Ultra-Efficient Gas Engine Passes Test

the transonic website is not forth coming with any details.

I'm a bit nervous about having petrol at what they describe as "supercritical pressures & tempratures "

outside the combustion chamber

There have to be patent applications pending if they made a public announcement or even publicly displayed the invention.

While public disclosure in the US doesn't preclude patent applications after the disclosure, European law is another matter. Patents must be submitted before disclosure or you can not submit a patent.

This is such a big thing that it would be absolute folly not to protect your intellectual property here and abroad.

My point is that details of this invention should be available somewhere.

Diesel engines such as the Ford Power stroke use approximately 3500 psig at the nozzle for pressure. The high pressure helps to atomize the air/fuel mixture. Still I would like their definition of "supercritical pressures & temperatures" Does sound interesting. Since I am in Texas I am going to do some more digging to see what I can find. Thanks for the post.

I'm a bit nervous about having petrol at what they describe as "supercritical pressures & tempratures "

But if they're just throwing a curve ball it worked on you

"worked"?

telling me about their innovation in those terms

makes it less likely for me to buy a vehicle outfitted with this technology for all the reasons Rhabe outlined.

I agree with the argument that oil & auto companies can't conspire amongst themselves, there's far too much money at stake.

How can sitting on trillions of dollars in profits be in the best interests of job one, the bottom line?

Hi GarthH et al,

I just spotted your thread and it definitely has my interest. I KNOW that a LOT better efficiency can be gotten out of automotive engines. But am not familiar with the term 'trans-sonic' except by what the terms themselves are indicative of.

Your info in your first posting of:

I'm a bit nervous about having petrol at what they describe as "supercritical pressures & temperatures " outside the combustion chamber!

From this info I'd say it is well warranted!

Definitely has warning bells, light and sirens going off for me as well with good reason!

I hope we can find out more detailed information about this. If it is true it is definitely a very significant positive development.

Congratulations on your new thread. Given the topic it definitely warrants further investigation and learning.

Interesting article, you have there Garthh.

For obvious reasons of patent protection, they do not go into the details on how they condition the fuel or operate the engine. But it sounds like they deliberately make a gasoline burning engine to run in the higher efficiency of a diesel cycle engine.

I agree with you. It sounds like TDI for gasoline. TDI is getting 52 mpg hwy on the Jetta. I think I will wait a few years to see the reliability and durability of these gasoline engines.

To obtain a patent, by law the patent disclosure must "enable" others to to duplicate what has been patented. U.S. patent laws encourages the spread of new ideas so new technology is forthcoming. It also helps the inventor since potential users have access to the information and would purchase rights to legally use the idea.

If the idea we are talking about is patented, it has already been "enabled".

And therein lies the potentially dangerous grey area of patent pending. Publishing before obtaining the patent can nullify the patent's value for the knowledge has been made public, and therefore cannot be owned. But if you never publish, then you have a difficulty proving that what's in the patent application is sufficient to develop the idea.

Oh it's a tricky tight rope to walk.

Not with US law. You can public disclose your invention and you have 1 year to apply for a patent.

Europe is different. You must first apply for the patent before disclosure. If you disclose your invention first, you can not be granted a patent in Europe.

Ideas of this magnitude should be patented in as many countries as possible to maximize their protection, so inventors would be forced to play by the European rules if they want a patent from countries in Europe.

I would think that would mean patents probably have been filed and the technology/science behind this invention should be on file for public review.

Exactly my point, but I did forgot to mention that I was considering European laws.

Well a 50% increase in fuel economy by replacing the injector would be realistically worth tens if not hundreds of billions of dollars in fuel savings. There is some wiggle room for development of fuel injectors and spark systems in modern internal combustion engines (as is indicated in the article).

Interesting (and certainly not the first company to do so, although their claims are higher than other real-world systems), but the fuel economy figures for new passenger vehicles show America averaging 25 MPG now while Japan is averaging 45 MPG. Even Australia (with similar road system and populace characteristics) is 35 MPG.

http://www.tscombustion.com/autoinefficiency.html

This just seems to be an American company inventing something the rest of the world already has (in one form or another), but even that doesn't make sense as many Americans drive European and Japanese-designed cars. Perhaps the sample indicated was being dragged down by old, really low MPG vehicles.

Anyway, something worth following.

