Run your Insight on water?

[dfiore]

Has anyone tried this Hydrostar or any of the so called hydrogen boosters? I'm thinking of trying ti on an old lawnmower. If that works then my John Deere and MAAAYYBEEE using it on NIIICE.

Any thoughts? It is an aluminum engine so it won't rust....

[ikhoudvanu199]

link to a website with some info maybe?

[JakkedUp]

here is just one link.
http://savefuel.ca/oxy-hydrogen/
there are many of these devices and I'm curious also if this is just junk.

[Dougie]

Send me $347 and I'll explain all about how these devices work!

There are two ways to look at these sorts of things. First, if it was so easy to improve mileage, why don't the manufacturers do it? Second, basic chemistry explains that it takes energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, and that energy has to come from somewhere...

Bottom line: Snake oil.

[JakkedUp]

I'd have to aggree Doug. If it was so easy, then why wouldn't Honda have done it in the first place on the Insight. For a measly $500 surely they would have installed such a device. Sounds like it's too good to be true, and we all know what that means.

[IamIan]

The Concept:
The fuel economy gain they speak of comes from being able to drive the engine in a lean burning mode.... between 5% and 8% BTU of an ICE if hydrogen will allow the faster flame speed of the hydrogen to promote lean burn operation.... the range is due to what type of engine and what type of fuel and ambiant temperature and RPMs ect...ect...

useless to the Insight:
The hydrogen injection proccess is used as a cheaper method to get a ICE to operate in lean burn without stalling.... the Insight has a better more advance lean burn operation ability that does not require the injection of the faster burning hydrogen gas.... from the factory and as such... this would not show the same improvement... while possible to try to combine the two lean burn precesses this would at most give you a 0.1% improvement to MPG and remember what happens in the insight when you hit lean burn to your power... double dipping into lean burn continues to drop power faster than it increase ICE Efficiency... Efficiency does not mean more power.... becuase in lean burn you are burning less fuel per engine cycle.

Beware of scams:
the vast majority of these things are scams... remember to ask some simple questions... like if they are talking about using electrolysis to split watter into hydrogen to then use the hydrogen to boost the ICE efficiecy... that is a waste of electrons for a hybrid as most comercial electrolizers are about 60% efficient at converting watter to hydrogen... if we have the electrons on board the IMA motor is like 90% efficient and as such will make better use of that electrical power.... you never get something for nothing... know what the costs are not just in money but other down sides and if it sounds too good to be true then it most likely is....

True ICE hydrogen boosting and conversion:
If you really want to convert your Inisight or Other ICE to run on Hydrogen gas or to boost your Gasoline with Hydrogen then I would sooner recomend: going to http://www.knowledgepublications.com

http://www.knowledgepublications.com/hy ... ot_com.htm

the address above above should take you to the Hydrogen and multi-fuel Engine DVD and Book... I have it and it is all good stuff... and explains the pitsfalls and how to do the stuff yourself if you actually want to...

Remember Hydrogen is nice for allot of things ... it burns clean for instance.... it is very light for instance.....

but also remeber hydrogen sucks for allot of things... energy per pound for instance... ( 5 gallons of space of hydrogen might move an insight for about 25 to 30 miles ) compared to 5 gallons of space used for gasoline will move the same insight over 300 miles... also remember that this low energy density per volume comes in when you put it into your pistons ... in order to get 5% or more of the BTUs from Hydrogen so the higher flame speed cane help you ... you give up allot of the volume in the piston that gasoline could have been in...

my 2
bits..

ian

[HafNHaf]

snake oil aint cheap!

[b1shmu63]

Thanks for a good summary Ian.

I researched it myself a while back. I learned interesting facts about Brown's gass generators and their applications for welding, but didn't find much technical info about hydrogen for ICEs.

[IamIan]

the above listed link I gave... the same people sell a small ICE that has been converted to run on Hydrogen... but 5HP just won't cut it to move a car very well...

one more thing:
it is easest if you think of hydrogen as an energy carrier and not a fuel... hydrogen carries energy like batteries do... hydorgen does not occure naturally you have to spend energy to make it ... so unlike gasoline and other things that are fuels... hydrogen is just a method of storing / moveing energy... very much like batteries.

If you want to do hydrogen in your car... it is also much better idea to electrolise at home... and then put the H2 you get into either a carbon fiber high pressure gas tank... or if you have tons of money to spend then use metal hydrides to store the hydrogen....

OH....
One more thing:
All the methods of storing hydrogen will have less energy per pound than NiMH batteries will.... which in turn are less than Li-Ion Batteries... which are still less than gasoline.

my 2 bits.

[jonnoshore]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OE4wRBu5 ... ed&search=

I thought this was the link to see proper hydrogen power...