Cars That Run on Compressed Air

I heard that in Europe they released a car that can run on compressed air.
I was wondering if anybody knew if they released the car in the US yet?
I think they sound pretty cool for in town driving.

 

seems a simple enough design that a little f-art car could be home-made . the euro air-car is pretty good : range 120miles at 50mph , takes 3min of electricity to charge the tank with compressed air . that ain't bad , almost free . if the elec. came from wind or hydro nothing gets burned .

 

This reminds me of a toy i usede to have when i was little called an air jammer, it was a car you pump up with air, it had a little piston type engine on it. They could probably come up with a battery powered air compressor to put in the car somewhere too.

 

What a great idea; sounds like a great commuter car, dont think I'd want to hit the road on a cross country trip yet.
Found this site, alot of info....
http://www.theaircar.com/car.html

..............Dennis.......Alaskan

 

Haven't heard of it in the U.S. Everything is about 20 years behind in the U.S., especially when it comes to cars.

There are compressed air motors used in RC airplanes.

Running a vehicle on nitrogen gas that evaporates from liquid N2 is another idea. It requires a really good thermos bottle. There are applications for it in aircraft since it would be lightweight and simple.

Here's another idea called the vanadium redox cell. It's like a battery but the electrolyte would be replaced at a 'gas station' instead of recharging it. That would give a quick recharge and long range. The electrodes don't get altered, so it should have a longer life than other batteries such as lead acid which need to be replaced every few years.

http://www.vrb.unsw.edu.au/
.
There are some ideas floating around about spinning up a large heavy disc and using the mechanical energy of it to power a car.

The problem of batteries is expense, large size and weight, relatively short life, and short range. The ideas of using compressed air and a spinning disc overcome some of those drawbacks.

.

 

this sounds awsome
i hope it gets to the U.S.

 

this issue of compressed-air-powered cars is not new, in fact it is pretty old and dates back to 2001 . Dr. Guy Negre, a french engineer, developed this "EOLO" car , which had to get into production in 2002 in Rieti (Italy) by a french corporation but for some reason the factory never started this production and the workers were sent home without doing a single day of work... It seems that the car suffered with problems of overcooling which were said to lead to freezing of some parts. It's very curious that a production line is built before proper, thorough tests of the final product, but this could be the result of the usual italian fraud: to get public money for something, with the complicity of some politician, then keep the money and invent some excuse, while keeping the money. It's not the first time.

Some people cry at the conspiracy against oil alternatives.
My personal opinion is that EOLO was a piece of crap since air must be compressed in advance and this costs energy. It's more obvious to use electric cars (EOLO had an auxiliary electric engine too) ; the real problem is always the same, to obtain a clean source of power. But unless people stops watching football matches and teen asses on the TV and starts struggling for his future, we are pretty likely doomed in a few decades or less.

 

I think it's very doable. Saw a program recently on alternative vehicles and to me this one made the most sense.

http://www.theaircar.com/

I am sure the petroleum industry and now the increasing ethanol industry will put and end to any consideration of it.

 

why lose time and money with those prototypes that after all dont solve nothing ? did you read the article? this latest Negre stuff has a conventional, gasoline engine AND a stupid compressed air motor for city use. doesnt look a genial idea at all. it uses the power of gasoline to compress air (thus wasting energy) in out-of-town circulation , then uses air for urban circulation.

according to my little brains the only viable, ready solution is biofuels like ethanol or vegetal oils, it was the predicted alternative , back in the 40's, to oil: Henry Ford believed in the alcohol engine and in Brazil they use ethanol alone or mixes of ethanol and gasoline since the _seventies_. what's wrong with ethanol ? we arent going to run short of alcohol, it is a renewable resource and, if it wont solve all problems of human combustions, at least it is cleaner (light a kerosene lamp in a room, then light a spirit stove in another room, wait one minute and tell me the difference...) , it is forever, it hasnt to be transported from a continent to another , its production will employ a lot of workers, if it spills from a ship it does no harm except running the fishes berzerk and isnt likely to be a reason of WAR since it isnt a limited resource. Yes, it is not as powerful as gas, yes, probably we cant produce as much alcohol as gasoline, but it is no God spell that everyone on this earth has to have his own motor car, or that one has to use it every day and for recreation too.

henry ford said :
"There's enough alcohol in one year's yeild of an acre of potatoes to drive the machinery necessary to cultivate the fields for one hundred years."
and he was a successful businessman , not some crazy idealist. He was also a nazist sympathizer but thats another story
i'd buy an alcohol powered vehicle right now if they were available along with a convenient way to refuel, i mean other than a trip to the nearest distillery. what do you think about this ?