Ok, I finally figured out what bothers me about this claim.

I am not confident about these numbers, but think a coal powered steam power plant delivers around 30% of the energy of coal to electricity.

A car gets what? 15%?, increase that by 50% should deliver 22.5%. That seems outrageous that such a relativly small powerplant could deliver that kind of effiency when large scale powerplants utilizing all the space and innovations can only better that by 7.5%.

Drew

Gail Banks has been working on this idea for a while as well as trying to pitch the ideas to military interests. You can see a bit more here:

http://www.jaylenosgarage.com/at-the-garage/trucks/banks-sidewinder-s-10/

He's "approaching" up to 30Kpsi from pumps to displace the fuel from the injectors. I've found a few people, around the U.S., developing their own ECM programing modification on their turbo charged four cylinder cars cruising at 22 to 28:1 ratios. Some getting up to 60mpg. Claims that have been tested with some viable means.

Here is a link to one of the patents related to GarthH's article: http://www.google.com/patents?id=PBjJAAAAEBAJ&pg=PA6&dq=%237546826&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=2#v=onepage&q=%237546826&f=false

What I don't find from Banks or these guys are the pumps they are using to generate such high pressures.

Thank you

I will follow this with great interest, Ky.

Don't even think about busting the laws of thermodynamics, they will just laugh in your face.

You can get 64mpg from a diesel Mini now, it depends on what you want to move and how fast.

Essentially similar results were available in naturally aspirated IC engines middle of the last century, why should we be surprised that big oil hasn't yet bought the rights?

I would love to see just one, just one tiny liitle bit of proof that "big oil" has ever bought the rights to any of these inventions. Big oil is in business to make money. If this invention made money then we would see big oil selling it. This conspiracy BS is tiresome.

I have often thought the same thing. The main thing is where is the proof? Even if 'big oil' owns the patents, the enthusiasts who search the patent database would expose them for owning them right?

Drew

patent or no you can do what ever you want for your own use

the legal stuff doesn't begin until you try to profit

patents are something i know a little about, 1st there is no protection for you. 2nd if it is not in there best interest you will get no were. you would think with 25 patents in your name also built and proven you could pay for bread & butter. he died broke and they are still useing his patents to day so good luck with ours.. spot

Hi,

this approach looks like high pressure generation and heating, combined in a useful order.

If heating in advance then problems with seals, if heating simultaneously with pressurising then least problems as compression-heat added and no time to cool down if fast injection (no "common rail" -technology with stored high pressure fuel), if first pressurised and heated at injection then problems with carbon near the heaters and maybe very dangerous small storage tank of supercritical fluid.

Supercritical will atomise with the best possible quality.

The injection-valves will be a masterpiece.

But a 50% increase in MPG will never be realised, 5% will be good enough to achieve and worth while. Look at the todays efficiency of fuel usage and the theoretical limit set by thermodynamics.

Useful search for a patent will be delayed 1 year after application, as publication is not immediate.

In total: looks fascinating, should be pushed forward.

RHABE

50% or 5%. Difference is only a zero! When selling an idea, people seem to think that sort of reasoning is OK!

Agree that even 5% will be a big advance and worth billions.

Also agree that big oil unlikely to buy it up and suppress it. Too much money to be made developing it.

If waste heat can be used to improve atomization, that alone will help combustion and efficiency.

Will watch with interest.

I didn't expect the "Big Oil" comment to get traction...and it is a very fine convoluted environment which causes seemingly great ideas to flounder.

Hat's off to ya! Anybody who can find anything in patents that quick deserves a medal!

This could be very interesting to see who comes out with a working production model first.

Nissan has that patent application which seems to be focused on the phase change tables for different fuels.

But Transonic Combustion has a number of issued patents relating to the electronic control

7,657,363

Fuel injector having algorithm controlled look-ahead timing for injector-ignition operation

and the construction of the actual injector assembly

7,546,826

Injector-ignition for an internal combustion engine

and more patents I haven't looked at yet.

Both of these look pretty interesting, and I'm no patent lawyer but appears transonic has beaten nissan to the punch, at least from a prototyping standpoint, maybe not on the theoretical advancement of the technology.

Cool thread and interesting technology.

-T

Hi all! Sceptic,

Thinking about the process of injection of such a 'supercritical' fluid conjures up many pictures in my mind.

