oxyhydrogen PWM circuit ?

Areal Person

Hi,

I want to use the Propeller in a (PWM I think) circuit to control
the a current cycle at 20k cps for around 3amps up to around 30amps.

I’m trying to duplicate Stan Meyers low current water fracturing
experiment with oxyhydrogen generation.

Here it is on youtube…




Could someone please explain what the basic circuit(s) would be ? (or look like?)
I just need simple general instructions to get started. I’m sure I have most all the parts.

But I have no idea how to build this simple circuit. (Or at least I think it is really simple)

My DC volts would be 6-12vdc, my amps would be 1 to 30. This range is for experiments.
and my cycles are as listed above.

Obviously, I want much gas with as little amps as possible.

I don’t know where to start, I’ve read the wiki on PWM etc… but I need
something in layman terms, so I can get started with the Propeller on the project.

Thanks for any help,
-Areal

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I have a tree growing out of my head, but

what do you expect ? I'm a programmer.

Areal Person

Don't I just need to build a high voltage circuit that I can switch
with the Propeller at the correct speed? Using MOSFETS ?

Is that all that it really is ?

I then would tune it to a frequency & duty cycle ?

That's it right ?

-Areal

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I have a tree growing out of my head, but

what do you expect ? I'm a programmer.

Philldapill

Areal,
The circuit itself is fairly simple. You would take the pwmASM object from the obex and use that in the propeller to generate a steady PWM signal. From there, you may need to bump up the signal to a higher voltage to drive your mosfets. Ideally, you should get a few mosfet gate drive chips(search on TI.com for some free samples to get you started). These special chips turn the mosfets on and off as quickly as possible. You can drive them with the 3.3V signal straight out of the propeller. Once you have the mosfets switching the way you want them to, connect it to your magic oxyhydrogen cell.

Sorry for any sarcasm in that last part, but I've watched countless video's on youtube about this very thing. Some call it HHO, some oxyhydrogen, some call it brown's gas, but what they all boil down to is nothing mysterious to someone with a freshman level background in chemistry/physics. I've tried this same expirement with the propeller and my guess is that this "magic" gas is just plain old stoichiometric H2 and O2. I even went so far as to log the energy consumption of my cell, and measure the energy(heat) when the gas was burned under a calorimeter. If you want to find a way to decompose hydrogen and oxygen at a level closer to 100% efficiency, go right ahead. Just don't get the idea(from youtube wacko nuts) that you are really going to be creating some sort of gas that gives you all this abundant free energy. Again, sorry for the rant but this just gets to me.

Here is a simple block diagram of what I did in my circuit.

Ale

As I said, you cannot break the rules of physics !. (Remembering the discussion some time ago). Do not forget the NaOH to make to solution more conductive, and corrosive, di I say you should wear gloves ?

To control mosfets you will need some mosfet drives. You can isolate the outputs of the propeller with optocouplers, they work well at 20kHz or so. If these experiments do not work well... you may have some already built circuit to control DC motors for a cart or something similar, or lighting (I mean with lights!).

hinv

Philldapil and Ale;

The sarcasm is quite common with the subject. I am skeptical of over unity hydrogen projects, but one doesn't need over unity hydrogen production in order to make a gasoline engine run much more efficient since modern gasoline engines run at around 25% to 30% efficient. When adding hydrogen to the air intake, it is possible to drastically increase combustion efficiency as many have demonstrated. It has to do with the rate of burn of hydrogen vs gasoline, which is about 10 times as fast. If you supply enough hydrogen above 5% of the fuel charge (by energy), it is possible and preferable to run without creating a vacuum which wastes 20+% of the power of a gasoline engine.

Just my 01 bits worth

Doug

Leon

Some haulage fleets in the UK are pressurising the vehicle fuel tanks with hydrogen, so that it gets mixed with the diesel fuel. They get a significant decrease in fuel consumption.

Leon

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Amateur radio callsign: G1HSM
Suzuki SV1000S motorcycle

parsko

My understanding as to why this would be a benefit in cars is due to the alternator always generating electricity. What is not used is dumped as heat. There would be no loss if that same energy is used to create hydrogen (which is then used in the fuel supply).

Right?

