, the claim of 100 mpg is not credible. With the energy ultimately coming from gasoline, and with the loss due to the heating of the air as it is compressed, I'd believe something in the 40 to 45 mpg range.