I've run cars for years with the old Lucas mechanical petrol injection systems ( Triumph PI) and had to put up with the problems of mechanical injection of fluids with little or no lubricity. Used it also on offshore racing boats in the mid 80s and early 90s. Running out of fuel was all that it took to completely shoot down the primary pressure pump, and it was only producing 120 psi. Cactus! New pump! Big $$$.

I'm puzzled how mechanical components fare with a fluid which has no lubricity to begin with, and then to alter it to one which is extremely harsh to handle.

Not disputing that they've got it to work to their satisfaction, but I've seen such reports many times before, and I reckon that there could be a long way to go to get it to a point of acceptability by the likes of you and I, as consumers, requiring long term reliability.

The extreme pressures claimed can only be achieved by some sort of pump, and a positive displacement one at that. Exotic materials, metals? Is it really worth the trouble?

Stu.

A critical component introduced as new, and all or nothing, seems to be a hard sell. In trying to have parity, cost to conventional injection might not mean doing away with conventional injection, for redundancy reasons. The new injector uses a catalyst in the fuel. What is this to mean for commercial vehicle use, if the catalyst is not readily available? Would a station want a fuel pump right next to the diesel pump with a big sign saying "Super critical fuel for fume injection"? A small canister could carry the catalyst to mix near the injector pump. It may be more important to have the system work independently at first, and not be a critical component of the engine. The $ cost of a problematic subsystem could be minimized.

rayacox

Hi, I'm not lazy, maybe a bit slow but could you please inform me about were or in which document The new injector uses a catalyst in the fuel is stated? Just can't find a reference.

I did not have the time to read through the patent (really, trust me) so it could be mentioned in there. Let me know if you can and I will be in a better position to reply to your:

Would a station want a fuel pump right next to the diesel pump with a big sign saying "Super critical fuel for fume injector"

Thanks in advance, Ky.

It is in this text exerpt from the article:

The key is heating and pressurizing gasoline before injecting it into the combustion chamber, says Mike Rocke, Transonic's vice president of business development. This puts it into a supercritical state that allows for very fast and clean combustion, which in turn decreases the amount of fuel needed to propel a vehicle. The company also treats the gasoline with a catalyst that "activates" it, partially oxidizing it to enhance combustion.

Kinda bothered me too. Seen many 'catalyst' scams out there.

Drew

Drew K

Thank you, not much to go by is there? A bit like making a move in chess and not moving anything and then claiming an advantage. I wish I were as gullible as I used to be so, overall, I'll take the given information with a grain of salt.

Keeping secrets is OK but not playing on the same board can be very confusing. Can't expect a level playing field here, so speculation is rife. The bean counters would have had their say in this and they would have done, what we are doing here now, a long time ago. Good luck to them though, if that is a required 'catalyst'.

Thanks again, Ky.

The catalyst statement can be found in this video clip(link below). You will find the statement just before the middle.

"Multimedia

The gas pump is just a little of my humor for effect.

Thank you

How do you guys find this stuff? I would have wasted half a day finding it, if at all. I think the catalyst is just a bit of hood winking. I knew this would be interesting to follow.

Thanks again, I think others will appreciate it as well, Ky.

Ky

www.uspto.gov is the gov't website. It has a clumsy yet comprehensive search engine for all patents and applications.

I have also used google to search keywords, or companies, and add patent at the end to find possible related patent numbers.

I don't bother looking at the text only version on uspto and go straight to

www.pat2pdf.org which handily converts to a pdf complete with drawings and charts.

TONS of information in patents, some of it is actually interesting if you can learn to skim patentese!

-T

I'm trying to make a list of the purged members, if you don't mind

Apparently the CEO used to work in Fuel Cells

"One vague clue Cheiky gave me was that some of the technology in Transonic's device can be traced in part to his work in fuel cells and batteries. Cheiky helped start battery company Zinc Matrix Power. "

from http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-9853175-54.html

Wonder what the catalyst does? Better gas dispersion perhaps? Aid the phase change? Anyone with fuel cell knowledge have a guess?

"The principles behind Transonic's technology can be traced back to Nicholas Leonard Sadi Carnot, an 18th-century French engineer, according to Cheiky. "

Time to read up on Carnot and see which of his ideas modern technology has made more feasible.

-T

This came out last night on the daily digest

here's a page that seems familiar