 

What good would they be? Compressed air isn't exactly an efficient medium for storing and using energy.

 

The vehicle they profiled on the cable article was supplemented by an electric engine. And they were working on having it generate it's own recharge while in operation. Perhaps it is a pie in the sky concept. But certainly something that gets you thinking.

 

If that profile had been true that would be the closest thing to perpetual motion ever actually designed, does make you think. If you could harness compressed air through a few bucks of electricity initially.... could you keep the thing running in perpetuity? It would be the biggest boon to the poor man ever invented.

Sure parts would fatigue and have to be replaced, but you wouldn't have to stop at the local fill up station. You could afford the repairs. And no more charge for the bi-annual smog check.

 

Oh great, another perpetual motion scheme.

 

compressed air, fly wheels, batteries, (even "clockworks" i.e. windups), these are all ways of storing energy, and as such all are superior as a form of propulsion for mechanized transportation. this still only solves one half of the problem with personal transportation as a primary means of long distance travel.

the other is real estate consumed, and in that context guideway based systems are inhierently superior. as they are likewise in the context of energy efficiency. and of course, any propulsion system which can be applied to personal vehicules, can also be implimented in mulitiple unit vehicules opperating on guideways.

and for very small form factor guideway based systems onboard solar charging of batteries becomes almost self sustaining.

compressed air as a means of storing energy for propulsion has been arround a long time. believe it or not, back in the steam era, there were smokeless compressed air railway engines that worked in certain areas where such alternatives were absolutely neccessary.

=^^=
.../\...

oh yes, and speaking of perpetual motion, yes, the energy STORED in stored energy systems DOES HAVE TO COME FROM somewhere.

preferably the wind, solar, hydro, combination and NOT oil, coal and/or nukes.

of course that energy to be stored and later used for propulsion, can be collected from the kennetic energy from every time you go down a hill, where motors become generators and 'regenerate' or, perhapse similarly with this compressed air system (or flywheels or clockworks). you're still not going to collect as much energy that way as you're going to expend climbing the next equivelant hill. but that would make the amount you can store go a bit further.

no you wouldn't have to stop at a GAS fill up station, you'd just have to stop at a compressed air fill up station instead. (and you don't think you'd have to in some way pay, for this charge of compressed air, if a majority of vehicules ran on it?)

=^^=
.../\...

 

get outta here - next you'll be telling us they invented a car that you wind up with a key and it goes at 50mph for 120 miles

like this one

 

I was my impression that the engine or motor of the compressed air car was a compressor, what it needed initially was electricity to generate the compression.

I think it would be hard even for policiticians to find a way to charge for air, but then many people pay for water, so I guess anything can be marketed.

 

It is something to think about and ask why not?

 

nazi?
makes sence,

It was a sweltering August day when the Cohen brothers entered the posh
Dearborn, Michigan, offices of Henry Ford, the car maker, "Mr. Ford,"
announced Norman Cohen, the eldest of the three. "We have a remarkable
invention that will revolutionise the automobile industry." Ford looked
sceptical, but their threat to offer it to the competition kept his
interest piqued. "We would like to demonstrate it to you in person."

After a little cajoling, they brought Mr. Ford outside and asked him to
enter a black automobile parked in front of the building. Hyman Cohen, the
middle brother, opened the door of the car. "Please step inside, Mr.
Ford."
"What!" shouted the tycoon, "Are you crazy? It must be two hundred degrees
in that car!"
"It is," smiled the youngest brother, Max, "but sit down Mr. Ford and push
the white button." Intrigued, Ford pushed the button. All of a sudden a
whoosh of freezing air started blowing from vents all around the car and
within seconds the automobile was not only comfortable, it was quite cool.
"This is amazing!" exclaimed Ford. "How much do you want for the patent?"
Norman spoke up, "The price is one million dollars." Then he paused. And
there is something else. The name 'Cohen Brothers Air-conditioning' must
be stamped right next to the Ford logo!"
"Money is no problem," retorted Ford, "but no way will I have a Jewish
name next to my logo on my cars!'

They haggled back and forth for a while and finally they settled. Five
million dollars, but the Cohens' name would be left off. However, the
first names of the Cohen brothers would be forever emblazoned upon the
console of every Ford air conditioning system.

And that is why, even today, whenever you enter a Ford vehicle, you will
see those three names clearly printed on the air conditioning control
panel: NORM, HI and MAX.

 

heard of somethin similar to this and inside the doors n shit it had this weird ass moss that was supposed to live in there so wherever u were ur car was turnin CO2 or w/e into usable oxygen pretty nice idea i think would prolly only work if mass produced tho

 

An air compressor can't power itself with only an "initial" charge.