-Parsko

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Alternators are always producing voltage but can load an engine incrementally the more current is demanded of them. So it's not a totally win-win situation. That said, using the alternator output to produce hydrogen gas by electrolysis to augment the fuel-air mixture does seem, from what I've read, to improve overall engine efficiency. This is something I've wanted to try on my ancient diesel Mercedes, now that diesel fuel is selling for $4.91/gal. But there are some things to consider as this article points out. Since my car is over 20 years old, the issue with worn seals is definitely a concern. And, BTW, I can see no advantage to modulating the electrolysis with 20KHz PWM (except perhaps to regulate the amount of gas produced). Anyone who tells you that something magic happens at 20 KHz is just selling snake oil.

-Phil

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'Still some PropSTICK Kit bare PCBs left!

Philldapill

parkso, the alternator is NEVER generating electricity, unless there is a load. The load being a depeleted battery, or lighting system, or just any electrical load in the system. That's just fundamental physics, nothing fancy. If you try generating hydrogen through electrolysis(using the alternator), you are loading it when you suck some current from it to run the H2 cell. When you load it, you are putting more load on the engine, requiring more fuel. Because you are using more fuel(and H2 NOT being anywhere near 100% efficient through combustion), you are NOT getting a net decrease in fuel consumption. I'm sorry, but this whole idea is just silly.

Ale,(LOL)

Phil, I think you are totally right about the whole 20kHz thing. I've seen alot of these over unity machines. They are usually involving magnets, even in electrolysis where they dip a magnet in the solution and think they are tapping the magnetic field's energy(?).

Areal, despite some sarcasm, if you really do want to go ahead with this, I think the propeller would be an excellent system to use for testing this. What you could do, is make a full system that monitors the pressure in your cell. What I mean by pressure change, is that you have a constant pressure bleeder attached so that it is bleeding off at a fairly constant rate, proportional to the pressure inside. This way, if gas production DOES in fact jump way up at a certain frequency, you should see a dramatic rise in pressure. The propeller would log this pressure, along with the frequency that it was modulating. During this "test" sequence, the propeller would be cycling through frequencies between 100Hz - 100kHz or something, each time incrementing about 50 Hz or something. Basically, you would be logging(on an SD card?) the gas production at certain frequencies.

I'm very skeptical, but if you get something other than a horizontal or negative-sloped line, I would LOVE to see it! If you need help on the electrical or coding, remember people on the forum are more than happy to help.

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Philldapill said...
... you are NOT getting a net decrease in fuel consumption. I'm sorry, but this whole idea is just silly.

I'm not sure that's accurate. As long as fuel is being incompletely combusted (i.e. wasted) under normal circumstances, there is additional energy to be gained if you can coax more complete combustion from it. Granted, you have to expend energy to hydrolize the water. And if the only thing you accomplish by it is some additional oomph when the H₂ reoxidizes in the combustion chamber, there would be no net gain. But I beleive the point of adding hydrogen is to increase overall combustion to the point that there is less unburnt fuel exiting the tailpipe. If this addition of hydrogen really can catylize further fuel combustion, then overall efficiency certainly will increase and your MPG will improve.

-Phil

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'Still some PropSTICK Kit bare PCBs left!

Philldapill

There is something to that Phil, but my statement was directed towards the simple addition of hydrogen. The fuel mixture and O2 must be tuned for there to be any appreciable gain. This really can't be done by the average hobbyist since it requires changes to the ECU. If you simply add hydrogen to the intake, the computer will not recognize it and will continue to pull in the same amount of O2, thinking it still has the same gasoline comming in. When you have the same O2 and more hydrogen(in addition to the hydrogen in the hydrocarbons), you end up with MANY hydrogen atoms not being oxidized. It's like you have more hungery children(that could potentially grow up and be productive members of society), but the same amount of food to go around... someone is going to starve and that is wasteful. So, like I said, NO net decrease in fuel consumption.( Granted I should have added "If you don't caliberate the ECU and other tuning first").

In reality, there is very little fuel exiting the tailpipe. The problem with internal combustion engines is that the vast majority of the energy in the hydrocarbons doesn't go into moving the pistons, and moving the car, but it goes into HEAT. I've forgoten the way you find the upper limit of how much energy you can extract, but it has an absolute limit due to something with the temperature differential between the enviroment and the heat produced(causing the movement of the piston). Basically, you are ALWAYS going to lose a certain percentage of heat to the enviroment. Ideally, to get the best energy efficiency, you would have REEEEALLY long cylinders and lots of them, and mechanical parts with EXTREMELY high thermal resistance, but that's a small deviation from this awesome chip from Parallax. [noparse];)[/noparse]

I'd love to see some data on the results of all this - I just can't find any hard results beyond "yeah, at first my MPG was about 27-32MPG, then with the hydrogen I'm getting about 34-37MPG". It seems everything I've found is just anecdotal, leaving the desire for definitive results unanswered. It's up to you Areal, build the test system and give us some data!

Ale

My comment was not... sarcastic. Just be aware of false promises.
Phildapill is right. I think you can get something like 40% (was 37% ? or may be was just 25%) of the gasoline energy transformed into mechanical movement. All the heat is not used at all. Completely wasted, besides the unburnt gasoline. H2 will burn faster, will increase the temp in the piston chamber and maybe make for a better burn of the gasoline. But you will need better seals nonetheless. H2 leaks everywhere, even in metal-metal seals, forget about rubber. (I work with H2 at the lab, what does not leak CO2 leaks H2 :-( ). Note: H2 does not dissolves in gasoline .

The wasted heat could be used by thermoelectric generators, to for instance, load the battery, or generate H2. The alternator will generate to supply its load using the energy from the engine, with a conversion of 90% or maybe lower. There there is also wasted energy, because that has to be generated by the combustion... so better something like the thermogenerators

I was looking at the tesla roadster, very sweet car, but the price was a bit... disconcerting (read: high!), I hope they come down in price, soon! Maybe "Hollywood stars" get them so the become more popular and down in price Burning gasoline, or H2 for that matters... is just old technology.

Phil Pilgrim (PhiPi)

Philldapill,

I know nothing about ECUs, nor do they pertain to my situation. My car is a simple four-cylinder diesel built in 1983. Like most diesels, it puts out a lot of unburnt carbon in the form of soot. I can't help thinking there's some efficiency to be gained if the carbon exited as CO or CO₂ instead. I find the argument for adding hydrogen compelling in this regard, and I'm dissuaded from trying it only by the risk of water leaking into the lube system and gunking it up.

In any event, I, too, would like to see what benefits, if any, Areal is able to extract from this exercize!

-Phil

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'Still some PropSTICK Kit bare PCBs left!

Philldapill

Ale, I like the thermogenerators idea.
I've thought about making a simple prototype device like this. The technology has already been proven, but there are a number of obstacles in the way. Regardless, think about this... In the radiator, the excess heat from the engine is going directly to the atmosphere through the fan and radiator - it's total waste. A peltier junction is an amazing little thing. If you run electricity through it, you get a temperature differential on both sides - one side is hot, the other cold. The same process works in reverse as well. If you get one side hot, and the other side cold(or cooler), you get electricity. If we are already using energy to run the fan, why not use that energy to still run a fan, but use the fan to blow atmosphere over a heat sink, connected to the peltier junction. The other side of the junction is connected to the heat source(coolant). You are still getting rid of the heat, but in a more useful way now.

BTW, there is a small amount of heat generated through ohmic heating, but that's the case with any generator. Nevertheless, that would give a net gain - maybe a few watts [noparse]:)[/noparse]

pharseid

· While we're on the subject of electrolysis, it might be a good place to mention a new type of actuator called the electrolytic acuator. It's a type of hydraulic actuator where the pressure is provided by electrolysis (contraction is provided by operating the actuator as a fuel cell). On one hand you eliminate a lot of the normal hardware of hydraulics (the hydraulic pump and valves), but on the downside, extension/contraction cycles seem fairly slow.

-phar

jazzed

Phildapill,

I bought a Peltier device for experiments. Several devices would be required in series to generate substantial voltage. I need to get some heat-sinks and thermal goo for valid experiments, but about about 0.5VDC was about all I could get out of the 62mm square I have using a gas stove (more elegant means possible of course). I didn't measure the current. The wider the temperature differential the better. Another consideration is most of these are rated only to about 180C. Devices built specifically for power generation would most likely be a little expensive.

Another idea is to use a Stirling engine and DC generator (maybe a low torque alternator) to recoup the waste heat. Also, I've used a PEM fuel cell before to split water, but the conversion rate was too slow to be useful (part of a Fuel-Cell experimenters kit).

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hinv

PhiPi,

I would guess that a byproduct of diesel combustion is H2O like it is with burning gasoline, so your engine probably already deals with the water.
Another thing to consider, one of the reasons that diesel engines are more efficient is that they are not pulling a vacuum. On a gasoline engine, the vacuum actually regulates and increases somewhat the hydrogen production. On a diesel, like my 1983 Rabbit, we might have to use the propeller to do the regulation of the hydrogen production. I don't know, I am just guessing at this point. I have to get my rabbit fixed before I start modifying it.


Doug